The
history of Rome spans 2,800 years of the existence
of a city that grew from a small Italian
village in
the 9th century BC into the center of
a vast civilization that dominated the
Mediterranean
region for centuries. Its political power
was eventually
replaced
by that of peoples of mostly
Germanic
origin, marking the beginning of the
Middle Ages.
Rome
became the
seat of the Roman Catholic
Church and the home of a sovereign state, the Vatican City
, within its walls. Today it is the capital
of Italy, an international worldwide political and cultural centre,
a major
global city, and is regarded as
one of the most beautiful cities of the ancient world.
The traditional date for the
founding
of Rome, based on a mythological account, is 21 April 753 BC,
and the city and surrounding region of
Latium
has continued to be inhabited with little interruption since around
that time.
Ancient Rome
For more information, and history of Rome as a complete
civilization, see Ancient
Rome
Origins
Legend of 'Rome'
The legendary origin of the city's name is the traditional founder
and first ruler. It is said that Romulus and Remus decided to build
a city. After an argument, Romulus killed his brother Remus. Then
he named it after himself, Rome. More recently, attempts have been
made to find a linguistic root for the name
Rome.
Possibilities include derivation from
Greek language Ῥώμη meaning bravery,
courage; possibly the connection is with a root
*rum-,
"teat", with possible reference to the totem wolf that adopted and
suckled the cognately-named twins
Romulus and Remus. Etruscan gives us the
word
Rumach, "from Rome", from which Ruma can be
extracted. Its further etymology, as with that of most Etruscan
words, remains unknown. The
Basque
scholar Manuel de Larramendi thought that the origin could be
related to the
Basque language word
orma (modern Basque
kirreal), "wall".
City's formation
Forum Romanum.
Rome grew
from pastoral settlements on the Palatine Hill
and surrounding
hills approximately 30 km from the Tyrrhenian Sea
on the south side of the Tiber. Another of these hills, the Quirinal Hill
, was probably an outpost for another Italic-speaking people, the Sabines. At this location the Tiber forms a
Z-shape curve that contains an island
where the
river can be forded. Because of the river and the ford, Rome
was at a crossroads of traffic following the river valley and of
traders travelling north and south on the west side of the
peninsula.
Archaeological finds have confirmed that in the
8th century BC in the area of the future Rome
there were two fortified settlements, the
Rumi one on the
Palatine Hill and the
Titientes one on the Quirinal Hill,
backed by the
Luceres living in the nearby woods.
These were
simply three of numerous Italic-speaking communities that existed
in Latium, a plain on
the Italian peninsula,
by the 1st millennium BC.
The origins of the
Italic
peoples is not known, but their
Indo-European languages migrated
from the east in the second-half of the
2nd millennium BC.
Italic context
In the
8th century BC, these Italic
speakers — Latins (in the west),
Sabines (in the upper valley of the Tiber), Umbrian (in
the north-east), Samnites (in the South),
Oscans and others — shared the peninsula
with two other major ethnic groups: the Etruscans
in the North, and the Greeks
in the south.
The Etruscans (
Etrusci or
Tusci in
Latin) were settled north of Rome in
Etruria (modern northern Lazio and
Tuscany). They deeply influenced Roman culture, as
clearly showed by the Etruscan origin of some of the mythical Roman
kings. The behaviour of the Etruscans has led to some confusion.
Like Latin, Etruscan is inflected and Hellenised. Like the
Indo-Europeans, the Etruscans were patrilineal and patriarchal.
Like the Italics, they were war-like. The
gladiatorial displays actually evolved out of
Etruscan funerary customs. Future studies of Etruscan and more
excavations in the region will no doubt clarify the origin of Rome
and the Romans even more.
The Greeks
had founded many colonies in Southern Italy (that the
Romans later called Magna Graecia),
such as Cumae
, Naples
and Taranto
, as well as
in the eastern two-thirds of Sicily, between
750 and 550
BC.
Out of Italy theory
Bikini girls of the Roman empire
One theory on the origins of the original settlers of Rome is that
the population may have been immigrants from outside the Italian
peninsula, possibly an off-shoot from the same group that would
become Celtic or Germanic peoples. Traces of this founding
population were apparently evident in the appearance of the
aristocracy well into the era of the Empire. According to Francis
Owens the evidence available from Roman literature, historical
records and statuary and personal names shows that in physical
appearance the Roman aristocracy differed from most of the
population in the rest of the peninsula. The records describe a
very large number of well known historical personalities as
blonde. In addition, 250 individuals are
recorded to have had the name Flavius, meaning blonde, and there
are many named
Rufus and
Rutilius, meaning
red haired and reddish
haired respectively. The following Roman gods are said to have had
blonde hair;
Amor,
Apollo,
Aurora,
Bacchus,
Ceres,
Diana,
Jupiter,
Mars,
Mercury,
Minerva
and
Venus.
The physical appearance of
Emperor Nero,
descended from an aristocratic family, is by the historian
Suetonius described as: "He was about the average
height, his body marked with spots and malodorous, his hair light
blond, his features regular rather than attractive, his eyes blue
and somewhat weak, his neck over thick, his belly prominent, and
his legs very slender."
It may be argued, however, that such descriptions of hair and eye
colour are relative, and do not correspond to 'blondes' or
'redheads' in English or other northern European languages. A more
direct translation of the Latin text of Suetonius renders
'grey-blue' or 'grey' rather than 'blue' for Nero's eyes, and
'yellowish' rather than 'light blond' for Nero's hair. His hair, in
other words, was yellowish in comparison to the brown or black hair
common in ancient Rome, rather than being actual blonde in colour.
In addition to this, the overwhelming majority of colour images
from Roman art, such as Pompeian frescoes, show both male gods and
aristocrats, as well as ordinary people, with tan complexions,
resembling people in Spain, Greece, and Italy today.
Etruscan dominance
After
650 BC, the Etruscans became dominant
in Italy and expanded into north-central Italy.
Roman tradition
claimed that Rome had been under the control of seven kings
from 753 to 509 BC beginning with the mythic Romulus who along with his brother
Remus were said to have founded the city of Rome.
Two of
the last three kings, namely Tarquinius Priscus and Tarquinius Superbus, were said to
be (at least partially) Etruscan (Priscus is said by the ancient
literary sources to be the son of a refugee Greek, and an Etruscan
mother), their names referring to the Etruscan town of Tarquinia
. The list of kings is of dubious historical
value, though the last-named kings may be historical figures. It is
believed by some historians (again, this is disputed) that Rome was
under the influence of the Etruscans for about a century. During
this period a bridge called the
Pons
Sublicius was built to replace the
Tiber
ford, and the
Cloaca Maxima was also
built; the Etruscans are said to have been great engineers of this
type of structure. From a cultural and technical point of view,
Etruscans had arguably the second-greatest impact on Roman
development, only surpassed by the Greeks.
Expanding further south, the Etruscans came into direct contact
with the Greeks. After initial success in conflicts with the Greek
colonists, Etruria went into a decline. Taking advantage of this,
around
500 BC Rome rebelled and
gained independence from the Etruscans. It also abandoned monarchy
in favour of a republican system based on a
Senate, composed of the nobles of the city,
along with popular assemblies which ensured political participation
for most of the freeborn men and elected magistrates
annually.
The Etruscans left a lasting influence on Rome. The Romans learned
to build temples from them, and the Etruscans may have introduced
the worship of a triad of gods —
Juno,
Minerva, and
Jupiter — from the
Etruscan gods:
Uni,
Menrva, and
Tinia. However, the influence of Etruscan
people in the evolution of Rome is often overstated. Rome was
primarily a Latin city. It never became fully Etruscan. Also,
evidence shows that Romans were heavily influenced by the Greek
cities in the South, mainly through trade.
