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ITALY
- HISTORY |
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A specific Italian history
is hard to identify. Italy
wasn't formally a united
country until 1861, and the
history of the peninsula
after the Romans is more one
of warring city states and
colonization and annexation
by foreign powers. It's
almost inconceivable now
that Italy should fragment
once again, but the regional
differences remain strong
and have even, in recent
years, become a major factor
in Italian politics
Early times
A smattering of remains
exist from the
Neanderthals who occupied
the Italian peninsula half
a million years ago, but
the main period of
colonization began after
the last Ice Age. Evidence
of Paleolithic
settlements dates from
this time, around 20,000
BC, the next development
being the spread of Neolithic
tribes across the
peninsula, between 5000
and 6000 years ago. More
sophisticated tribes
developed towards the end
of the prehistoric period,
between 2400 and 1800 BC;
those who left the most
visible traces were the Ligurians
(who inhabited a much
greater area than modern
Liguria), the Siculi
of southern Italy and
Latium, and the Sards
, who farmed and raised
livestock on Sardinia.
More advanced still were
migrant groups from the
eastern Mediterranean, who
introduced the techniques
of working copper. Later,
various Bronze Age
societies (1600-1000 BC)
built a network of farms
and villages in the
Apennines, and on the
Sicilian and southern
coasts, the latter
population trading with
Mycenaeans in Greece.
Other tribes brought
Indo-European languages
into Italy. The Veneti,
Latins and Umbrii moved
down the peninsula from
the north, whilst the
Piceni and the Messapians
in Puglia crossed the
Adriatic from what is now
Croatia. The artificial
line between prehistory
and history is drawn
around the eighth century
BC, with the arrival of
the Phoenician
alphabet and writing
system. Sailing west along
the African coast, the
Phoenicians established
colonies in Sicily and
Sardinia, going on to
build trade links between
Carthage and southern
Italy. These soon
encouraged the arrival of
the Carthaginians ,
who set themselves up on
Sicily, Sardinia and the
Latium coast, at the same
time as both Greeks
and Etruscans were
gaining influence.
Etruscans and Greeks
Greek settlers colonized
parts of the Tuscan coast
and the Bay of Naples in
the eighth century BC,
moving on to Naxos
on Sicily's Ionian coast,
and founding the city of
Syracuse in the year 736
BC. The colonies they
established in Sicily and
southern Italy came to be
known as Magna Graecia
. Along with Etruscan
cities to the north they
were the earliest Italian
civilizations to leave
substantial buildings and
written records.
The Greek settlements
were hugely successful,
introducing the vine and
the olive to Italy, and
establishing a
high-yielding agricultural
system. Cities like Syracuse
and Tarentum were
wealthier and more
sophisticated than those
on mainland Greece,
dominating trade in the
central Mediterranean,
despite competition from
Carthage. Ruins such as
the temples of Agrigento
and Selinunte , the
fortified walls around
Gela, and the theatres at
Syracuse and Taormina on
Sicily attest to a great
prosperity, and Magna
Graecia became an
enriching influence on the
culture of the Greek
homeland - Archimedes,
Aeschylus and Empedocles
were all from Sicily. Yet
these colonies suffered
from the same factionalism
as the Greek states, and
the cities of Tarentum,
Metapontum, Sybaris and
Croton were united only
when faced with the threat
of outside invasion. From
400 BC, after Sybaris was
razed to the ground, the
other colonies went into
irreversible economic
decline, to become
satellite states of Rome.
The Etruscans
were the other major
civilization of the
period, mostly living in
the area between the Tiber
and Arno rivers.
Their language, known
mostly from funerary
texts, is one of the last
relics of an ancient
language common to the
Mediterranean. Some say
they arrived in Italy
around the ninth century
BC from western Anatolia,
others that they came from
the north, and a third
hypothesis places their
origins in Etruria.
