About Italy

FAST FACTS

OFFICIAL NAME: Italian Republic

FORM OF GOVERNMENT: Republic

CAPITAL: Rome

POPULATION: 62,246,674

OFFICIAL LANGUAGE: Italian

MONEY: Euro

AREA: 116,324 square miles (301,277 square kilometers)

MAJOR MOUNTAIN RANGES: Alps, Apennines

MAJOR RIVERS: Po, Adige, Arno, Tiber

Italy is a country in central Europe that sits on a peninsula that juts out into the Mediterranean Sea. Italy is sometimes described as a country shaped like a boot because it has some of the world’s most diverse and scenic landscapes. The Alps, which are among the world’s most difficult mountains, stand at its vast crest. The highest points in Italy are located along Monte Rosa, which is in Switzerland, and Mont Blanc, which is in France. The western Alps gaze out over a scene of Alpine lakes and glacier-carved valleys that stretches all the way down to the Po River and Piedmont.

Tuscany is the country’s most well-known area, located to the south of the cisalpine region. The lofty Apennine Range emanates from the central Alps and runs the length of the country, widening around Rome to cover nearly the whole width of the Italian peninsula. The Apennines thin south of Rome and are flanked by two broad coastal plains, one facing the Tyrrhenian Sea and the other facing the Adriatic Sea. Wild boars, wolves, asps, and bears inhabit much of the lower Apennine chain, which is home to a diverse range of species rarely seen elsewhere in western Europe, including wild boars, wolves, asps, and bears.

The southern Apennines are also tectonically unstable, with numerous active volcanoes, including Vesuvius, which spews ash and steam into the air above Naples and its island-strewn bay on a regular basis. The islands of Sicily and Sardinia lie at the bottom of the country, in the Mediterranean Sea.

This rough landscape has influenced Italy’s political geography. Italy’s towns and cities have a history of self-sufficiency, independence, and mutual mistrust due to the lack of direct highways between them and the usually difficult journey from one point to another. Today’s visitors marvel at how different each town is from the next, at the marked contrasts in food and accent, and at the many subtle differences that make Italy seem less like a single nation and more like a collection of culturally connected places in an unusually lovely setting.

Italy’s location on the Mediterranean connected it to old trading routes. The Italian peninsula became the core of a large empire that lasted for centuries after the city of Rome rose to power.

Around 1200 B.C., the earliest Italian societies arose. Greeks settled in the south around 800 B.C., while Etruscans arose in the center. The Etruscans established Etruria in the sixth century B.C., a confederation of states. Meanwhile, to the south of Etruria, the Latin and Sabine peoples combined to establish Rome, a powerful city-state.

For over a century, Etruscan kings ruled Rome. However, in 510 B.C., the Romans expelled the Etruscans and went on to capture the entire peninsula. After that, they set out to create a massive empire. The Roman Empire spanned from Portugal to Syria, Britain, and North Africa at its peak in A.D. 117.

In 27 B.C., Octavian, the first solo emperor of Rome, assumed the name Augustus Caesar. The empire thrived for more than 400 years. It was, however, in decline by the fourth century A.D. The empire was split in half in 395, and the final emperor was deposed in 476 by Germanic tribes from the north.

Italian art, architecture, and culture have influenced people all over the world since the emergence of the Roman Empire. Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo are two well-known Italian painters. The Catholic Church, which is ruled from Vatican City, a city-state bordered by Rome, is also based in Italy.

In Italian society, the family is at the core. Even if they have a job, many young people live at home until they are in their 30s. When parents retire, they frequently relocate to their children’s homes.

Italians and their forefathers have cleaned fields, grazed livestock, and hunted wild animals for 22 centuries. Forests that formerly covered vast swaths of land are vanished. However, several national parks and distant areas of the country still contain wilderness that has mostly been unspoiled by humanity.

Forests occupy the lower slopes of the Italian Alps. Meadows rise above these woods in the spring, bursting with highly suited wildflowers. During their annual migration to Africa, millions of birds stop in Italy to rest.