History of Italy
has been inhabited by humans since the Paleolithic. During antiquity, there were many peoples in the Italian peninsula, including Etruscans, Latins, Samnites, Umbri, Cisalpine Gauls, Greeks in Magna Graecia and others. Most significantly, Italy was the cradle of the Roman civilization. Rome was founded as a kingdom in 753 BC and became a republic in 509 BC. The Roman Republic then unified Italy forming a confederation of the Italic peoples and rose to dominate Western Europe, Northern Africa, and the Near East. The Roman Empire, established in 27 BC, ruled the Mediterranean region for centuries, contributing to the development of Western culture, philosophy, science and art.
During the early Middle Ages, Italy experienced the succession in power of Ostrogoths, Byzantines, Longobards and the Holy Roman Empire and fragmented into numerous city-states and regional polities, a situation that would remain until the unification of the country. These polities and the maritime republics, in particular Venice and Genoa, rose to prosperity. Eventually, the Italian Renaissance emerged and spread to the rest of Europe, bringing a renewed interest in humanism, science, exploration, and art with the start of the modern era. In the medieval and early modern era, Southern Italy was ruled by the Norman, Swabian and Angevin dynasties and the Aragonese, French and Spanish crowns. Central Italy was largely part of the Papal States.
In the 19th century, Italian unification led to the establishment of an Italian nation-state under the House of Savoy. The new Kingdom of Italy quickly modernized and built a colonial empire, controlling parts of Africa and countries along the Mediterranean. At the same time, Southern Italy remained rural and poor, originating the Italian diaspora. Victorious in World War I, Italy completed the unification by acquiring Trento and Trieste and gained a permanent seat in the League of Nations's executive council. The partial infringement of the Treaty of London led to the sentiment of a mutilated victory among radical nationalists, contributing to the rise of the fascist dictatorship of Benito Mussolini in 1922. During World War II, Italy was part of the Axis powers until the Italian surrender to Allied powers and its occupation by Nazi Germany with Fascist collaborators and then a co-belligerent of the Allies during the Italian resistance and liberation of Italy.
Following the end of the German occupation and the killing of Benito Mussolini, the 1946 Italian institutional referendum abolished the monarchy and became a republic, reinstated democracy, enjoyed an economic boom, and co-founded the European Union, NATO, the Group of Six, and the G20.
Prehistory
The arrival of the first hominins was 850,000 years ago at Monte Poggiolo. The presence of the Homo neanderthalensis has been demonstrated in archaeological findings near Rome and Verona dating to years ago. Homo sapiens sapiens appeared during the upper Palaeolithic. Remains of the later prehistoric age include Ötzi the Iceman, dating to BC.During the Copper Age, Indoeuropean people migrated to Italy in four waves. A first Indoeuropean migration occurred around the mid-3rd millennium BC, from a population who imported coppersmithing. The Remedello culture took over the Po Valley. The second wave occurred in the Bronze Age, from the late 3rd to the early 2nd millennium BC, with tribes identified with the Beaker culture and by the use of bronze smithing, in the Padan Plain, in Tuscany and on the coasts of Sardinia and Sicily. In the mid-2nd millennium BC, a third wave arrived, associated with the Apenninian civilization and the Terramare culture. The Terramare people were hunters, but had domesticated animals and cultivated crops; they were fairly skilful metallurgists, casting bronze in moulds.
In the late Bronze Age, from the late 2nd millennium to the early 1st millennium BC, a fourth wave, the Proto-Villanovan culture, brought iron-working to the Italian peninsula. Proto-Villanovan culture may have been part of the central European Urnfield culture system, or a derivation from Terramare culture. Various authors, such as Marija Gimbutas, associated this culture with the spread of the proto-Italics into the Italian Peninsula.
Nuragic civilization
Born in Sardinia and southern Corsica, the Nuraghe civilization lasted from the 18th century BC to the 2nd century AD. They take their name from the characteristic Nuragic towers, which evolved from the pre-existing megalithic culture, which built dolmens and menhirs. Today more than 7,000 nuraghes appear in Sardinia.No written records of this civilization have been discovered, apart from a few possible short epigraphic documents. The only written information comes from classical literature of the Greeks and Romans, and may be considered more mythological than historical. The language spoken in Sardinia during the Bronze Age is unknown since there are no written records from the period, although research suggests that around the 8th century BC the Nuragic populations may have adopted an alphabet similar to that used in Euboea.