Whatever the case, they
set up a cluster of twelve
city states in
northern Italy, traded
with Greek colonies to the
south and were the most
powerful people in
northern Italy by the
sixth century BC, edging
out the indigenous
population of Ligurians,
Latins and Sabines. Tomb
frescoes in Umbria and
Lazio depict a refined and
luxurious culture with
highly developed systems
of divination, based on
the reading of animal
entrails and the flight of
birds. Herodotus wrote
that the Etruscans
recorded their ancestry
along the female line, and
tomb excavations last
century revealed that
women were buried in
special sarcophagi carved
with their names.
Well-preserved chamber
tombs with wall paintings
exist at Cerveteri
and Tarquinia , the
two major sites in Italy.
The Etruscans were
technically advanced,
creating new agricultural
land through irrigation
and building their cities
on ramparted hilltops - a
pattern of settlement that
has left a permanent mark
on central Italy. Their
kingdom contracted,
however, after invasions
by the Cumans , Syracusans
and Gauls , and was
eventually forced into
alliance with the
embryonic Roman state.
Roman Italy
The growth of Rome
, a border town between
the Etruscans and the
Latins, gained impetus
around 600 BC from a
coalition of Latin and
Sabine communities. The Tarquins
, an Etruscan dynasty,
oversaw the early
expansion, but in 509 BC
the Romans ejected the
Etruscan royal family and
became a republic ,
with power shared jointly
between two consuls, both
elected for one year.
Further changes came half
a century later, after a
protracted class struggle
that resulted in the Law
of the Twelve Tables ,
which made patricians and
plebeians equal. Thus
stabilized, the Romans set
out to systematically
conquer the northern
peninsula, and after the
fall of Veii in 396 BC,
succeeded in capturing Sutri
and Nepi , towns
which Livy considered the
"barriers and
gateways of Etruria".
Various wars and truces
with other cities brought
about agreements to pay
harsh tributes.
The Gauls
captured Rome in 390,
refusing to leave until
they had received a vast
payment, but this proved a
temporary reversal. The
Romans took Campania
and the fertile land of
Puglia after defeating the
Samnites in battles
over a period of 35 years.
They then set their sights
on the wealthy Greek
colonies to the south,
including Tarentum, whose
inhabitants turned to the
Greek king, Pyrrhus of
Epirus for military
support. He initially
repelled the Roman
invaders, but lost his
advantage and was defeated
at Beneventum in
275 BC. The Romans had by
then established their
rule in most of southern
Italy, and now became a
threat to Carthage. In 264
they had the chance of
obtaining Sicily ,
when the Mamertines, a
mercenary army in control
of Messina, appealed to
them for help against the
Carthaginians. The Romans
obliged - sparking off the
First Punic War -
and took most of the
island, together with
Sardinia and Corsica. With
their victory in 222 BC
over the Gauls in the Po
Valley, all Italy was now
under Roman control.
They also turned a
subsequent military threat
to their advantage, in
what came to be known as
the Second Punic War
. The Carthaginians had
watched the spread of
Roman power across the
Mediterranean with some
alarm, and at the end of
the third century BC they
allowed Hannibal to
make an Alpine crossing
into Italy with his army
of infantry, horsemen and
elephants. Hannibal
crushed the Roman legions
at Lago Trasimeno and
Cannae (216 BC), and then
halted at Capua. With
remarkable cool,
considering Hannibal's
proximity, Scipio
set sail on a retaliatory
mission to the
Carthaginian territory of Spain
, taking Cartagena, and
continuing his journey
into Africa . The
Carthaginians recalled
Hannibal, who was finally
defeated by Roman troops
at Zama in 202 BC.
It was another fifty years
before Carthage was taken,
closely followed by all of
Spain, but the Romans were
busy in the meantime
adding Macedonian
Greece to their
territory.
These conquests gave
Roman citizens a tax-free
existence subsidized by
captured treasure, but
society was sharply
divided into those
enjoying the benefits, and
those who were not. The
former belonged mostly to
the senatorial party
, who ignored demands for
reform by their
opposition, the popular
party. The radical reforms
sponsored by the tribune Gaius
Gracchus came too
close to democracy for the
senatorial party, whose
declaration of martial law
was followed by the
assassination of Gracchus.