Roman Republic
After 500 BC, Rome joined with the Latin cities in defence against
incursions by the
Sabines. Winning the
Battle of Lake Regillus in
493 BC, Rome established again the supremacy
over the Latin countries it had lost after the fall of the
monarchy. After a lengthy series of struggles, this supremacy
became fixed in 393, when the Romans finally subdued the
Volsci and
Aequi.
In 394 BC, they also conquered the menacing Etruscan
neighbour of Veii
. The
Etruscan power was now limited to Etruria itself, and Rome was the
dominant city in Latium.
Also a
formal treaty with the city of Carthage
is reported to have been made in the end of the
sixth century BC, which defined the spheres of influence of each
city and regulated the trade between them.
At the same time,
Heraclides
states that fourth century Rome is a
Greek city.
Rome's early enemies were the neighbouring hill tribes of the
Volscians, the Aequi, and of course the Etruscans. As years passed
and military successes increased Roman territory, new adversaries
appeared. The fiercest were the
Gauls, a loose
collective of peoples who controlled much of Northern Europe
including what is modern North and Central-East Italy.
In
387 BC, Rome was sacked and burned by the
Senones coming from eastern Italy and led by
Brennus, who had
successfully defeated the Roman army at the
Battle of the Allia in
Etruria. Multiple contemporary records suggest that
the Senones hoped to punish Rome for violating its diplomatic
neutrality in Etruria. The Senones marched 130 km to Rome
without harming the surrounding countryside; once sacked, the
Senones withdrew from Rome.
Brennus was defeated by the dictator
Furius Camillus at Tusculum
soon afterwards.
After that, Rome hastily rebuilt its buildings and went on the
offensive, conquering the Etruscans and seizing territory from the
Gauls in the north. After
345 BC, Rome pushed
south against other Latins. Their main enemy in this quadrant were
the fierce
Samnites, who heavily defeated
the legions in
321 BC at the
Battle of Caudine Forks. In
spite of these and other temporary setbacks, the Romans advanced
steadily. By
290 BC, Rome controlled over
half of the Italian peninsula. In the
3rd
century BC, Rome brought the Greek
poleis
in the south under its control as well.
Amidst the never ending wars (from the beginning of the Republic up
to the Principate, the doors of the temple of
Janus were closed only twice - when they were open it
meant that Rome was at war), Rome had to face a severe major social
crisis, the struggle between
patrician and
plebeians.
Map of the centre of Rome during the
time of the Roman Empire
According to tradition, Rome became a
republic in
509
BC. However, it took a few centuries for Rome to become the
great city of popular imagination. By the
3rd century BC, Rome had become the
pre-eminent city of the Italian peninsula. During the
Punic Wars between Rome and the great
Mediterranean empire of Carthage, Rome's stature increased further
as it became the capital of an overseas empire for the first time.
Beginning in the
2nd century BC, Rome
went through a significant population expansion as Italian farmers,
driven from their ancestral farmlands by the advent of massive,
slave-operated farms called
latifundia,
flocked to the city in great numbers. The victory over Carthage in
the
First Punic War brought the
first two provinces outside the Italian peninsula,
Sicily and
Sardinia.
Parts of
Spain
(Hispania) followed, and in
the beginning of the 2nd century the Romans got involved in the
affairs of the Greek world. By then all Hellenistic kingdoms
and the Greek city-states were in decline, exhausted from endless
civil wars and relying on mercenary troops.
The Romans looked upon the Greek civilisation with great
admiration. The Greeks saw Rome as a useful ally in their civil
strifes, and it wasn't long before the Roman legions were invited
to intervene in Greece. In less than 50 years the whole of mainland
Greece was subdued.
The Roman legions crushed the Macedonian
phalanx twice, in 197 and 168 BC; in 146 BC
the Roman consul Lucius
Mummius razed Corinth
, marking the end of free Greece.
The same
year, Cornelius Scipio
Aemilianus, the son of Scipio
Africanus destroyed the city of Carthage, making it a Roman province.
In the following years, Rome continued its conquests in Spain with
Tiberius Gracchus, and it set foot
in Asia, when the last king of
Pergamus
gave his kingdom to the Roman people. The end of the 2nd century
brought once again threat, when a great host of
Germanic peoples, namely
Cimbri and
Teutones, crossed
the river Rhone and moved to Italy.
Gaius
Marius was consul five consecutive times (seven total), and won
two decisive battles in 102 and 101 BC He also reformed the Roman
army, giving it such a good reorganization that it remained
unchanged for centuries.
The first thirty years of the last century BC were characterized by
serious internal problems that threatened the existence of the
Republic. The
Social
War, between Rome and its allies, and the
Servile Wars (slave uprisings) were very hard
conflicts, all within Italy, and forced the Romans to change their
policy with regards to their allies and subjects. By then Rome had
become an extensive power, with great wealth which derived from the
conquered people (as tribute, food or manpower, i.e. slaves). The
allies of Rome felt bitter since they had fought by the side of the
Romans, and yet they were not citizens and shared little in the
rewards. Although they lost the war, they finally got what they
asked, and by the beginning of the first century AD practically all
free inhabitants of Italy were Roman citizens.
However, the growth of the Imperium Romanum (Roman power) created
new problems, and new demands, that the old political system of the
Republic, with its annually elected magistrates and its sharing of
power, could not solve. The dictatorship of Sulla, the
extraordinary commands of Pompey Magnus, and the first
triumvirate made that clear. In January 49 BC,
Julius Caesar the conqueror of Gaul,
marched his legions against Rome. In the following years, he
vanquished his opponents, and ruled Rome for four years. After his
assassination in 44 BC, the Senate tried to reestablish the
Republic, but its champions,
Marcus
Junius Brutus (descendant of the founder of the republic) and
Gaius Cassius Longinus were
defeated by Caesar's lieutenant
Marcus
Antonius and Caesar's nephew,
Octavian.
The years 44-31 mark the struggle for power between Marcus Antonius
and Octavian (later known as Augustus).
Finally, on September
2, 31 BC, in the Greek promontory of Actium
, the final
battle took place in the sea. Octavian was victorious, and
became the sole ruler of Rome (and its empire). That date marks the
end of the Republic and the beginning of the
Principate.
Roman empire
By the
end of the Republic, the city of Rome had achieved a grandeur
befitting the capital of an empire dominating the whole of the
Mediterranean. It was, at the time, the largest city in
the world. Estimates of its peak population range from 450,000 to
over 3.5 million people with estimates of 1 to 2 million being most
popular with historians.
This grandeur increased under Augustus, who completed Caesar's projects and added
many of his own, such as the Forum of Augustus
and the Ara
Pacis
. He is said to have remarked that he found
Rome a city of brick and left it a city of marble. Augustus'
successors sought to emulate his success in part by adding their
own contributions to the city. The
Great Fire of Rome during the reign of
Nero left much of the city destroyed, but in
many ways it was used as an excuse for new development.
Rome was a subsidized city at the time, with roughly 15 to 25
percent of its grain supply being paid by the central government.
Commerce
and industry played a smaller role compared to that of other cities
like Alexandria
. This meant that Rome had to depend upon
goods and production from other parts of the Empire to sustain such
a large population. This was mostly paid by taxes that were levied
by the Roman government. If it had not been subsidised, Rome would
have been significantly smaller.