Iron Age
Etruscan civilization
The Etruscan civilization flourished in central Italy after 800 BC. The main hypotheses on the origins of the Etruscans are that they are indigenous, probably stemming from the Villanovan culture, or that they are the result of invasion from the north or the Near East. A 2007 study has suggested a Near Eastern origin. The researchers conclude that their data, taken from the modern Tuscan population, "support the scenario of a post-Neolithic genetic input from the Near East to the present-day population of Tuscany". In the absence of any dating evidence, there is however no direct link between this genetic input and the Etruscans. By contrast, a mitochondrial DNA study of 2013 has suggested that the Etruscans were probably an indigenous population. Among ancient populations, ancient Etruscans are found to be closest to a Neolithic population from Central Europe.It is widely accepted that Etruscans spoke a non-Indo-European language. Some inscriptions in a similar language, known as Lemnian, have been found on the Aegean island of Lemnos. Etruscans were a monogamous society that emphasized pairing. The historical Etruscans had achieved a form of state with remnants of chiefdom and tribal forms. The first attestations of an Etruscan religion can be traced to the Villanovan culture.
Etruscan expansion was focused across the Apennines. The political structure of the Etruscan culture was similar, albeit more aristocratic, to Magna Graecia in the south. The mining and commerce of metal, especially copper and iron, led to an enrichment of the Etruscans and to the expansion of their influence in the Italian peninsula and the western Mediterranean. Here their interests collided with those of the Greeks, especially in the 6th century BC, when Phoceans of Italy founded colonies along the coast of France, Catalonia and Corsica. This led the Etruscans to ally themselves with the Carthaginians.
Around 540 BC, the Battle of Alalia led to a new distribution of power in the western Mediterranean. Carthage expanded its sphere of influence at the expense of the Greeks, and Etruria saw itself relegated to Corsica. From the first half of the 5th century, the new international political situation meant the beginning of the Etruscan decline. In 480 BC, Etruria's ally Carthage was defeated by a coalition of Magna Graecia cities led by Syracuse.
A few years later, in 474 BC, Syracuse's tyrant Hiero defeated the Etruscans at the Battle of Cumae. Etruria's influence over the cities of Latium and Campania weakened, and it was taken over by Romans and Samnites. In the 4th century, Etruria saw a Gallic invasion end its influence over the Po valley and the Adriatic coast. Meanwhile, Rome had started annexing Etruscan cities. This led to the loss of their north provinces. Etruscia was assimilated by Rome around 500 BC.
Italic peoples
The Italic peoples were an ethnolinguistic group identified by use of Italic languages. Among the Italic peoples in the Italian peninsula were the Osci, the Veneti, the Samnites, the Latins and the Umbri.In the region south of the Tiber, the Latial culture of the Latins emerged, while in the north-east of the peninsula the Este culture of the Veneti appeared. Roughly in the same period, from their core area in central Italy, the Osco-Umbrians began to emigrate in various waves, through the process of Ver sacrum, the ritualized extension of colonies, in southern Latium, Molise and the whole southern half of the peninsula, replacing the previous tribes, such as the Opici and the Oenotrians. This corresponds with the emergence of the Terni culture, which had strong similarities with the Celtic cultures of Hallstatt and La Tène.
Before and during the period of the arrival of the Greek and Phoenician immigrants, Sicily was already inhabited by native Italics in three major groups: the Elymians in the west, the Sicani in the centre, and the Sicels in the east.
It is generally believed that around 2000 BC, the Ligures occupied a large area of the peninsula, including much of north-western Italy and all of northern Tuscany. Since many scholars consider the language of this ancient population to be Pre-Indo-European, they are often not classified as Italics.
By the mid-first millennium BC, the Latins of Rome were growing in power and influence. After the Latins had liberated themselves from Etruscan rule they acquired a dominant position among the Italic tribes. Frequent conflict between various Italic tribes followed; the best documented are the Samnite Wars. The Latins eventually succeeded in unifying the Italic elements in the country. In the early first century BC, several Italic tribes, in particular the Marsi and the Samnites, rebelled against Roman rule. After Roman victory was secured, all peoples in Italy, except for the Celts of the Po Valley, were granted Roman citizenship. In the subsequent centuries, Italic tribes adopted Latin language and culture in a process known as Romanization.