Lombardy (Lombard and ; ) is an administrative region of Italy that covers ; it is located in northern Italy and with a population of about 10 million is the most populous region, constituting more than one-sixth of Italy's population. Lombardy is located between the Alps mountain range and tributaries of the river Po, and includes Milan, its capital and largest city, whose metropolitan area is the largest in the country and among the largest in the EU..
Its territory is divided into 1,501 municipalities (the region with the largest number of municipalities in the entire national territory), distributed among 12 administrative subdivisions (11 provinces plus the Metropolitan City of Milan). The region ranks first in Italy in terms of population, population density, and number of municipalities, while it is fourth in terms of surface area, after Sicily, Piedmont, and Sardinia.
It is the second-most populous region of the European Union (EU), and the second region of the European Union by nominal GDP. Lombardy is the leading region of Italy in terms of economic importance, contributing to approximately one-fifth of the national gross domestic product (GDP). It is also a member of the Four Motors for Europe, an international economic organization whose other members are Baden-Württemberg in Germany, Catalonia in Spain, and Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes in France. Milan is the economic capital of Italy and a global centre for business, fashion, and finance.
Of the 58 UNESCO World Heritage Sites in Italy, 11 are in Lombardy, tying it with Castile and León in northwest-central Spain.
Etymology
The name Lombardy comes from Lombard, which is derived from Late Latin ("a Lombard"), which derived from the Proto-Germanic elements + ; equivalent to long beard. According to some scholars, the second element derives from Proto-Germanic *bardǭ, *barduz ("axe"), related to German .
The name of the region derives from the name of the people of the Lombards who arrived in Italy in 568 and made Pavia their capital. During the Early Middle Ages, "Lombardy" referred to the Kingdom of the Lombards (). It was ruled by the Germanic Lombard raiders, who controlled most of early Christian Italy since the Lombard invasion of Italy of Byzantine Italy in 568, until the fall of Pavia, in 774 by Charlemagne on the Pope's behalf. As such, "Lombardy" and "Italy" were nearly interchangeable; by the mid-8th century, the Lombards ruled everywhere except the Papal possessions around Rome—roughly modern Lazio and northern Umbria—Venice and some Byzantine possessions in the south—southern Apulia and Calabria; some coastal settlements including Amalfi, Gaeta, Naples and Sorrento; Sicily and Sardinia; their culture is foundational to Italy in the Middle Ages. The term was also used until around 965 in the form () as the name for the territory roughly covering modern Apulia, which the Byzantines had recovered from the Lombard rump state Duchy of Benevento.
History
Prehistory and antiquity
From archaeological findings of ceramics, arrows, axes, and carved stones, the area of current-day Lombardy has been settled at least since the second millennium BC. Well-preserved rock drawings left by ancient Camuni in the Valcamonica depicting animals, people, and symbols were made over 8,000 years before the Iron Age, based on about 300,000 records.
The many artefacts found in a necropolis near Lake Maggiore and the Ticino demonstrate the presence of the Golasecca Bronze Age culture that prospered in western Lombardy between the ninth and the 4th centuries BC. In the following centuries, Lombardy was inhabited by different peoples; the Etruscans founded the city of Mantua and spread the use of writing. It was the seat of the Celtic Canegrate culture starting from the 13th century BC, and later of the Celtic Golasecca culture. From the 5th century BC, the area was invaded by more Celtic Gallic tribes coming from north of the Alps. These people settled in several cities including Milan and extended their rule to the Adriatic Sea. Celtic development was halted by the Roman expansion in the Po Valley from the 3rd century BC. After centuries of struggle, at the end of the 2nd century B.C., the entirety of modern-day Lombardy became a Roman province called Gallia Cisalpina—"Gaul on the inner side (with respect to Rome) of the Alps".
The Roman culture and language overwhelmed the former civilization in the following years, and Lombardy became one of the most developed and richest areas of Italy with the construction of roads and the development of agriculture and trade. Important figures were born here, such as Pliny the Elder (in Como) and Virgil (in Mantua). In late antiquity the strategic role of Lombardy was emphasised by the move of the capital of the Western Empire to Mediolanum (Milan). Here, in 313 AD, Roman Emperor Constantine issued the famous Edict of Milan, which gave freedom of confession to all religions within the Roman Empire.
Kingdom of the Lombards
During and after the fall of the Western Empire, Lombardy heavily suffered from destruction brought about by a series of invasions by tribal peoples. After 540, Pavia became the permanent capital of the Ostrogothic Kingdom, the fixed site of the court and the royal treasury. The last and most effective invasion was that of the Germanic Lombards or Longobards, whose nation migrated to the region from the Carpathian basin in fear of the conquering Pannonian Avars in 568. The Lombards' long-lasting reign, with its capital in Pavia, gave the current name to the region. There was a close relationship between the Frankish, Bavarian and Lombard nobility for many centuries.