Rome's population declined after its peak in the
2nd century. At the end of that century, during
the reign of
Marcus Aurelius, a
plague killed 2,000 people a day. Marcus Aurelius died in 180, his
reign being the last of the "
Five
Good Emperors" and
Pax Romana. His
son
Commodus, who had been co-emperor since
177, assumed full imperial power, which is most generally
associated with the gradual decline of the Western Roman Empire.
Rome's
population was only a fraction of its peak when the Aurelian
Wall
was completed in the year 273 (at that year its
population was only around 500,000).
Starting in the early
3rd century,
matters changed. The "
Crisis
of the third century" defines the disasters and political
troubles for the Empire, which nearly collapsed.
The new feeling of
danger and the menace of barbarian invasions was clearly shown by
the decision of Emperor Aurelian, who at
year 273 finished encircling the capital itself with a massive
wall which had a
perimeter that measured close to 20 km. Rome formally
remained capital of the
empire, but
emperors spent less and less time there. At the end of
3rd century Diocletian's political reforms, Rome was deprived
of its traditional role of administrative capital of the Empire.
Later,
western emperors ruled from
Milan
or Ravenna
, or cities in Gaul.
In
330, Constantine I
established a second capital at Constantinople
. At this time, part of the Roman
aristocratic class moved to this new centre, followed by many of
the artists and craftsmen who were living in the city.
However, the
Senate, while stripped of
most of its political power, was socially prestigious. The Empire's
conversion to Christianity made the
Bishop of Rome (later called the Pope) the
senior religious figure in the Western Empire, as officially stated
in
380 by the Edict of Thessalonica.
In spite
of its increasingly marginal role in the Empire, Rome retained its
historic prestige, and this period saw the last wave of
construction activity: Constantine's predecessor Maxentius built notable buildings such its
spectacular basilica in the Forum
, Constantine
himself erected its famous arch
to celebrate his victory over the former, and
Diocletian built the greatest baths of all. Constantine was
also the first patron of official Christian buildings in the city.
He
donated the Lateran
Palace
to the Pope, and built the first great basilica,
the old St. Peter's
Basilica
.
The ancient basilica of St. Lawrence
outside the walls was built directly over the tomb of the people's
favourite Roman martyr
Still Rome remained one of the strongholds of Paganism, led by the
aristocrats and senators. When the
Visigoths showed off before the walls in
408, the Senate and the prefect proposed pagan
sacrifices, and it seems that even the pope was agreeable if this
could help to save the city. However, the new walls did not stop
the city being sacked first by
Alaric on
August 24, 410, by
Geiseric in
455 and even by general
Ricimer's
unpaid Roman troops (largely composed of barbarians) on July 11,
472. The sackings of the city, which had remained untouched by
barbarians since the times of
Brennus 800 years earlier (390 BC),
astonished all the Roman world. The fall of Rome was read as the
definitive fall of the ancient order. Many inhabitants fled, and at
the end of the century Rome's population may have been less than
50,000. In any case, the damage the sackings made has been probably
overestimated. The city was already in a steep decline, and many
monuments had been destroyed by the citizens themselves, who
stripped stones from closed temples and other precious buildings,
and even burned statues to make lime for their personal use. In
addition, most of the increasing number of churches were built in
this way. For example, the first St. Peter was erected using spoils
from the abandoned Circus of Nero. This "self-eating" attitude was
a constant feature of Rome until the
Renaissance. From the
4th
century imperial edicts against stripping of stones and
especially marble were common, but the need for their repetition
shows that they were ineffective. Sometimes new churches were
created by simply taking advantage of early Pagan temples, perhaps
changing the Pagan god or hero to a corresponding Christian saint
or martyr.
In this way the Temple of Romulus and Remus
became the basilica of the twin saints Cosmas and
Damian
. Later, the Pantheon
, Temple of All Gods, become the church of All
Martyrs.
Medieval Rome
Barbarian and Byzantine rule
In 480, the last Western Roman emperor,
Julius Nepos, was murdered and a Roman general
of barbarian origin,
Odoacer, declared
allegiance to Byzantine emperor Zeno.
Despite owing nominal
allegiance to Constantinople, Odoacer and later the
Ostrogoths continued, like the last
emperors, to rule Italy as a virtually independent realm from
Ravenna. Meanwhile, the Senate, even though long
since stripped of wider powers, continued to administer Rome
itself, with the Pope usually coming from a senatorial family. This
situation continued until
Theodahad
murdered
Amalasuntha in 535. The
Eastern Roman emperor,
Justinian I (reigned 527–565) , used
this as a pretext to send forces to Italy under his famed general
Belisarius, recapturing the city next
year. The Byzantines successfully defended the city in a
year-long siege, and
eventually took Ravenna.
Gothic resistance revived however, and on December 17, 546, the
Ostrogoths under
Totila recaptured and
sacked Rome. Belisarius soon
recovered the city, but the Ostrogoths retook it in 549. Belisarius
was replaced by
Narses, who captured Rome
from the Ostrogoths for good in 552, ending the so-called
Gothic Wars which had
devastated much of Italy. The continual war around Rome in the
530s and
540s left it in a
state of total disrepair — near-abandoned and desolate with much of
its lower-lying parts turned into unhealthy marshes as the drainage
systems were neglected and the Tiber's embankments fell into
disrepair in the course of the latter half of the sixth century.
Here,
malaria developed. The
aqueducts were never repaired, leading to a
shrinking population of less than 50,000 concentrated near the
Tiber and around the
Campus Martius, abandoning those districts
without water supply. There is a legend, significant though untrue,
that there was a moment where no one remained living in Rome.
Justinian
I tried to grant Rome subsidies for the maintenance of public
buildings, aqueducts and bridges — though, being mostly drawn from
an Italy dramatically
impoverished by the recent wars, these were not always
sufficient. He also styled himself the patron of its
remaining
scholar,
orators,
physicians and
lawyers in the stated hope that eventually
more youths would seek a better
education.
After the
wars, the Senate was theoretically restored, but under the
supervision of the urban prefect and
other officials appointed by, and responsible to, the Byzantine
authorities in Ravenna.
However, the Pope was now one of the leading religious figures in
the entire Byzantine Empire and effectively more powerful locally
than either the remaining senators or local Byzantine officials. In
practice, local power in Rome devolved to the Pope and, over the
next few decades, both much of the remaining possessions of the
senatorial aristocracy and the local Byzantine administration in
Rome were absorbed by the
Church.
The reign
of Justinian's nephew and successor Justin
II (reigned 565–578) was marked from the Italian point of
view by the invasion of the Lombards under
Alboin (568). In capturing the
regions of Benevento
, Lombardy, Piedmont, Spoleto
and Tuscany, the invaders
effectively restricted Imperial authority to small islands of land
surrounding a number of coastal cities, including Ravenna, Naples, Rome and the area
of the future Venice
.
The one
inland city continuing under Byzantine control was Perugia
, which provided a repeatedly threatened overland
link between Rome and Ravenna. In 578 and again in 580, the
Senate, in some of its last recorded acts, had to ask for the
support of
Tiberius II
Constantine (reigned 578–582) against the approaching Dukes,
Faroald I of Spoleto and
Zotto of
Benevento.
Maurice (reigned 582–602) added a
new factor in the continuing conflict by creating an alliance with
Childebert II of Austrasia (reigned
575–595). The armies of the
Frankish King invaded the Lombard
territories in 584, 585, 588 and 590. Rome had suffered badly from
a disastrous flood of the Tiber in 589, followed by a plague in
590.
The
latter is notable for the legend of the
angel seen, while the newly elected Pope Gregory I (term 590–604) was passing in
procession by Hadrian's
Tomb
, to hover over the building and to sheathe his
flaming sword as a sign that the pestilence was about to
cease. The city was safe from capture at least.
