Italian history timeline

This chart puts 25 states of Italy on one timeline in order, from Roman Kingdom (c. 753 to 509 BCE) to Italian Republic (1946 CE to the present).

See it on the interactive chart

Latin and Romance
Isolates and small families
Germanic
Greek

Italy was divided among many states before 1861, so this page shows the best known. The Europe page lists more. Every bar links to a page listing the sources its dates were checked against.

In order

Roman Kingdom

c. 753 to 509 BCE. about 244 years. capital Rome. Italy, Europe.

By tradition founded by Romulus in 753 BCE and ruled by seven kings, the last three of them Etruscan. The Romans expelled Tarquin the Proud and set up a republic.

Etruscan civilization

c. 720 to 90 BCE. about 630 years. capital Veii, Tarquinia, Caere and other cities. Italy, Europe.

City-states of Etruria, loosely joined in a league of twelve, whose pre-Indo-European language is only partly understood. Rome took their cities one by one, starting with Veii in 396 BCE, and granted the Etruscans citizenship in 90 BCE.

Roman Republic

509 to 27 BCE. about 482 years. capital Rome. Italy, Europe.

Governed by two annual consuls and the Senate, Rome conquered Italy, destroyed Carthage and took Greece and Gaul. Its civil wars ended with Octavian as sole ruler.

Roman Empire

27 BCE to 395 CE. about 421 years. capital Rome, later Constantinople. Italy, Europe.

In 27 BCE the Senate gave Octavian the title Augustus, marking him as the first emperor. The empire reached its greatest extent under Trajan and encircled the Mediterranean. Theodosius I, the last emperor to rule both East and West, died in 395.

Western Roman Empire

395 to 476 CE. about 81 years. capital Milan, later Ravenna. Italy, Europe.

The western half of the empire, often dominated by generals of barbarian origin while the Visigoths, Vandals and others carved kingdoms from its provinces. Odoacer forced Romulus Augustulus to abdicate in 476.

Kingdom of Odoacer

476 to 493 CE. about 17 years. capital Ravenna. Italy, Europe.

Odoacer, a soldier of non-Roman birth, ruled Italy as king while formally recognising the eastern emperor Zeno. Theodoric the Ostrogoth besieged him in Ravenna and murdered him after the city surrendered in 493.

Ostrogothic Kingdom

493 to 553 CE. about 60 years. capital Ravenna. Italy, Europe.

Theodoric the Great ruled Italy from Ravenna with Roman officials such as Boethius, whom he later executed in 524. Justinian's armies invaded in 535 and destroyed the kingdom by 553.

Byzantine Italy (Exarchate of Ravenna)

554 to 751 CE. about 197 years. capital Ravenna. Italy, Europe.

Justinian's reconquered Italy, governed from Ravenna. The Lombards took most of the interior from 568 and captured Ravenna in 751.

Lombard Kingdom

568 to 774 CE. about 206 years. capital Pavia. Italy, Europe.

The Lombards under Alboin invaded Italy in 568 and ruled the north and centre from Pavia. After the Lombard king Desiderius warred on lands claimed by Pope Adrian I, Charlemagne conquered the kingdom in 774.

Republic of Venice

c. 697 to 1797 CE. about 1,100 years. capital Venice. Italy, Europe.

Ruled by an elected doge from, by tradition, 697, Venice built a trading empire in the Adriatic and Aegean and steered the Fourth Crusade to Constantinople. Napoleon ended it in 1797.

Papal States

756 to 1870 CE. about 1,114 years. capital Rome. Italy, Europe.

Pepin the Short gave Pope Stephen II lands in central Italy in 756. The popes ruled as temporal princes until Italian troops took Rome in 1870.

County and Duchy of Savoy

c. 1003 to 1720 CE. about 717 years. capital Chambery, later Turin. Italy, Europe.

Humbert the White-Handed was made a count in 1003, and his descendants, the House of Savoy, were raised to dukes in 1416. Emmanuel Philibert moved the capital from Chambery to Turin in 1562.

Republic of Genoa

c. 1099 to 1797 CE. about 698 years. capital Genoa. Italy, Europe.

A maritime republic with colonies from Crimea to Chios, and Venice's long-standing rival. In the early modern period it turned to banking and became a lasting partner of the Spanish Empire. Napoleon replaced it with the Ligurian Republic in 1797.

Republic of Florence

1115 to 1532 CE. about 417 years. capital Florence. Italy, Europe.