After the initial struggles, relationships between the Lombard people and the Gallo-Roman peoplesPellegrini: "L'Italia settentrionale nei secoli del tardo impero ed in quelli successivi sino al 1000 (forse anche dopo) risulta strettamente collegata con la Gallia sul piano politico e linguistico; si può parlare senza tema di errore di un'ampia 'Galloromania' che include non soltanto la Rezia ma anche la Cisalpina con buona parte del Veneto." [Northern Italy in the centuries of the Late Empire and in the following ones up to 1000 (maybe even later) is closely connected with Gaul on a political and linguistic level; one can speak without fear of error of a broad 'Galloromania' which includes not only Rhaetia but also the Cisalpine with a good part of Veneto.] improved. The Lombard language and culture was integrated with the Latin culture, leaving evidence in many names, the legal code and laws. The Lombards became intermixed with the Roman population owing to their relatively smaller number. The end of Lombard rule came in 774, when the Frankish king Charlemagne conquered Pavia, deposed Desiderius the last Lombard king, and annexed the Kingdom of Italy—mostly northern and central present-day Italy—to his newly established Holy Roman Empire. Charlemagne was crowned by the Pope on 25 December 800. The former Lombard dukes and nobles were replaced by other German vassals, prince-bishops and marquises. The entire northern part of the Italian peninsula continued to be called "Lombardy" and its population "Lombards" throughout the following centuries.
Communes and the Empire
In the 10th century, Lombardy, although formally under the rule of the Holy Roman Empire, was included in the kingdom of Italy, of which Pavia remained the capital until 1024. Starting gradually in the late-11th century, Lombardy became divided into many small, autonomous city-states, the medieval communes. Also in the 11th century, the region's economy underwent a significant boom due to improved trading, sartorial manufacturing of silk and wool, and agricultural conditions; arms manufacturing for the purpose of defensive army development, by the German imperial divisions of Guelphs (Welfen) defending the Pope and Ghibellins (Wibellingen) defending the Emperor, became a significant factor. As in other areas of Italy, this led to a growing self-acknowledgement of the cities, whose increasing wealth made them able to defy the traditional feudal supreme power that was represented by the German emperors and their local legates.
This process peaked in the 12th and 13th centuries, when Lombard Leagues formed by allied cities of Lombardy, usually led by Milan, defeated the Hohenstaufen Emperor Frederick I, at Legnano but not his grandson Frederick II at Battle of Cortenuova. Although having the military purpose as preponderant, the Lombard League also had its own stable government, considered one of the first examples of confederation in Europe. Subsequently, among the local city-states, a process of consolidation took place, and by the end of the 14th century, two signoria emerged as rival hegemons in Lombardy; Milan and Mantua.
Renaissance duchies of Milan and Mantua
In the 15th century, the Duchy of Milan was one of the wealthiest states during the Renaissance. Milan and Mantua became centres of the Renaissance, whose culture with people such as Leonardo da Vinci and Andrea Mantegna, and works of art such as da Vinci's The Last Supper were highly regarded. The enterprising class of the communes extended its trade and banking activities well into northern Europe; the metonym "Lombard" designated a merchant or banker from northern Italy, for example Lombard Street, London.
The name "Lombardy" came to denote the whole of northern Italy until the 15th century and sometimes later. From the 14th century onward, the instability created by the internal and external struggles ended in the creation of noble seigniories, the most significant of whom were the Viscontis (later Sforzas) in Milan and of the Gonzagas in Mantua. This wealth, however, attracted the now-more-organised armies of national powers such as France and Austria, which waged a lengthy battle for Lombardy in the late 15th to early 16th centuries.
Late-Middle Ages, Renaissance and Enlightenment
After the Battle of Pavia, the Duchy of Milan became a possession of the Habsburgs of Spain. The eastern part of modern-day Lombardy, including the cities Bergamo and Brescia, was controlled by the Republic of Venice, which had begun to extend its influence in the area from the 14th century onwards. Between the mid-15th century and the battle of Marignano in 1515, the northern part of east Lombardy from Airolo to Chiasso (modern Ticino), and the Valtellina valley came under possession of the Old Swiss Confederacy.
Pestilences like that of 1628–1630, which Alessandro Manzoni described in his I promessi sposi (The Betrothed), and the general decline of Italy's economy in the 17th and 18th centuries halted further development of Lombardy. In 1706 the Austrian Empire came to power.
Austrian rule was interrupted in the late-18th century by the French; under Napoleon, Lombardy became the centre of the Cisalpine Republic and of the Kingdom of Italy, both of which were puppet states of France's First Empire, with Milan as capital and Napoleon as head of state. During this period, Lombardy regained Valtellina from Switzerland.
Modern era
The restoration of Austrian rule in 1815 as the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia was characterised by a struggle with the new ideals introduced by the Napoleonic era. Lombardy was then an important centre of the Risorgimento, with the Five Days of Milan in March 1848, the Ten Days of Brescia in 1849, the Belfiore martyrs in Mantua in the years between 1851 and 1853. The annexation of Lombardy to the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia occurred following the Second Italian War of Independence in 1859, a war during which Lombardy was the main theatre of battle (battles of Montebello, Palestro, Magenta, Solferino and San Fermo).