Agilulf, however, the new Lombard King
(reigned 591 to c.
616), managed to secure peace with Childebert, reorganized his territories and
resumed activities against both Naples and Rome by
592. With the Emperor preoccupied with
wars in the eastern borders and the various succeeding
Exarchs unable to secure Rome from invasion, Gregory
took personal initiative in starting negotiations for a
peace treaty. This was completed in the autumn
of 598 — only later recognized by Maurice. It would last till the
end of his reign.
The position of the
Bishop of Rome
was further strengthened under the usurper
Phocas (reigned 602–610). Phocas recognized his
primacy over that of the
Patriarch of
Constantinople and even decreed
Pope Boniface III (607) to be "the head of
all the
Churches".
Phocas' reign saw the
erection of the last imperial monument in the Roman Forum, the column
bearing his name. He also gave the Pope
the Pantheon, at the time closed for centuries, and thus
probably saved it from destruction.
During the
7th century, an influx of
both Byzantine officials and churchmen from elsewhere in the empire
made both the local lay aristocracy and Church leadership largely
Greek speaking. However, the strong Byzantine cultural influence
did not always lead to political harmony between Rome and
Constantinople. In the controversy over
Monothelitism, popes found themselves under
severe pressure (sometimes amounting to physical force) when they
failed to keep in step with Constantinople's shifting theological
positions. In 653,
Pope Martin I was
deported to Constantinople and, after a show trial, exiled to the
Crimea, where he died.
Then, in 663, Rome had its first imperial visit for two centuries,
by
Constans II — its worst disaster
since the Gothic Wars when the emperor proceeded to strip Rome of
metal, including that from buildings and statues, to provide
armament materials for use against the
Saracens. However, for the next half century,
despite further tensions, Rome and the Papacy continued to prefer
continued Byzantine rule - in part because the alternative was
Lombard rule, and in part because Rome's food was largely coming
from Papal estates elsewhere in the Empire, particularly
Sicily.
However, in 727,
Pope Gregory II
refused to accept the decrees of Emperor
Leo III, which promoted the emperor's
iconoclasm. Leo reacted first
by trying in vain to abduct the Pontiff, and then by sending a
force of
Ravennate troops under
the command of the
Exarch Paulus, but they
were pushed back by the Lombards of Tuscia and Benevento. Roman
general
Eutychius sent west by the emperor
successfully captured Rome and restored it as a part of the empire
in 728.
On
November 1, 731, a council was called in St.
Peter by Gregory III to
excommunicate the iconoclasts. The Emperor responded by
confiscating large Papal estates in
Sicily
and
Calabria and transferring areas
previously ecclesiastically under the Pope to the
Patriarch of
Constantinople. Despite the tensions Gregory III never
discontinued his support to the imperial efforts against external
threats.
In this period the Lombard kingdom was living an age of revival
under the strong
Liutprand. In
730 he razed the countryside of Rome to punish the Pope
who had supported the duke of Spoleto. Though still protected by
his massive walls, the pope could do little against the Lombard
king, who managed to ally himself with the Byzantines . Other
protectors were now needed. Gregory III was the first Pope to ask
for concrete help from the Frankish Kingdom, then under the command
of
Charles Martel (
739).
Liutprand's successor
Aistulf was even more
aggressive.
He conquered Ferrara
and Ravenna, ending the Exarchate of Ravenna. Rome
seemed his next victim. In
754,
Pope Stephen II went to France to name
Pippin the Younger, king of the
Franks, as
patricius romanorum, i.e.
protector of Rome.
In the August of that year the King and Pope
together crossed back the Alps and defeated Aistulf at Pavia
.
When Pippin went back to St. Denis however, Aistulf did not keep
his promises, and in
756 besieged Rome for 56
days. The Lombards returned north when they heard news of Pippin
again moving to Italy.
This time he agreed to give the Pope the
promised territories, and the Papal States
were born.
In
771 the new King of the Lombards,
Desiderius, devised a plot to conquer Rome and
seize
Pope Stephen III during a
feigned pilgrimage within its walls. His main ally was one Paulus
Afiarta, chief of the Lombard party within the city. He conquered
Rome in 772 but angered Charlemagne. However the plan failed, and
Stephens' successor,
Pope Hadrian I
called
Charlemagne against Desiderius,
who was finally defeated in
773. The Lombard
Kingdom was no more, and now Rome entered into the orbit of a new,
greater political institution.
Numerous remains from this period, along with a museum devoted to
Medieval Rome, can be seen at
Crypta Balbi in
Rome.
Holy Roman Empire
On April
25, 799 the new Pope, Leo III, led the
traditional procession from the Lateran to
the Church of San Lorenzo in Lucina
along the Via Flaminia
(now Via del Corso). Two nobles
(followers of his predecessor Hadrian) who disliked the weakness of
the Pope with regards to Charlemagne, attacked the processional
train and delivered a life threatening wound to the Pope. Leo fled
to the King of the Franks, and in November
800
the King entered in Rome with a strong army and a number of French
bishops. He declared a judicial trial to decide if Leo was to
remain Pope, or if the deposers' claims had reasons to be upheld.
This trial, however, was only a part of a well thought out chain of
events which ultimately surprised the world. The Pope was declared
legitimate and the attempters subsequently exiled.
On December 25, 800,
Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne
Holy Roman Emperor in St. Peter's
Basilica.
This act
forever severed the loyalty of Rome from its
imperial progeny, Constantinople. It created instead a rival empire which,
after a long series of conquests by
Charlemagne, now encompassed most of the
Christian Western territories.
Following the death of Charlemagne, the lack of a figure with equal
prestige led the new institution into disagreement. At the same
time the universal
church of Rome
had to face emergence of the lay interests of the City itself,
spurred on by the conviction that the Roman people, though
impoverished and abased, had again the right to elect the Western
Emperor.
The famous counterfeit document called the
Donation of
Constantine, prepared by the Papal notaries, guaranteed to
the Pope a dominion stretching from Ravenna to Gaeta
.
This nominally included the suzerainty over Rome, but this was
often highly disputed and as the centuries passed only the
strongest Popes were to be able to assert it. The main element of
weakness of the Papacy within the walls of the city was the
continued necessity of the election of new popes, in which the
emerging noble families soon managed to insert a leading role for
themselves. The neighbouring powers, namely the
Duchy of Spoleto and
Toscana, and later the Emperors, learned how to take
their own advantage of this internal weakness, playing the role of
arbiters among the contestants.
Rome was indeed prey of anarchy in this age. The lowest point was
touched in
897, when a raging crowd exhumed the
corpse of a dead pope,
Formosus, and
put it on trial.
Roman Commune
In this period the renovated
Church was again attracting pilgrims and
prelates from all the Christian world, and
money with them: even with a population of only 30,000, Rome was
again becoming a city of consumers dependent upon the presence of a
governmental bureaucracy.
In the meantime, Italian cities were
acquiring increasing autonomy, mainly led by new families which
were replacing the old aristocracy with a new class formed by
entrepreneurs, traders and merchants. After the sack of Rome
by the
Normans in
1084, the rebuilding of the city was supported by
powerful families such as the
Frangipane family and the
Pierleoni family, whose wealth came from
commerce and banking rather than landholdings.
Inspired by
neighbouring cities like Tivoli
and Viterbo
, Rome's people began to consider adopting a
communal status and gaining a substantial amount of freedom from
papal authority.