A wool and banking republic whose Medici rulers patronised Brunelleschi, Botticelli and Michelangelo. After a siege backed by Charles V, a new constitution of 1532 made the Medici hereditary dukes.

Kingdom of Sicily

1130 to 1282 CE. about 152 years. capital Palermo. Italy, Europe.

Roger II united the Norman conquests in Sicily and southern Italy and was crowned king in 1130. The crown passed to the Hohenstaufen emperor Frederick II, and the Sicilian Vespers of 1282 threw off Angevin rule on the island.

Kingdom of Naples

1282 to 1816 CE. about 534 years. capital Naples. Italy, Europe.

The mainland half of the old Sicilian kingdom, kept by the Angevins after 1282 and later ruled by Aragon, Spain, Austria and the Bourbons. It was one of the largest Italian states and, around 1600, the most populous Spanish holding outside Castile.

Duchy of Milan

1395 to 1796 CE. about 401 years. capital Milan. Italy, Europe.

The Visconti and then the Sforza ruled it, and under the Sforza it became one of the wealthiest states of the Renaissance. Spain ruled it from 1556 and Austria from 1707 until Napoleon took it in 1796.

Duchy and Grand Duchy of Tuscany

1532 to 1859 CE. about 327 years. capital Florence. Italy, Europe.

The Medici duchy of Florence, raised to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany in 1569 and ruled by Habsburg-Lorraine from 1737. Its grand duke was deposed in 1859, and a plebiscite in 1860 approved its annexation.

Kingdom of Sardinia (Piedmont-Sardinia)

1720 to 1861 CE. about 141 years. capital Turin. Italy, Europe.

The House of Savoy took the title of King of Sardinia in 1720. Under Cavour and Victor Emmanuel II it led the unification of Italy.

Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia

1815 to 1866 CE. about 51 years. capital Milan and Venice. Italy, Europe.

A crown land of the Austrian Empire created by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 from the former Duchy of Milan and Republic of Venice. Lombardy was lost in 1859 after the Second Italian War of Independence, and the rest joined the Kingdom of Italy in 1866.

Kingdom of the Two Sicilies

1816 to 1861 CE. about 45 years. capital Naples. Italy, Europe.

The Bourbon union of Naples and Sicily, the largest Italian state. Garibaldi's Thousand conquered it in 1860.

Kingdom of Italy

1861 to 1946 CE. about 85 years. capital Turin, Florence, then Rome. Italy, Europe.

Proclaimed in 1861 and completed with the capture of Rome in 1870, it fought on the winning side in the First World War. A referendum abolished the monarchy in 1946.

Fascist Italy

1922 to 1943 CE. about 21 years. capital Rome. Italy, Europe.

Mussolini's dictatorship invaded Ethiopia in 1935 and allied with Hitler. After the Allied landings in Sicily the king had him arrested in 1943, and Germany then set him up at the head of a puppet state in the north until 1945.

Italian Social Republic

1943 to 1945 CE. about 2 years. capital Salò (de facto). Italy, Europe.

German puppet state with limited recognition, created in occupied Italy after the German invasion of September 1943 and led by Benito Mussolini. Rome was its declared capital and Salò its de facto one. It was disbanded when Axis troops in Italy surrendered in May 1945.

Italian Republic

1946 CE to the present. about 79 years so far. capital Rome. Italy, Europe.

Created by the referendum of 1946, it joined NATO in 1949 and was a founding member of what became the European Union. Its economy boomed until the late 1960s in the Italian economic miracle.

