The history of Lodi, a city and commune in Lombardy, Italy, draws its origins from the events related to the ancient village of Laus Pompeia, so named from 89 BC in honor of the Roman consul Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo..
The settlement was founded by the Boii in a territory inhabited since the Neolithic period by the first nomadic farmers and breeders;. in later eras, the town became a Roman municipium (49 B.C.), a diocese (4th century) and finally - after coming under the control of the Lombards and the Franks - a free commune (11th century).. In the Middle Ages, by virtue of its privileged geographical position and the resourcefulness of its inhabitants, the township undermined the commercial and political supremacy of nearby Milan; the tension between the two municipalities resulted in a bitter armed conflict, in the course of which Ambrosian militias destroyed Laus twice..
The city was refounded at the initiative of Emperor Frederick Barbarossa on August 3, 1158, a day remembered as the birth date of the new Lodi.. Due to the lordships and protection of the emperors, the municipality remained independent until 1335, when it fell under the rule of the Visconti, becoming one of the major centers of the Duchy of Milan.. In the mid-15th century it hosted the important negotiations between the pre-unitary Italian states that led to the Peace of Lodi (April 9, 1454); in the following decades - by virtue of the contributions of numerous artists and intellectuals - it experienced a season of great cultural splendor..
Between the end of the sixteenth century and the mid-nineteenth century, the people of Lodi endured foreign occupations: the Spanish period was a phase of decadence, during which the town was transformed into a fortress; under Austrian rule, on the other hand, the city experienced an era of decisive economic expansion and urban renewal; the Battle of Lodi (May 10, 1796) opened the parenthesis of the Napoleonic twenty-year period..
The decades following Italian unification saw the birth of the first factories as well as a resurgence of cultural life and civic activism.. Lodians also played an important role during the Resistance.. Since March 6, 1992, the city has been the capital of an Italian province.Decreto legislativo 6 marzo 1992, n. 251, articolo 2.
Laus Pompeia
Origins
In all likelihood, the Lodi territory was occupied since the Neolithic period by nomadic populations of farmers and ranchers.. As testified by archaeological findings, the first stable settlements - included within a triangle having vertices coinciding with the modern settlements of Gugnano, Lodi Vecchio and Montanaso Lombardo - date back to the Iron Age and are probably due to the settlement of some Ligurian tribes; the oldest find, preserved at the Lodi Civic Museum, is a bronze ring bearing an engraving depicting six geese. The main village, which in a later period would have assumed the name of Laus, was located at Lodi Vecchio, about 7 km west of the site of the city of Lodi; in the third book of the Naturalis historia, Pliny the Elder expressly states that the village was founded by the Boii, although historically that area was always controlled by the Insubri. The Gallic toponym of the settlement has not been recorded accurately, which makes it prohibitive to reconstruct the exact etymology of the name "Laus"..
According to the Greek historian Polybius, the Romans arrived in the Po Valley between 223 and 222 B.C., years in which the consuls (Publius Furius Philus and Gaius Flaminius Nepos first, Marcus Claudius Marcellus and Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio later) attacked and defeated the Insubrians... This first occupation was short-lived, since the Celts - profiting from Hannibal's descent - regained their independence and maintained it for over twenty years. It was not until 195 B.C. that Insubrian resistance was finally overwhelmed: from then until 49 B.C., Laus was part of the Roman province of Cisalpine Gaul. Meanwhile, in 89 B.C., the village had been renamed "Laus Pompeia" in gratitude to Consul Gnaeus Pompeius Strabo, who that very year had promoted the Lex Pompeia de Transpadanis, granting Latin right - that is, a status intermediate between full citizenship and subject status - to the inhabitants of the communities located north of the Po. Strabo's measure had brought about a radical transformation not only from a legal point of view, but above all from a cultural and urban planning point of view: Latin was adopted as the official language and the settlement was rebuilt in a roughly rectangular shape, on the model of the castrum.. Forty years later, the Laudensians became full-fledged Roman citizens: Laus Pompeia acquired at the same time the rank of municipium, governed autonomously by a quadrumvirate and a town council, both elective.
The Lodi Civic Museum preserves a fragment of black marble, dating from the first century AD, on which stands the epigraph: "Tiberius Caesar Augustus, son of Augustus, and Drusus Caesar, son of Augustus, had this gate built"; thus there must have been a wall.. As was the prerogative of any Roman city, there was also a forum, civil basilica, covered market, theater and baths. Laus quickly became a flourishing agricultural, artisan and commercial center, mainly due to its privileged geographic location: the town was situated in the central part of the Po Valley, on the confluence of the roads from Placentia (Piacenza) and Acerrae (Pizzighettone) that led to Mediolanum (Milan), as well as at the point of intersection of these with the road from Ticinum (Pavia) that went up to Brixia (Brescia).. The earliest Laudense craftsman of whom there is evidence, specializing in the production of ceramics, was named Lucius Acilius..