Led by
Giordano Pierleoni, the
Romans rebelled against the aristocracy and Church rule in
1143. The Senate and the Roman Republic, the
Commune of Rome, were born again. Through
the inflammatory words of preacher
Arnaldo da Brescia, an idealistic, fierce
opponent of ecclesiastical property and church interference in
temporal affairs, the revolt that led to the creation of the
Commune of Rome continued until it
was put down in
1155, though it left its mark
on the civil government of the Eternal City for centuries.
Twelfth-century Rome, however, had little in
common with the empire which had ruled over the Mediterranean some
700 years before, and soon the new Senate had to work hard to
survive, choosing an ambiguous policy of shifting its support from
the Pope to the
Holy Roman Empire
and vice versa as the political situation required. At
Monteporzio, in
1167, during one of these shifts, in the war with
Tusculum, Roman troops were defeated by the imperial forces of
Frederick
Barbarossa. Luckily, the winning enemies were soon dispersed by
a plague and Rome was saved.
Interior of the basilica of Santa
Maria in Trastevere, one of the most beautiful Roman churches built
or re-built in the Middle Ages
In
1188 the new communal government was finally
recognized by
Pope Clement III. The
Pope had to make large cash payments to the communal officials,
while the 56 senators became papal vassals. The Senate always had
problems in the accomplishment of its function, and various changes
were tried. Often a single Senator was in charge. This sometimes
led to tyrannies, which did not help the stability of the new-born
organism.
In
1204 the streets of Rome were again in
flames when the struggle between
Pope
Innocent III's family and its rivals, the powerful
Orsini family, led to riots in the city. Many
ancient buildings were then destroyed by machines used by the rival
bands to besiege their enemies in the innumerable towers and
strongholds which were a hallmark of the Middle Age Italian
towns.
The
struggle between the Popes and the emperor Frederick II, also king of
Naples and Sicily, saw Rome support the Ghibelline. To repay his loyalty,
Frederick sent to the commune the Carroccio he had won to the Lombards at the battle of Cortenuova in 1234, and which was exposed in the Campidoglio
. In that year, during another revolt against
the Pope, the Romans headed by senator
Luca
Savelli sacked the
Lateran. Curiously,
Savelli was the nephew of
Pope
Honorius III and father of
Honorius
IV, but in that age family ties often did not determine one's
allegiance.
Rome was never to evolve into an autonomous,
stable reign, as happened to other communes like Florence
, Siena
or
Milan. The endless struggles between noble
families (
Savelli,
Orsini,
Colonna,
Annibaldi), the ambiguous position
of the Popes, the haughtiness of a population which never abandoned
the dreams of their splendid past but, at the same time, thought
only of immediate advantage, and the weakness of the republican
institutions always deprived the city of this possibility.
In an
attempt to imitate more successful communes, in 1252 the people elected a foreign Senator, the Bolognese
Brancaleone degli
Andalò. In order to bring peace in the city he
suppressed the most powerful nobles (destroying some 140 towers),
reorganized the working classes and issued a code of laws inspired
by those of northern Italy. Brancaleone was a tough figure, but
died in
1258 with almost nothing of his reforms
turned into reality. Five years later
Charles I of Anjou, then king of
Naples, was elected Senator. He
entered the city only in
1265, but soon his
presence was needed to face
Conradin, the
Hohenstaufen's heir who was
coming to claim his family's rights over southern Italy, and left
the city. After June
1265 Rome was again a
democratic republic, electing
Henry of Castile as senator. But
Conradin and the Ghibelline party were crushed in the
Battle of Tagliacozzo (
1268), and therefore Rome fell again in the hands of
Charles.
Nicholas III, a member of Orsini family, was elected in 1277 and moved the seat of the Popes from the Lateran to the more defensible Vatican. He
also ordered that no foreigner could become senator of Rome. Being
a Roman himself, he had himself elected senator by the people. With
this move, the city began again to side for the papal party. In
1285 Charles was again Senator, but the
Sicilian Vespers reduced his
charisma, and the city was thenceforth free from his authority. The
next senator was again a Roman, and again a pope,
Honorius IV of the Savelli.
Boniface VIII and the Babylonian captivity
Successor to the meteoric
Celestine
V was an energetic Roman of the Caetani family,
Boniface VIII. Entangled in a local feud
against the traditional rivals of his family, the
Colonna, at the same time he struggled to
reassure the universal supremacy of the
Holy
See. In
1300 he launched the first
Jubilee and founded the first University
of Rome. The Jubilee was an important move for Rome, as it
increased further its international prestige and, most of all, the
city's economy was boosted by the flow of pilgrims.
Boniface died in
1303 after the humiliation of the Schiaffo di Anagni
("Slap of Anagni"), which signed instead the
rule of the King of
France
over the Papacy and marked
another period of decline for Rome.
Boniface's successor, Clement V, never entered in the city,
starting the so-called "Babylonian
Captivity", the absence of the Pope from their Roman seat in
favour of Avignon
, which will last for more than 70 years.
This situation brought the independence of the local powers, but
these revealed largely unstable; and the lack of the holy revenues
caused a deep decay of Rome. For more than a century Rome had no
new major buildings. Furthermore, many of the monuments of the
city, including the main churches, began to ruin.
Cola di Rienzo and the Pope's return to Rome
In spite
of its decline and the absence of the Pope, Rome had not lost its
spiritual prestige: in 1341 the famous poet
Petrarca came to the city to be crowned as
poet in Capitoline
Hill. Noblemen and poor people at one time
demanded with one voice the return of the Pope.
Among the many
ambassadors that in this period took their way to Avignon, emerged the bizarre but eloquent figure of
Cola di Rienzo. As his
personal power among the people increased by time, on May 30, 1347
he conquered the Capitoline at the head of an enthusiast crowd. The
period of his power, though very short-lived, is anyway one of the
most interesting in the life of Rome in
Middle Ages, as Cola tried to assure himself a
renovating, almost mystical aura of a paladin of Italian
independence, within a confused political dream inspired to the
prestige of the Ancient Rome. Now in possession of dictatorial
powers, he took the title of "tribune", referring to the
pleb's
magistracy of the
Roman Republic. Cola also considered
himself at an equal status of that of the Holy Roman Emperor. On
August 1, he conferred Roman citizenship on
all the Italian cities, and even prepared for the election of a
Roman emperor of Italy. It was too much: the Pope denounced him as
heretic, criminal and pagan, the populace had begun to be
disenchanted with him, while the nobles had always hated him. On
December 15, he was forced to
flee.
In August
1354, Cola was again a protagonist, when Cardinal Gil Alvarez De
Albornoz entrusted him with the role of "senator of Rome" in
his program of reassuring the Pope's rule in the Papal States. In October the tyrannical Cola, who had
become again very unpopular for his delirious behaviour and heavy
bills, was killed in a riot provoked by the powerful family of the
Colonna. In April of
1355,
Charles
IV of
Bohemia entered the city for the
ritual coronation as Emperor. His visit was very disappointing for
the citizens. He had little money, received the crown not from the
Pope but from a Cardinal, and moved away after a few days.
With the
emperor back in his lands, Albornoz could regain a certain control
over the city, while remaining in his safe citadel in Montefiascone
, in the Northern Lazio. The senators were
chosen directly by the Pope from several cities of Italy, but the
city was in fact independent. The Senate council included six
judges, five notaries, six marshals, several familiars, twenty
knights and twenty armed men. Albornoz had heavily suppressed the
traditional aristocratic families, and the "democratic" party felt
confident enough to start an aggressive policy.
In 1362 Rome declared war on Velletri
. This move, however, provoked a civil war.
