Calabria

Calabria, formerly Brutium, is a region in southern Italy which occupies the "toe" of the Italian peninsula south of Naples. It is bounded in the north by the region of Basilicata, region of Sicily in SW, to the west by the Tyrrhenian Sea, and to the east by the Ionian Sea. The region covers 15,080 km² and has a population of 2.05 million.

History

Greeks settled heavily along the coast at an early date and several of their settlements, including Sybaris, Crotona, and Locri, were numbered among the leading cities of Magna Graecia during the 6th and 5th centuries BC. Conquered by the Romans in the 3rd century BC, the region never regained its former prosperity. The inhabitants were in large part driven inland by the spread of malaria and, during the early Middle Ages, by pirate raids.

Related Topics:
Sybaris - Crotona - Locri - Magna Graecia - 6th - 5th centuries BC - 3rd century BC

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After several wars with rival Italian tribes, Many Romans, including Cicero, had vacation homes in Vibo Valentia. Calabria was for many years part of the Roman Empire and after its fall, was devastated during the Gothic War before it came under the rule of a local dux for the Byzantine Empire. In the 9th and 10th centuries, Calabria, which had been the rich breadbasket of Rome before Egypt was conquered, was the borderland between Byzantine rule and the Arab emirs in Sicily, subject to raids and skirmishes, depopulated and demoralized, with vibrant Greek monasteries providing fortresses of culture. In the 1060s, Normans under the leadership of Robert Guiscard's brother Roger established a presence in this borderland, organized a government along Byzantine lines that was run by the local Greek magnates of Calabria. In 1098, Pope Urban II bestowed on Roger the equivalence of an apostolic legate and the Hauteville clan formed the precursors of the Kingdom of Naples which in one form or another ruled Calabria until the unification of Italy. This kingdom itself came under many rulers: the Habsburg dynasties of both Spain and Austria; the French Bourbon dynasty, and briefly Napoleon's general Joachim Murat, who was executed in the small town of Pizzo.

Related Topics:
Gothic War - Byzantine Empire - Sicily - Normans - Robert Guiscard - Borderland - Urban II - Naples - Italy - Habsburg - Spain - Austria - Bourbon - Napoleon - Joachim Murat - Pizzo

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Throughout all this, Calabria remained a very rural and exploited region. The Aspromonte, a mountainous region of central Calabria, was the scene of a famous battle of the Risorgimento (unification of Italy), in which Garibaldi was wounded. Several of the important philosophers of the Risorgimento (namely, Bernardino Telesio from Cosenza, Gioacchino da Fiore from San Giovanni in Fiore, Tommaso Campanella from Stilo) came from Calabria, and famous Americans of Calabrian descent are almost too numerous to name. The seawater around Calabria is very clear, and there is a good level of tourist accommodation. The poet Gabriele d'Annunzio called the seafront at Reggio "The most beautiful kilometer in Italy".

Related Topics:
Aspromonte - Risorgimento - Garibaldi - Bernardino Telesio - Cosenza - Gioacchino da Fiore - San Giovanni in Fiore - Tommaso Campanella - Stilo - D'Annunzio

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