Italy

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Ancient Italia
Peoples
Unification
Life Under Rome
Magna Italia
Provinces
Legacy
Reading

Ancient Italia

The Italia of the ancient world was very similar in size and shape to the one today. The name “Italia” was a word used by the Greeks originally to describe the current Italian region of Calabria, before it became extended to the whole of the peninsula. Until the late 1^st century BCE, Italia was meant to be everywhere south of the Po River valley, which meant excluding all of what is today Northern Italy.

Peoples

Prior to the Romans, the idea of a united Italian peninsula had never existed. Ancient Italia consisted of several “tribes”. These were peoples with roads, coinage, militaries, and towns, but none of them a thought of themselves as a nation state. They included the Umbrians, Etruscans, Gauls, Samnites, Latins, and the Greek colonies of Magna Graecia that lined the coastline of the south.

Unification

The Romans “unified” Italia through a series of wars in the late 4^th century and early 3^rd centuries BCE, known as the Samnite Wars. The Samnites lived in the Southern Apenines and waged war with Rome as it began to expand. The Romans eventually fought the Greek general Pyrrhus over the Greek colonies. After many “pyrrhic” victories, his armies left the peninsula, and the Romans conquered the Greek colonies anyway.

Life Under Rome

As the Romans expanded into Italia they asked that the conquered cities give soldiers to their war efforts, instead of taxes. They also extended Roman citizenship and/or voting rights to certain elites in conquered territories, thereby spreading their identity to successive generations. By unifying Italia, Rome had an endless supply of manpower for its foreign wars. Centuries later in the 1^st century BCE, the peoples of Italia revolted, again led by the Samnites, in what was known as the Social War. This time, it was not to fight the Romans for supremacy, but for full rights as Roman citizens for all Italians.

Magna Italia

Under the reigns of Julius and Augustus Caesar, the borders of Italy were expanded to encompass the Alps (and all of what is today Northern Italy) which formed a natural protective barrier against any wayward generals thinking of invading the capital the way Caesar had done himself. By that point, this region, once known as Cisalpine Gaul, had been completely colonized by Italians (and the Celtic peoples either mostly driven out or killed).

Provinces

The islands of Sicily and Sardinia, today a part of Italy, were considered the first two Roman provinces (with Sardinia joined with Corsica, now a part of France). They were never considered a part of Italia but were used as the templates for how to govern overseas territories. Sardinia’s coastline was colonized while the rough interiors were left to the natives. Sicily became a major source of grain and hosted many slave estates, with the famous Greek city of Syracuse remaining the island’s capital.

Legacy

The citizens of Italia were the top of the Roman food chain throughout the Empire’s many centuries, receiving the lion’s share of the Empire’s largesse, even after Rome had ceased to be the political capital. First Milan and eventually Ravenna became the main capitals of the Western Roman Empire after the empire’s permanent division in the late 4^th century CE. After the fall of the Western Empire and the invasion of the Lombards in the 6^th century, Italy would be divided for almost 1,300 years. In the mid-to-late 19^th century, it was reunified (with Sicily and Sardinia added in) in the Risorigimento.

Reading

A terrific book about how the Romans unified Italy and how they spread their identity there and, later, to the entire empire, I highly recommend S.P.Q.R. by Mary Beard which is a fantastic read.

Italy

Italy

ABOUT

Ancient Italia

Peoples

Unification

Life Under Rome

Magna Italia

Provinces

Legacy

Reading

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