Roma

Rome (Italian and Latin: Roma) is the capital city of Italy and of the Lazio region, as well as the country's largest and most populous comune, with about 2.5 million residents (3.8 million considering the whole urbanised area, as represented by the Province of Rome). It is located in the central-western portion of the Italian peninsula, where the river Aniene joins the Tiber. As one of the largest cities in the European Union, the Comune di Roma has a gross domestic product of EUR97 billion in the year 2005, equal to 6.7% of Italy's GDP -- the highest proportion of GDP produced by any single Italian comune. The current Mayor of Rome is Walter Veltroni.

According to legend, the city of Rome was founded by the twins Romulus and Remus on April 21, 753 BC. Archaeological evidence supports claims that Rome was inhabited since the 8th century BC and earlier.[2] The city was the cradle of Roman civilization that produced the largest and longest-lasting empire of classical antiquity that reached its greatest extent in AD 117. The city was pivotal and responsible for the spread of Greco-Roman culture that endures to this day. Rome is also identified with Christianity and the Catholic Church and has been the episcopal seat of the Popes since the 1st century AD. The State of the Vatican City, the sovereign territory of the Holy See and smallest nation in the world, is an enclave of Rome.

Rome, Caput mundi ("capital of the world"), Limen Apostolorum ("threshold of the Apostles"), la citta dei sette colli ("the city of the seven hills") or simply l'Urbe ("the City"),[3] is thoroughly modern and cosmopolitan. As one of the few major European cities that escaped World War II relatively unscathed, central Rome remains essentially Renaissance in character. The Historic Centre of Rome is listed by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site[4] by virtue of its three thousand years of accumulated history and art: a city of the divine and the sublime, of gods, kings, emperors and popes -- Citta Eterna -- the "Eternal City".

Culture and society

Religion

The Religio Romana constituted the major religion of the city in antiquity. However, several other religions and imported mystery cults remained represented within its ever-expanding boundaries, including Judaism, whose presence in the city dates back from the Roman Republic and was sometimes forcibly confined to the Roman Ghetto, as well as Christianity. Despite initial persecutions, by the early 4th century, Christianity had become so widespread that it was legalised in 313 by Emperor Constantine I, and later made official religion of the Roman Empire in 380 by Emperor Theodosius I, allowing it to spread further and eventually wholly replace the declining Religio Romana.

Rome became the pre-eminent Christian city (vis-a-vis Antioch and Alexandria, and later Constantinople and Jerusalem) based on the tradition that Saint Peter and Saint Paul were martyred in the city during the 1st century, coupled with the city's political importance. The Bishop of Rome, later known as the Pope, claimed primacy over all Bishops and therefore all Christians on the basis that he is the successor of Saint Peter, upon whom Jesus built his Church; his prestige has been enhanced since 313 through donations by Roman emperors and patricians, including the Lateran Palace and patriarchal basilicas, as well as the obviously growing influence of the Church over the failing civil imperial authority. Papal authority has been exercised over the centuries with varying degrees of success, at times triggering divisions among Christians, until the present.

With the increasing chaos and disorder leading to the collapse of the Roman Empire in 476, the popes assumed more and more civil authority first in Rome and in the surrounding territories. Rome became the centre of the Catholic Church and the capital city of the Papal States; consequently, a great number of churches, convents and other religious buildings were erected in the city, sometimes above the ruins of older pre-Christian sites of worship. Churches proliferated during the Renaissance, when the most notable churches currently in Rome were built (this includes St. Peter's basilica on the Vatican Hill (the largest church in the world) and the city cathedral of St. John at the Lateran. The Papacy established its residence first in the Lateran Palace, then in the Quirinal Palace. When Rome was annexed by force to the newly unified Kingdom of Italy In 1870, Pope Pius IX retired to the Vatican, proclaiming himself a prisoner of the Savoy monarchy and leading to decades of conflict between the neonate state and the Catholic Church. This was resolved in 1929, when the Lateran Treaties were signed in Rome, establishing the right for the Holy See to govern the Vatican City as an independent, sovereign state. The patron saints of Rome remain Saint Peter and Saint Paul (or, as they are collectively referred to in this context, "the most holy Saints Peter and Paul"), both celebrated on June 29.