Major events

753 BCE Traditional founding of Rome. Varro's chronology dates the legendary founding of Rome by Romulus to 753 BCE, still the basis of the Roman year count. Romans celebrated the city's birthday on 21 April. Source: Wikipedia: Founding of Rome
218 BCE Hannibal crosses the Alps. The Carthaginian general leads his army and elephants from Spain over the Alps into Italy and wins at Trebia, Trasimene and Cannae. Source: Wikipedia: Hannibal's crossing of the Alps, Wikipedia: Hannibal
216 BCE Battle of Cannae. Hannibal's Carthaginians and allies surround and practically annihilate a larger Roman and Italian army in Apulia. Ancient writers put the Roman dead at 50,000 (Appian, Plutarch) to 70,000 (Polybius), figures some modern writers doubt. Source: Wikipedia: Battle of Cannae
73 BCE Spartacus's slave revolt. About 70 gladiators escape a school at Capua and start a rebellion that grows to some 120,000 men, women and children within two years. Crassus crushes it in 71 BCE, and about 6,000 survivors are crucified along the Appian Way. Source: Wikipedia: Third Servile War
49 BCE Caesar crosses the Rubicon. Defying the Senate's order to disband his army, Julius Caesar crosses the Rubicon into Italy with the 13th Legion in January 49 BCE. The crossing starts a civil war that eventually makes him dictator for life. Source: Wikipedia: Crossing the Rubicon
44 BCE Assassination of Julius Caesar. Senators led by Brutus and Cassius stab Caesar, dictator for life, on the Ides of March, setting off the civil wars that end the Republic. Source: Wikipedia: Assassination of Julius Caesar
31 BCE Battle of Actium. Octavian's fleet under Agrippa defeats Mark Antony and Cleopatra in the Ionian Sea off Actium in Greece on 2 September. The victory consolidates Octavian's power and marks Rome's transition from republic to empire. Source: Wikipedia: Battle of Actium
9 Battle of the Teutoburg Forest. Arminius of the Cherusci destroys three Roman legions under Varus, and Rome gives up the conquest of Germany beyond the Rhine. Source: Wikipedia: Battle of the Teutoburg Forest
79 Vesuvius buries Pompeii. Mount Vesuvius erupts and buries the Roman towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum under pyroclastic surges and ash. The total number of deaths is unknown. Source: Wikipedia: Eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD
313 Edict of Milan. Constantine and Licinius grant Christians freedom of worship across the Roman Empire. Source: Wikipedia: Edict of Milan
330 Constantinople dedicated. Constantine dedicates his new capital on the site of Byzantium. It stays the seat of the eastern Roman Empire for over 1,100 years. Source: Wikipedia: Constantinople
378 Battle of Adrianople. Gothic rebels under Fritigern overwhelm an Eastern Roman army near Adrianople (modern Edirne) and kill Emperor Valens. The battle is often considered the start of the events that led to the fall of the Western Roman Empire. Source: Wikipedia: Battle of Adrianople
410 Visigoths sack Rome. Alaric's Visigoths plunder Rome for three days, the first time in almost 800 years that the city falls to a foreign enemy. Source: Wikipedia: Sack of Rome (410)
451 Battle of the Catalaunian Plains. A coalition under the Roman general Aetius and the Visigothic king Theodoric I fights Attila's Huns and their vassals in Gaul. It is one of the Western Roman Empire's last major operations, and its strategic significance is disputed. Source: Wikipedia: Battle of the Catalaunian Plains
476 End of the Western Roman Empire. Odoacer deposes the boy emperor Romulus Augustulus and sends the imperial regalia to Constantinople. Source: Wikipedia: Fall of the Western Roman Empire
1054 East-West Schism. Papal legates and the Patriarch of Constantinople excommunicate each other, splitting the Catholic and Orthodox churches. Source: Wikipedia: East–West Schism
1204 Crusaders sack Constantinople. Knights of the Fourth Crusade and the Venetian fleet storm and loot Constantinople and divide the Byzantine Empire among themselves. Source: Wikipedia: Sack of Constantinople
1957 Treaty of Rome. France, West Germany, Italy and the Benelux countries found the European Economic Community, forerunner of the European Union. Source: Wikipedia: Treaty of Rome

Questions

What is the order of states of Italy?

By start date: Roman Kingdom, Etruscan civilization, Roman Republic, Roman Empire, Western Roman Empire, Kingdom of Odoacer, Ostrogothic Kingdom, Byzantine Italy (Exarchate of Ravenna), Lombard Kingdom, Republic of Venice, Papal States, County and Duchy of Savoy, Republic of Genoa, Republic of Florence, Kingdom of Sicily, Kingdom of Naples, Duchy of Milan, Duchy and Grand Duchy of Tuscany, Kingdom of Sardinia (Piedmont-Sardinia), Kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia, Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Kingdom of Italy, Fascist Italy, Italian Social Republic and Italian Republic.

How many states of Italy were there?

This timeline shows 25. Other lists count differently, depending on how they treat rival states and periods of division.

Which came first?

Roman Kingdom, c. 753 to 509 BCE, is the earliest on this timeline.

Where do these dates come from?

Each row's dates were checked against the sources listed on that row's own page, mostly English Wikipedia articles, which cite the underlying scholarship. Dates that are uncertain are marked c.