The most widely practiced cult in the territory - along with the veneration for Maia, Mefitis, and Mercury - was that of Hercules, who in late Roman times rose to symbolize state power and civilization prevailing over barbarism; this conspicuous diffusion was likely due to identification with an earlier Celtic deity, Ogmios.. The temple dedicated to Hercules stood outside the city, on the right bank of the Adda, where the church of Santa Maria Maddalena is located in Lodi Nuova. As everywhere else in the Roman Empire, the veneration of the dead was also very much in vogue. The presence of a Christian community in Laus - where the Berber soldiers Victor Maurus, Nabor and Felix were martyred in 303 - is attested as early as the third century, but the establishment of the diocese occurred only with Saint Bassianus between 373 and 374.. An epistle of St. Ambrose reports that in November 387 Bassianus invited Bishop Felix of Como and Ambrose himself to the consecration ceremony of the Basilica of the XII Apostles, one of the oldest churches in Lombardy, located in the suburb of Laus Pompeia.
Barbarian invasions and the early Middle Ages The barbarian invasions - which had affected the Lodi territory as early as 271, with the descent of the Juthungi and Alemanni - resumed with greater vigor at the beginning of the fifth century, so it was decided - for greater security - to relocate the episcopal see within the walls: the site chosen for the new cathedral of St. Mary was the south side of the ancient forum, where more than 1,400 Christians had been killed at the time of the persecutions of Diocletian and Maximian...
On November 18, 401, the Visigoths of Alaric I crossed the Alps, setting their sights on the Po Valley and sowing devastation in the unprotected countryside; by the following February, the roads near Laus were impassable, so much so that the senator Quintus Aurelius Symmachus - in order to travel to Mediolanum to meet the emperor Honorius - had to pass through Pavia once he reached Piacenza.. In 452 Attila's Huns penetrated Italy, attacking Milan and hitting Laus Pompeia hard; the Lodians were also involved in the clashes between Flavius Orestes and Odoacer, king of the Heruli, as well as between the latter and Theodoric the Great, king of the Goths.. The Gothic War of the 6th century, fought by the Ostrogoths against the Byzantine emperor Justinian I, also inflicted extensive damage on the city. Later it was the turn of the Lombards, who broke into northern Italy in 568 and conquered Milan the following year, but did not besiege and occupy Laus until 575, after the surrender of Pavia; in all likelihood the Laudensi capitulated due to a voluntary retreat of the front, due to the fact that the settlement was now considered indefensible.
Although marshes - present in the territory since prehistoric times - were still extremely widespread, especially to the east of the city, an extension and rationalization of cultivation (vineyards, meadows, turkey oak, chestnut and even olive groves). occurred at that time. Moreover, in spite of the protracted phase of decline, the first large-scale commercial activities began to develop: in a decree issued by the Lombard ruler Liutprand, dating back to 715, it is stated that traffic to and from the Adriatic was guaranteed in Laus by two river ports, located respectively at the confluence of the Lambro and Adda rivers in the Po..
In 774 began the long domination of the Franks, during which the city was elevated to capital of a comitatus, that is, an administrative district of the Carolingian Empire.. Between the end of the ninth century and the beginning of the next, during the so-called "feudal anarchy," two incursions of the Magyars took place, which were followed by a period of quiet, due to the agreements made with them by King Berengar; however, these new incursions instilled a feeling of collective fear, which led a part of the population to take refuge inside some castles built to the south of the town. On November 24, 975, with a diploma from Emperor Otto II of Saxony, Bishop Andrea obtained recognition of temporal power over the town and the surrounding territory within a seven-mile radius, thus becoming the first bishop-count of Laus: the ruler ceded landed estates, serf families, market management and tax revenues to Andrea; these prerogatives were expanded in July 981 with a second measure, which also entrusted the diocese with the administration of justice. The figure of Bishop Andrea was crucial to the history of the Lodi community in the Middle Ages, as he laid the foundations for future city autonomy in the form of direct vassalage to the monarch, within the feudal system.
Conflict with Milan At the beginning of the 11th century, Laus constituted one of the greatest obstacles to the political and economic expansion of Milan, which was on its way to becoming a mercantile center of European stature: the Laudensians held almost exclusive control of commercial traffic across the territory's rivers, notably the Lambro, demanding tolls from boats that sailed up the waterways.
Into this context came the actions of the Archbishop of Milan Ariberto da Intimiano, who fully embodied the imperialistic spirit of the time: when Lodi's bishop Notker, Andrea's successor, died in 1027, he availed himself of a faculty granted to him by the ruler Conrad II the Salic and imposed on the clergy of Laus the episcopal appointment of Ambrose II of Arluno, a canon who would act as his loyal vavasour. Believing this arrangement to be an undue interference in their own affairs, the Laudensians adamantly opposed it and prevented the designated bishop from entering the city; Aribertus in turn did not desist and gathered an army around him, militarily occupying the countryside of Laus and laying siege to the village. Realizing that they had little chance to resist, the citizens finally signed a peace agreement, swore an oath of allegiance to the archbishop and accepted the election of Ambrose II, who remained in office until 1051.