The majority of people
realized that the only
hope of gaining influence
was through the army, but General
Gaius Marius , when
put into power, was
ineffective against the
senatorial clique, who
systematically picked off
the new regime.
The first century BC
saw civil strife on an
unprecedented scale.
Although Marius was still
in power, another general,
Sulla, was in the
ascendancy, leading
military campaigns against
northern invaders and
rebellious subjects in the
south. Sulla subsequently
took power and established
his dictatorship in Rome,
throwing out a populist
government which had
formed while he was away
on a campaign in the east.
Murder and exile were
common, and cities which
had sided with Marius
during their struggle for
power were punished with
massacres and destruction.
Thousands of Sulla's war
veterans were given
confiscated land, but much
of it was laid to waste.
In 73 BC a gladiator named
Spartacus led
70,000 dispossessed
farmers and escaped slaves
in a revolt, which lasted
for two years before they
were defeated by the
legions.
Barbarians and Byzantines
In the middle of the third
century, incursions by Goths
in Greece, the Balkans and
Asia, and the Franks
and Alamanni in
Gaul foreshadowed the
collapse of the empire. Aurelian
(270-75) re-established
some order after terrible
civil wars, to be followed
by Diocletian
(284-305), whose
persecution of Christians
produced many of the
Church's present-day
saints. Plagues had
decimated the population,
but problems of a huge but
static economy were
compounded by the doubling
in size of the army at
this time to about half a
million men. To ease
administration, Diocletian
divided the empire
into two halves, east and
west, basing himself as
ruler of the western
empire in Mediolanum
(Milan). This measure
brought about a relative
recovery, coinciding with
the rise of Christianity
, which was declared the
state religion during the
reign of Constantine
(306-337). Constantinople
, capital of the eastern
empire, became a thriving
trading and manufacturing
city, while Rome itself
went into decline, as the
enlargement of the
senatorial estates and the
impoverishment of the
lower classes gave rise to
something comparable to a
primitive feudal system.
Barbarians
(meaning outsiders, or
foreigners) had been
crossing the border into
the empire since 376 AD,
when the Ostrogoths
were driven from their
kingdom in southern Russia
by the Huns , a
tribe of ferocious
horsemen. The Huns went on
to attack the Visigoths
, 70,000 of whom crossed
the border and settled
inside the empire. When
the Roman aristocracy saw
that the empire was no
longer a shield against
barbarian raids, they were
less inclined to pay for
its support, seeing that a
more comfortable future
lay in being on good terms
with the barbarian
successor states.
By the fifth century,
many legions were made up
of troops from conquered
territories, and several
posts of high command were
held by outsiders. With
little will or loyalty
behind it, the empire
floundered , and on
New Year's Eve of 406,
Vandals, Alans and Sueves
crossed the frozen Rhine
into Gaul, chased by the
Huns from their kingdoms
in what are now Hungary
and Austria. Once this had
happened, there was no
effective frontier. A
contemporary writer
lamented that "the
whole of Gaul is smoking
like an enormous funeral
pyre". Despite this
shock, worse was to come.
By 408, the imperial
government in Ravenna
could no longer hold off Alaric
(commander of Illyricum -
now Croatia), and he went
on to sack Rome in
410, causing a crisis of
morale in the west.
"When the whole world
perished in one
city," wrote Saint
Jerome, "then I was
dumb with silence."
The bitter end of
the Roman Empire in
the west came after Valentinian
III 's assassination
in 455. His eight
successors over the next
twenty years were finally
ignored by the Germanic
troops in the army, who
elected their general Odoacer
as king. The remaining
Roman aristocracy hated
him, and the eastern
emperor, Zeno , who
in theory now ruled the
whole empire, refused to
recognize him. In 488,
Zeno rid himself of the
Ostrogoth leader Theodoric
by persuading him to march
on Odoacer in Italy. By
493, Theodoric had
succeeded, becoming ruler
of the western
territories.