The
countryside party hired a condottieri
band called "Del Cappello" ("Hat"), while the Romans bought the
services of German
and
Hungarian
troops, plus a citizen levy of 600 knights and even
22,000 infantry. This was the period in which Italy was
scourged by these ruthless condottieri bands. Many of the Savelli,
Orsini and Annibaldi expelled from Rome became leaders of such
military units. The war with Velletri languished, and Rome again
gave itself to the new Pope,
Urban V,
provided the dreadful Albornoz did not enter the walls.
On October 16, 1367, in reply to the prayers of
St Brigid and
Petrarca, Urban finally visited for the city.
During his presence,
Charles IV was again crowned
in the city (October
1368). In addition, the
Byzantine emperor John V Palaeologus came in Rome to beg
for a crusade against the
Ottoman
Empire, but in vain.
However, Urban did not like the unhealthy
air of the city, and on September 5, 1370 he sailed again to
Avignon. His successor, Gregory XI, officially set the date of his
return to Rome at May 1372, but again the
French cardinals
and the King stopped him.
Only on January 17, 1377, Gregory XI could finally reinstate the
Holy See in Rome.
The incoherent behaviour of his successor, the Italian
Urban VI, provoked in
1378
the
Western Schism, which impeded any
true attempt of improving the conditions of the decaying
Rome.
Modern Rome
Early 15th century
When in
1433 the Duke of Milan Filippo Maria Visconti signed a
treaty of peace with Florence and Venice
, he sent the condottieri
Niccolò Fortebraccio and
Francesco Sforza to harass the
Papal
States, in vengeance for Eugene
IV's support to these former republics. Fortebraccio,
supported by the
Colonna, occupied
Tivoli in October and ravaged Rome's countryside. Despite the
concessions made by Eugene to the Visconti, the Milanese soldiers
did not stop their action. This led the Romans to institute a
Republic government under the
Banderesi (May 29, 1434).
Eugene left the city in the night of
June
4.
However, the
Banderari soon proved incapable to govern the
city, and their misfits and violences deprived it soon of the
popular support. The city was therefore returned to Eugene by the
army of
Giovanni Vitelleschi on
October 26, 1434. After the death of Vitelleschi in mysterious
circumstances, the power in the city was under
Ludovico Scarampo,
Patriarch of
Aquileia. Eugene returned in Rome on 28 September 1443.
Renaissance Rome
With
Nicholas V (reigned from March
19, 1447) the
Renaissance entered in
Rome, starting a period in which Rome was to become the centre of
Humanism. He was the first pope to
embellish the Roman court with scholars and artists, including
Lorenzo Valla and
Vespasiano da Bisticci.
On September 4, 1449 Nicholas proclaimed a Jubilee for the
following year, which saw a great influx of pilgrims from all
Europe.
The crowd was so large that in December, on
Ponte
Sant'Angelo
, some 200 people died crushed under their feet or
drowned in the Tiber. But that year the plague reappeared in
the city, and Nicholas fled dishonourably.
View of Rome in 1493
In any case, Nicholas asserted in a stable way the temporal power
of the Papacy, a power in which the Emperor was to have no part at
all. In this way, the coronation and the marriage of
Frederick III, Holy Roman
Emperor on March 16, 1452, was more a civil ceremony. The
Papacy now controlled Rome with a strong hand. A plot by
Stefano Porcari, whose aim was the
restoration of the Republic, was ruthlessly suppressed on January
1453. Porcari was hanged together with the
other plotters, Francesco Gabadeo, Pietro de Monterotondo, Battista
Sciarra and Angiolo Ronconi, but the Pope gained a treacherous
reputation, as when the execution was beginning he was too drunk to
confirm the grace he had previously given to Sciarra and
Ronconi.
He also
designed urban renewal in collaboration with Leon Battista Alberti, including the
construction of a new St Peter's Basilica.
Nicholas' successor
Calixtus III
neglected the new cultural policy of Nicholas, devoting himself
instead to his greatest passion, the love for his nephews. The
Tuscan Pius II,
who took the reins after his death in
1458, was
a great Humanist, but did little for Rome. During his reign
Lorenzo Valla demonstrated that the
Donation of Constantine was
a forgery. Pius was the first pope to use guns, in campaign against
the rebel barons Savelli in the neighbourhood of Rome, in
1461. One year later the moving to Rome of the head of
the apostle
St. Andrew produced a great
number of pilgrims. The reign of
Pope Paul
II (
1464-
1471) was
notable only for the reintroduction of the
Carnival, which was to become a very popular feast
in Rome in the following centuries. In the same year (
1468) a plot was discovered against the pope, organized
by the intellectuals of the
Roman
Academy founded by
Pomponio
Leto. The plotters were sent to Castel Sant'Angelo.
More important by far was the pontificate of
Sixtus IV. In order to favour his relative
Girolamo Riario, he promoted the
unsuccessful
Congiura dei Pazzi against the
Medici of Florence (April 26, 1478) and in
Rome fought the
Colonna and the
Orsini. The personal politics of
intrigues and wars needed much money, but in spite of this Sixtus
was a true patron of art in the wake of
Nicholas V.
He reopened the Academy and reorganized
the Collegio degli Abbreviatori, and in 1471
started the construction of the Vatican Library
, whose first curator was Platina. The
Library was officially founded on June 15, 1475.
He restored several
churches, including Santa Maria del Popolo
, the Aqua Virgo and
the Hospital of the Holy Spirit, paved some streets and also built
a famous bridge on the Tiber which still today carries his
name. However, his main building project was the
Sistine
Chapel
in the Vatican Palace
. Its decoration called on some of the most
renowned artists of that age, including
Mino da Fiesole,
Sandro Botticelli,
Domenico Ghirlandaio,
Pietro Perugino,
Luca Signorelli and
Pinturicchio, and in the
16th century Michelangelo painted it with his famous
masterpiece and made it one of the most outstanding monuments of
the world. Sixtus died on August 12, 1484. He is considered the
first Pope-king of Rome.
Chaos, corruption and nepotism appeared in Rome under the reign of
his successors,
Innocent VIII and
Pope Alexander VI (
1492-
1503). During the vacation
period between the death of the former and the election of the
latter there were 220 murders in the city. Alexander had to face
Charles VIII of France, who
invaded Italy in
1494 and entered in Rome on
December 31 of that year.
The Pope could only
barricade himself into Castel Sant'Angelo, which had been turned into a true fortress by
Antonio da Sangallo the
Younger. In the end, the skilful Alexander was able to
gain the support of the king, assigning his son
Cesare Borgia as military counsellor for the
subsequent invasion of the
Kingdom of
Naples. Rome was safe and, as the King directed himself
southwards, the Pope again changed his position, joining the
anti-French League of the Italian States which finally compelled
Charles to flee to France.
The most
nepotist Pope of all, Alexander favoured his ruthless son Cesare,
creating for him a personal duchy out of territories of the
Papal
States, and banning from Rome the Orsini family, Cesare's
most relentless enemy. In
1500 the city
hosted a new Jubilee, but its street grew even more unsafe as,
especially at night, when they were controlled by bands of lawless
"bravi". Cesare himself assassinated
Alfonso of Bisceglie, his sister
Lucrezia's, as well as, presumably,
the Pope's son, Giovanni of Gandia.
The Renaissance had a great impact on Rome's face, with works like
the
Pietà by Michelangelo and
the frescoes of the
Borgia
Apartment, all made during Innocent's reign. Rome reached the
highest point of splendour under
Pope
Julius II (
1503-
1513)
and his successors
Leo X and
Clement VII, both members of the Medici
family. In this twenty-years period Rome became the greatest centre
of art of the world.
The old St. Peter's Basilica was demolished and a new one begun.
