Etruscans
The Etruscans
The first civilisation known in Italy was established by the Etruscans around the 8th century BC. They were based in the modern-day region of Tuscany. During the 7th century BC, they were a powerful presence, setting up a series of City-States reaching as far south as Rome and at one stage as far north as the Po river. During the 5th century BC, their power began to wane. Previously a part of the Etruscan empire, the Romans began to take over until, by 42 BC, the whole of Italy as far north as the Alps was being administered as Roman provinces.
The first civilisation known in Italy was established by the Etruscans around the 8th century BC. They were based in the modern-day region of Tuscany. During the 7th century BC, they were a powerful presence, setting up a series of City-States reaching as far south as Rome and at one stage as far north as the Po river. During the 5th century BC, their power began to wane. Previously a part of the Etruscan empire, the Romans began to take over until, by 42 BC, the whole of Italy as far north as the Alps was being administered as Roman provinces.
Julius Caesar
The Romans
The Romans ruled Italy and the Roman Empire for many centuries and, although the boundaries of their empire advanced and retreated over the years, the city of Rome and the Italian peninsula remained secure. In 330 AD Rome ceased to be the centre of the Roman Empire when the emperor Constantine, who had become a christian, rebuilt the city of Byzantium in modern-day Turkey and established it as a new christian capital city for the Roman Empire. The city was renamed Constantinople.
Attila the Hun
By the 5th century AD, even the boundaries of the roman state itself were under threat. Powerful warrior tribes from the north had Italy in their sights. Three times during the 5th century the entire state was threatened: The Visigoths reached Rome in 410; Attila the Hun turned back from northern Italy in 452 and The Vandals reached Rome from the south in 455. But the final straw came in 476 when an army of German tribesmen, lead by a chieftain called Odoacer, successfully challenged the rulers of Rome and set Odoacer up as the first King of Italy. This effectively marked the end of the Roman Empire as Italy would from then on be ruled by a series of kings and popes.
A decade later another warrior chieftain, Theodoric, attacked Italy, backed by the powerful emperor in Constantinople. Having overthrown Odoacer, he reigned for thirty-three years, bringing a period of calm to a previously turbulent Italy. This feat justifiably earned him the title 'Theodoric the Great'. However, after his death, Italy was again attacked by a series of invaders with varying degrees of success. It was not until 562 that the whole of the peninsular was again under Byzantine rule.
The Lombards
In 568 the Lombards entered Italy. In four years, the whole of the northern swathe of the country had been captured. Refugees, fleeing the advance of the Lombards, were responsible for establishing a settlement in the lagoons of the Po delta - a settlement that would eventually become Venice. In the face of this invasion, the Byzantine emperor tried to protect Ravenna and his other possessions in Italy, but by 751 the country had been taken by the Lombards in the north, and by local Dukes in the south, and could no longer be said to be part of the Roman Empire.
The Pope annointing Pepin III
The Papal States
The pope, alarmed by the fall of Ravenna, and sensing that Rome could be next, called on the Frankish king, Pepin III, to ask for help in ousting the Lombards. Once successful, Pepin did not return the lands to the Byantines, but instead donated all of it to the pope and his successors. These lands, called the Papal States, would remain in the hands of the church until the unification of Italy in 1870.
In the following years, the papacy became the only stable element in a constantly changing political landscape. From Hungarians in the north, to Arabs in the south, the peninsular of Italy was seemingly open to attack from all directions. Southern Italy, and Sicily in particular, was occupied by a series of powerful forces. After the Byzantines came the Arabs, the Normans, the Germans, the French and finally the Spanish Aragonese family.
History of Italy(2)
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