A lull followed. The
Senate in Rome and the
civil service continued to
function, and the remains
of the empire were still
administered under Roman
law. Ostrogothic rule of
the west continued after
Theodoric's death, but in
the 530s the eastern
emperor, Justinian
, began to plan the
reunification of the Roman
Empire "up to the two
oceans". In 536 his
general Belisarius
landed in Sicily and moved
north through Rome to
Ravenna; complete
reconquest of the Italian
peninsula was achieved in
552, after which the
Byzantines retained a
presence in the south and
in Sardinia for 500 years.
During this time the Christian
Church developed as a
more or less independent
authority, since the
emperor was at a safe
distance in
Constantinople. Continual
invasions had led to an
uncertain political scene
in which the bishops of
Rome emerged with the
strongest voice -
justification of their
primacy having already
been given by Pope Leo I
(440-461), who spoke of
his right to "rule
all who are ruled in the
first instance by
Christ". A confused
period of rule followed,
as armies from northern
Europe tried to take more
territory from the old
empire.
Lombards and Franks
During the chaotic sixth
century, the Lombards
, a Germanic tribe, were
driven southwest into
Italy. Rome was
successfully defended
against them, but by the
eighth century the
Lombards were extending
their power throughout the
peninsula. In the middle
of that century the Franks
arrived from Gaul. They
were orthodox Christians,
and therefore acceptable
to Gallo-Roman nobility,
integrating quickly and
taking over much of the
provincial administration.
The Franks were ruled by
the Merovingian royal
family, but the mayors of
the palace - the
Carolingians - began to
take power in real terms.
Led by Pepin the Short
, they saw an advantage in
supporting the papacy,
giving Rome large
endowments and forcibly
converting pagans in areas
they conquered. When Pepin
wanted to oust the
Merovingians, and become
King of the Franks, he
appealed to the pope in
Rome for his blessing, who
was happy to agree,
anointing the new Frankish
king with holy oil.
This alliance was
useful to both parties. In
755 the pope called on the
Frankish army to confront
the Lombards. The Franks
forced them to hand over
treasure and 22 cities and
castles, which then became
the northern part of the Papal
States . Pepin died in
768, with the Church
indebted to him. According
to custom, he divided the
kingdom between his two
sons, one of whom died
within three years. The
other was Charles the
Great, or Charlemagne.
An intelligent and
innovative leader,
Charlemagne was proclaimed
King of the Franks and of
the Lombards, and
patrician of the Romans,
after a decisive war
against the Lombards in
774. On Christmas Day of
the year 800, Pope Leo III
expressed his gratitude
for Charlemagne's
political support by
crowning him Emperor of
the Holy Roman Empire
, an investiture that
forged an enduring link
between the fortunes of
Italy and those of
northern Europe. By the
time Charlemagne died, all
of Italy from south of
Rome to Lombardy,
including Sardinia, was
part of the huge Carolingian
Empire . The parts
which didn't come under
his domain were Sicily and
the southern coast, which
were gradually being
reconquered by Arabs from
Tunisia; and Puglia and
Calabria, colonized by
Byzantines and Greeks.
The task of holding
these gains was beyond
Charlemagne's successors,
and by the beginning of
the tenth century the
family was extinct and the
rival Italian states had
become prizes for which
the western (French) and
eastern (German) Frankish
kingdoms competed. Power
switched in 936 to Otto
, king of the eastern
Franks. Political disunity
in Italy invited him to
intervene, and in 962 he
was crowned emperor;
Otto's son and grandson (Ottos
II and III) set the seal
on the renewal of the Holy
Roman Empire.
Popes and emperors
On the death of Otto
III in 1002, Italy was
again without a recognized
ruler. In the north,
noblemen jockeyed for
power, and the papacy was
manipulated by rival Roman
families. The most
decisive events were in
the south, where Sicily,
Calabria and Puglia were
captured by the Normans
, who proved effective
administrators and
synthesized their own
culture with the existing
half-Arabic, half-Italian
south. In Palermo
in the eleventh century
they created the most
dynamic culture of the
Mediterranean world.
