Rome Day Tour from Tuscany and Umbria

Rome: Legend has it that it was founded on 21st April 753 BC, by Romulus, the first of the famous seven kings of Rome. In 509 BC it was proclaimed a republic, and then began its ascent and true development. In the following centuries, in fact, firstly it subdued the other Italian populations, including the Etruscans and the Magna Graecia, and it widened its borders even over vast areas of the Mediterranean (from North Africa to Spain, from Gaul to Greece). In the first Century BC, the city was shaken by a series of civil wars, which determined the passage from Republic to Empire, an Empire which rapidly included the world, as it was known at that time, from Great Britain to Egypt, from the Atlantic coast to India. In this period, Rome was an enormous city which had approximately 2 million inhabitants, a modern city with state of the art infrastructure, a cosmopolitan city with people from all the provinces of the Empire, a city rich with palaces and public works, built to add lustre to the wealth and power of its Empire. The Centuries of the Empire represent the maturing of the Roman civilisation, a civilisation which, at par with that of the ancient Greece, and with the Italian Renaissance, represents the foundation of modern western society. Almost simultaneously with the fall of the Empire, the city became the seat of the Pope, and therefore the spiritual centre for Christianity. During the Middle Ages, Rome, together with the whole world, went through a strong demographic and economic decline (the area of the Colosseum and of Forum was aimed at the use of sheep!), but nevertheless it kept a dominant role in Medieval political life, thanks to the importance of the church, and the Pope who lived there. During the Renaissance and the following centuries, the city was reborn and returned to its former glory, thanks to urban, economic and social modernization, put in place by the ruling Popes of that time. With the sole exception of Napoleon from the XVIII and XIX Centuries, Rome continued to be ruled by the Catholic church until 1870, the year in which it was annexed to the Kingdom of Italy, of which it became the capital. During the second world war the city was occupied by Germans, from whom they were subjected to many raids, as also an intense bombardment by the allied army, who freed it in 1944. In the following decades it was the period known as the Sweet Life (dolce Vita) and, visited by artists, writers, thinkers, became a capital of cinema, of fashion and culture of that time. In 1956, the first International Treaty was signed in Rome, which established and bound the six founding states in the Economic European Community. Kings, Emperors, Popes, architects, painters, philosophers, musicians, politicians, poets, directors, writers … during its thousand year history, many well known figures around the world were born here, or/and are strongly tied to the city; among the many to be remembered are Romulus and Julius Caesar, the Emperors: Augustus, Nero, Marcus Aurelius and Constantine, the Latin poet, Virgil, the apostle Peter (first Pope in history), the artists: Michelangelo, Raffaello, Donatello, Caravaggio, Bernini, Canova and many others.

Do not miss! Colosseum, Forum, Vatican Museum, Saint Peter’s Basilica, Spanish Steps, Trevi Fountain, Piazza Navona, Piazza del Popolo, Piazza Venezia, Pantheon, Trastevere, Villa Borghese, Via Veneto, Via Condotti.