The city
hosted artists like Bramante, who
built the temple of San Pietro in Montorio
and planned a great project to renovate the
Vatican. Raphael, who in Rome
became the most famous painter of Italy creating frescos in the
Cappella
Niccolina
, the Villa Farnesina
, the Raphael's Rooms,
plus many other famous paintings. Michelangelo started
the decoration of the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and executed the famous statue of the Moses for the tomb of Julius.
Rome lost in part its religious character, becoming increasingly a
true Renaissance city, with a great number of popular feasts, horse
races, parties, intrigues and licentious episodes. Its economy was
rich, with the presence of several Tuscan bankers, including
Agostino Chigi, who was a friend of
Raphael and a patron of arts. Before his early death,
Raphael also promoted for the first time the
preservation of the ancient ruins.
Sack of Rome and Counter-Reformation
In
1527 the ambiguous policy followed by the
second
Medici Pope,
Pope Clement VII, resulted in the dramatic
sack of the city by the unruly
Imperial troops of
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor.
After the execution of some 1,000 defenders, the pillage began. The
city was devastated for several days, many of the citizens were
killed or took shelter outside the walls. Of 189
Swiss Guards on duty only 42 survived.
The Pope
himself was imprisoned for months in Castel Sant'Angelo. The sack marked the end of one of the most
splendid eras of modern Rome.
The
1525's Jubilee resulted in a farce, as
Martin Luther's claims had spread
criticism and even despise against the Pope's greed of money
throughout Europe. The prestige of Rome was then challenged by the
defections of the churches of Germany and England.
Pope Paul III (
1534-
1549) tried to recover the
situation by summoning the
Council of
Trento, although being, at the same time, the most nepotist
Pope of all.
He even separated Parma
and
Piacenza
from the Papal States to create an independent duchy for his son Pier Luigi.
He
continued the patronage of art supporting the Michelangelo's
Last Judgment, asking him to
renovate the Campidoglio and the on-going construction of St.
Peter's. After the shock of the sack, he also called
the brilliant architect Giuliano da
Sangallo the Younger to strengthen the walls of the Leonine City
.
The need for renovation in the religious costumes became evident in
the vacancy period after Paulus' death, when the streets of Rome
became seat of masked carousels which satirized the Cardinals
attending the
conclave. His two
immediate successors were feeble figures who did nothing to escape
the actual Spanish suzerainty over Rome.
Paul IV, elected in 1555,
was a member of the anti-Spanish party, but his policy resulted in
the Neapolitan troops of the viceroy again besieging Rome in
1556. Paul sued for peace, but had to
accept the supremacy of
Philip II of
Spain. He was one of the most hated Popes of all, and, after
his death the raging populace burned the
Holy Inquisition's palace and destroyed his
marble statue on the Campidoglio. Paul's
Counter-Reformation views are well shown
by his order that a central area of Rome, around the
Porticus Octaviae, be delimited,
creating the famous
Roman Ghetto,the
very constricted area in which the city's
Jews
were forced to live.
View of Rome (north), ca. 1640
View of Rome (south), ca. 1640
The
Counter-Reformation gained
pace under his successors, the milder
Pope
Pius IV and the severe
Saint Pius V.
The former was a nepotist lover of court splendours, but more
severe costumes arrived anyway through the ideas of his advisor,
the prelate
Charles Borromeo, who
was to become one of the most popular figures among the Rome's
people. Pius V and Borromeo gave Rome a true Counter-Reformation
character. All pomp was removed from the court, the jokers were
expelled, and cardinals and bishops were obliged to live in the
city. Blasphemy and concubinage were severely punished. Prostitutes
were expelled or confined in a reserved district. The Inquisition's
power in the city was reasserted, and its palace rebuilt with an
increased space for prisons.
During this period Michelangelo and opened
the Porta
Pia
and turned the Baths of Diocletian into the spectacular
basilica of Santa Maria degli Angeli e dei
Martiri
, where Pius IV was buried.
The pontificate of his successor,
Gregory XIII, was considered a failure. As
he tried to use milder measures than those of St. Pius, the worst
element of the Roman population felt free to scourge again the
streets.
The French writer and philosopher Montaigne maintained that "life and
goods were never as unsure as at the time of Gregorius XIII,
perhaps", and that a confraternity even held homosexual marriage in
the church of San Giovanni a Porta Latina
. The courtesans repressed by Pius had
now returned.
Sixtus V was of very different temper.
Although short (
1585-
1590),
his reign however remembered as one of the most effective in the
modern Rome's history. He was even tougher than Pius V, and was
variously nicknamed
castigamatti ("punisher of the mad"),
papa di ferro ("Iron Pope"),
dictator and even,
ironically,
demon, since no other Pope before him pursued
with such a determination the reform of the church and the
costumes. Sixtus profoundly reorganized the Papal States'
administration, and cleaned the streets of Rome of thugs,
procurers, dueling and so on. Even the nobles and Cardinals could
not consider themselves free from the arms of Sixtus' police. The
money from taxes, which were not now wasted in corruption,
permitted an ambitious building program. Some ancient aqueducts
were restored, and new one, the
Acquedotto Felice (from Sixtus' name,
Felice Peretti) was constructed.
New houses were built in the desolate
district of Esquilino
, Viminale
and Quirinale
, while old houses in the centre of the city
were destroyed to open new, larger streets. Sixtus's
principal aim was to make Rome a better destination for
pilgrimages, and the new streets were intended to permit a better
access to the major Basilicas. Old obelisks were moved or erected
to embellish St. John in Lateran, Santa Maria Maggiore and St.
Peter, as well as Piazza del Popolo, in front of Santa Maria del
Popolo.
Some of the most famous views of Rome in the
18th century were etched by
Giovanni Battista Piranesi. His
grand vision of classic Rome inspired many to visit the city and
examine the
ruins themselves.
|
Population of Rome |
| 350
BC |
30,000. |
| 270
BC |
100,000. |
| 100
BC |
>500,000. |
| 44
BC |
1,000,000. |
| 100 |
1,650,000. |
| 300 |
1,200,000. |
| 400 |
1,100,000. |
| 450 |
80,000. |
| 500 |
50,000. |
| 752 |
40,000. |
| 800 |
30,000. |
| 1000 |
30,000. |
| 1347 |
17,000. |
| 1519 |
50,000. |
| 1527 |
32,000. |
| 1590 |
90,000. |
| 1660 |
120,000. |
| 1798 |
150,000. |
| 1814 |
117,000. |
| 1832 |
138,000. |
| 1848 |
150,000. |
| 1871 |
244,000. |
| 1900 |
600,000. |
| 1921 |
692,000. |
| 1931 |
1,000,000. |
| 1944 |
1,600,000. |
| 1990 |
3,500,000. |
Italian unification (Risorgimento)
The rule of the Popes was interrupted by the short-lived
Roman Republic (
1798), which was built under the influence of the
French Revolution.
During Napoleon's reign, Rome was annexed into
his empire and was technically part of France. After the fall of Napoleon's Empire,
new states were created in Italy through the Congress of Vienna of
1814. The Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (Naple and Sicily) under
Bourbon Ferdinand IV, the restored Papal States, and the kingdom of
Piedmont-Sardinia under King Charles-Albert. The two regions of
Venetia and Lombardy were given to the Austrians under their direct
control for some time.
Another
Roman Republic
arose in
1849, within the framework of
revolutions of
1848. Two of the most influential figures of the
Italian unification,
Giuseppe Mazzini and
Giuseppe Garibaldi, fought for the
short-lived republic. However, the actions of these two great men
would not have resulted in unification without the sly leadership
of
Camille Cavour,
Prime Minister of
Piedmont-Sardinia.