Meanwhile in Rome, a
series of reforming popes
began to strengthen the
church. Gregory VII
, elected in 1073, was the
most radical, demanding
the right to depose
emperors if he so wished .
Emperor Henry IV was
equally determined for
this not to happen. The
inevitable quarrel broke
out, over a key
appointment to the
archbishopric of Milan.
Henry denounced Gregory as
"now not pope, but
false monk"; the pope
responded by
excommunicating him,
thereby freeing his
subjects from their
allegiance. By 1077 Henry
was aware of his tactical
error and tried to make
amends by visiting the
pope at Canossa ,
where the emperor,
barefoot and penitent, was
kept waiting outside for
three days. The formal
reconciliation thus did
nothing to heal the rift,
and Henry's son, Henry
V , continued the
feud, eventually coming to
a compromise in which the
emperor kept control of
bishops' land ownership,
while giving up rights
over their investiture.
After this symbolic
victory, the papacy
developed into the most
comprehensive and advanced
centralized government in
Europe in the realms of
law and finance, but it
wasn't long before unity
again came under attack.
This time, the threat came
from Emperor Frederick
I (Barbarossa), who
besieged many northern
Italian cities from his
base in Germany from 1154.
Pope Alexander III
responded with ambiguous
pronouncements about the
imperial crown being a
"benefice" which
the pope conferred,
implying that the emperor
was the pope's vassal. The
issue of papal or imperial
supremacy was to polarize
the country for the next
two hundred years, almost
every part of Italy being
torn by struggles between Guelphs
(supporting the pope) and Ghibellines
(supporting the emperor).
Henry's son, Frederick
II , assumed the
imperial throne at the age
of three and a half,
inheriting the Norman Kingdom
of Sicily . Later
linked by marriage to the
great Hohenstaufen
dynasty in Germany, he
inevitably turned his
attentions to northern
Italy. However, his power
base was small, and
opposition from Italian
comune and the papacy
snowballed into civil war.
His sudden death in 1250
marked a major downturn in
imperial fortunes.
The emergence of city
states
Charles of Anjou ,
brother of King Louis IX
of France, defeated
Frederick II's heirs in
southern Italy, and
received Naples and
Sicily as a reward
from the pope. His
oppressive government
finally provoked an
uprising on Easter Monday
1282, a revolt that came
to be known as the Sicilian
Vespers , as some two
thousand occupying
soldiers were murdered in
Palermo at the sound of
the bell for vespers. For
the next twenty years the
French were at war with Peter
of Aragon , who took
Sicily and then tried for
the southern mainland.
If imperial power was
on the defensive, the
papacy was in even worse
shape. Knowing that the
pontiff had little
military backing or
financial strength left, Philip
of France sent his men
to the pope's summer
residence in 1303,
subjecting the old man to
a degrading attack.
Boniface died within a few
weeks; his French
successor, Clement V,
promptly moved the papacy
to Avignon .
The declining political
power of the major rulers
was countered by the
growing autonomy of the
cities. By 1300, a broad
belt of some three hundred
virtually independent
city states stretched
from central Italy to the
northernmost edge of the
peninsula. In the middle
of the century the
population of Europe was
savagely depleted by the Black
Death - brought into
Europe by a Genoese ship
returning from the Black
Sea - but the city states
survived, developing a
concept of citizenship
quite different from the
feudal lord-and-vassal
relationship. By the end
of the fourteenth century
the richer and more
influential states had
swallowed up the smaller comune
, leaving four as clear
political front runners.
These were Genoa
(controlling the Ligurian
coast), Florence
(ruling Tuscany), Milan
, whose sphere of
influence included
Lombardy and much of
central Italy, and Venice
. Smaller principalities,
such as Mantua and
Ferrara, supported armies
of mercenaries, ensuring
their security by building
impregnable
fortress-palaces.
Perpetual vendettas
between the propertied
classes often induced the
citizens to accept the
overall rule of one signore
in preference to the
bloodshed of warring
clans. A despotic form of
government evolved,
sanctioned by official
titles from the emperor or
pope, and by the fifteenth
century most city states
were under princely rather
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