In antiquity, Italy was home to numerous peoples; the Latin city of Rome, founded as a Kingdom, became a Republic that conquered the Mediterranean world and ruled it for centuries as an Empire. With the spread of Christianity, Rome became the seat of the Catholic Church and the Papacy. During the Early Middle Ages, Italy experienced the fall of the Western Roman Empire and inward migration from Germanic tribes. By the 11th century, Italian city-states and maritime republics expanded, bringing renewed prosperity through commerce and laying the groundwork for modern capitalism. The Italian Renaissance flourished during the 15th and 16th centuries and spread to the rest of Europe. Italian explorers discovered new routes to the Far East and the New World, leading the European Age of Discovery. However, centuries of rivalry and infighting between city-states left the peninsula divided. During the 17th and 18th centuries, Italian economic importance waned significantly. (Full article...)
Founded with the name of Sport-Club Juventus, initially as an athletics club, it is the second oldest of its kind still active in the country after Genoa's football section (1893) and has competed every season of the premier club division (reformulated in different formats until the Serie A inception in 1929) since its debut in 1900 with the exception of the 2006–07 season, being managed by the industrialAgnelli family almost continuously since 1923. The relationship between the club and that dynasty is the oldest and longest in national sports, making Juventus one of the first professional sporting clubs ante litteram in the country, having established itself as a major force in the national stage since the 1930s and at confederation level since the mid-1970s, and becoming, in a nearly stable basis, one of the top-ten wealthiest in world football in terms of value, revenue and profit since the mid-1990s, being listed on the Borsa Italiana since 2001. (Full article...)
The cuisine of ancient Rome changed greatly over the duration of the civilization's existence. Dietary habits were affected by the political changes from kingdom to republic to empire, and Roman trading with foreigners along with the empire's enormous expansion exposed Romans to many new foods, provincial culinary habits and cooking methods.
In the beginning, dietary differences between Roman social classes were not great, but disparities developed with the empire's growth. (Full article...)
Image 14The Roman Empire provided an inspiration for the medieval European. Although the Holy Roman Empire rarely acquired a serious geopolitical reality, it possessed great symbolic significance. (from Culture of Italy)
Image 32The cover of the Corriere dei Piccoli on 11 July 1911 carries a cartoon strip in the Italian style without speech bubbles. (from Culture of Italy)
Image 40The Colosseum, originally known as the Flavian Amphitheatre, is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, the largest ever built in the Roman Empire. (from Culture of Italy)
Image 42The espresso comes from the Italian esprimere, which means "to express," and refers to the process by which hot water is forced under pressure through ground coffee. (from Culture of Italy)