In his attempt to unify Northern Italy under the kingdom of
Piedmont-Sardinia, Cavour enacted major industrialization of the
country in order to become the economic leader of Italy. In doing
so, he believed that the other states would naturally come under
his rule. Next, he sent the army of Piedmont to the Crimean War to
join the French and British. Making minor successes in the war
against Russia, cordial relations were established between
Piedmont-Sardinia and France; a relationship to be exploited in the
future.
The return of
Pope Pius IX in Rome,
with help of French troops, marked the exclusion of Rome from the
unification process that was embodied in the
Second Italian Independence
War and the
Mille expedition, after
which all the Italian peninsula, except Rome and
Venetia, would be unified under the
House of Savoy. Garibaldi first
attacked Sicily, luckily under the guise of passing British ships
and landing with little resistance.
Taking the island, Garibaldi's actions were publicly denounced by
Cavour but secretly encouraged via weapons supplements. This policy
or real-politik, where the ends justified the means of unification,
was continued as Garibaldi faced crossing the Strait of Messina.
Cavour privately asked the British navy to allow Garibaldi's troops
across the sea while publicly he again, denounced Garibaldi's
actions. The maneuver was a success and Garibaldi's military genius
carried him on to take the entire kingdom.
Cavour then moved to take Venetia and Lombardy via an alliance with
France. The Italians and French together would attack the two
states with France getting the city of Nice and the region of Savoy
in return. However, the French pulled out of their agreement soon
after, enraging Cavour who subsequently resigned. Only Lombardy had
been captured at the time.
With French units still stationed at Rome however, Cavour, being
called back to office, foresaw a possibility of Garibaldi attacking
the Papal States and accidentally disrupting French-Italian
relations. The army of Sardinia was therefore mobilized to attack
the Papal States but remain outside Rome.
In the Austro-Prussian war however, a deal was made between the new
Italy and Prussia, where Italy would attack Austria in return for
the region of Venetia. The war was a major success for the
Prussians (though the Italians did not win a single battle), and
the northern front of Italy was complete.
In July,
1870, the
Franco-Prussian War started, and French
Emperor
Napoleon III could no
longer protect the Papal States.
Soon after, the Italian army under
general Raffaele Cadorna entered
Rome on September 20, after a cannonade
of three hours, through Porta
Pia (see capture of
Rome). The Leonine City was occupied the following day, a provisional
Government Joint created by Cadorna out of local noblemen to avoid
the rise of the radical factions. Rome and
Latium were annexed to the Kingdom of Italy after a
plebiscite held on October 2. 133,681
voted for annexion, 1,507 opposed (in Rome itself, there were
40,785 "Yes" and 57 "No").
Initially, the Italian government had offered to let Pope Pius IX
keep the Leonine City, but the pope rejected the offer because
acceptance would have been an implied endorsement of the legitimacy
of the Italian kingdom's rule over his former domain. Pope Pius IX
declared himself a
prisoner in
the Vatican, although he was not actually restrained from
coming and going. Officially, the capital was moved from Florence
to Rome in early
1871.
Current state
Today's Rome reflects the stratification of the epochs of its long
history, but it also is a huge contemporary metropolis. Its vast
historical centre contains many areas from Ancient Rome, areas from
medieval times, many palaces and artistic treasures from the
Renaissance era, many fountains,
churches and palaces from
baroque times, as
well as many examples of the
Art
Nouveau,
Neoclassic,
Modernism,
Rationalism
and any other artistic styles of the XIX and XX centuries (the city
is in fact considered a living encyclopedia and museum of the last
3000 years of western art). The historical centre is identified as
within the limits of the ancient imperial walls.
Some central areas
were reorganised after the unification (1880–1910 - Roma
Umbertina), and some important additions and adaptations made
during the Fascist period, with the
discussed creation of the Via
dei Fori Imperiali, of the Via della
Conciliazione in front of the Vatican (for the construction of
which a large part of the old Borgo
neighbourhood was destroyed) and the founding
of new quartieri (among which EUR, San Basilio,
Garbatella, Cinecittà, Trullo, Quarticciolo and, on the coast,
the restructuring of Ostia
) and the inclusion of bordering villages
(Labaro, Osteria del Curato, Quarto
Miglio, Capannelle, Pisana,
Torrevecchia, Ottavia,
Casalotti). These expansions were needed to house
the huge increase of population caused by the centralisation of the
Italian state.
During
World War II, Rome suffered few
bombings (notably at San Lorenzo) and relatively little
damage because none of the sides involved wanted to endanger the
life of Pope Pius XII in Vatican City. Rome
fell to
the
Allies on June 4, 1944.
It was the first capital of an
Axis
nation to fall, and was relatively undamaged because the Germans
had declared it an "open city" and withdrawn, meaning that the
Allies did not have to fight their way in.
After the war, Rome continued to expand due to Italy's growing
state administration and industry, with the creation of new
quartieri and suburbs. The current official population
stands at 2.5 million; during the business day workers increase
this figure to over 3.5 million. This is a dramatic increase from
previous figures, which were 138,000 in
1825,
244,000 in
1871, 692,000 in
1921, 1,600,000 in
1931.
Rome
hosted the 1960 Summer
Olympics, using many ancient sites such as the Villa
Borghese
and the Thermae of Caracalla
as venues. For the Olympic Games many new
structures were created, notably the new large Olympic Stadium
(which was also enlarged and renewed to host qualification and the
final match of the 1990 FIFA
football
World Cup), the Villaggio
Olimpico (Olympic Village, created to host the athletes and
redeveloped after the games as a residential district),
etc.
Many of
the monuments of Rome were restored by the Italian state and by the
Vatican for the 2000
Jubilee.
Being
the capital city of Italy, Rome hosts
all the principal institutions of the nation, like the Presidency
of the Republic, the government (and its single
Ministeri), the Parliament, the main judicial Courts, and
the diplomatic representatives of all the countries for the states
of Italy and the Vatican City (curiously, Rome also hosts, in the
Italian part of its territory, the Embassy of Italy for the Vatican
City, a unique case of an Embassy within the boundaries of its own
country). Many international institutions are located in
Rome, notably cultural and scientific ones - such as the American
Institute, the British School, the French Academy, the Scandinavian
Institutes, the German Archaeological Institute - for the honour of
scholarship in the Eternal City, and humanitarian ones, such as the
FAO.
Rome today is one of the most important
tourist
destinations of the world, due to the incalculable immensity of
its archaeological and artistic treasures, as well as for the charm
of its unique traditions, the beauty of its panoramic views, and
the majesty of its magnificent "villas" (
parks).
Among the most significant resources:
plenty of museums - (Musei Capitolini
, the Vatican Museums
, Galleria Borghese
, and a great many others) — aqueducts,
fountains, churches, palaces, historical buildings, the monuments
and ruins of the Roman
Forum, and the Catacombs.
Among
its hundreds of churches, Rome contains the only four Major
Basilicas of the Catholic Church:
Basilica di San Giovanni in Laterano (St. John
Lateran
, Rome's cathedral), Basilica di San Pietro
in Vaticano (St. Peter's Basilica), Basilica di San Paolo fuori le Mura
(St. Paul Outside the Walls
), and Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore
(St.
Mary Major
). Along with the minor basilica of
Basilica di San Lorenzo fuori le Mura (St.
Lawrence Outside the Walls
), those churches correspond to the five ancient sees of chalcedonian Christianity namely
Rome,Constatinople,Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem
respectively.The Bishop of Rome is the
Pope.
Footnotes
Source
External links
.
. Rome is replaced by Constantinople
.
.
and founding of the Vittoriano
.
.
Top topics
Wikis
Quiz
Map
Search
