Metauro, river of the Marches, c.68 mi (110 km) long, rising in the Etruscan Apennines, central Italy, from a double source (the Meta and the Auro) and flowing NE into the Adriatic Sea near Fa...

Flaminian Way, one of the principal Roman roads, the greatest artery from Rome to Cisalpine Gaul. Construction was begun (220 B.C.) by Caius Flaminius. The road ran N from Rome to Narnia (mode...

Pentapolis [Gr.,=five cities], collective name anciently applied to several groups of five cities. The chief cities of Cyrenaica on the northern coast of Africa (Apollonia, Arsinoë, Berenice, ...

Marche or the Marches, region (1991 pop. 1,429,205), 3,742 sq mi (9,692 sq km), E central Italy, extending from the eastern slopes of the Apennines to the Adriatic Sea. Ancona is the capital o...

Leo III (Leo the Isaurian or Leo the Syrian), c.680–741, Byzantine emperor (717–41). He was probably born in N Syria (rather than in Isauria, as once thought). He held diplomatic and military ...

Malatesta, Italian family, ruling Rimini and nearby cities for almost 300 years from the 13th to 16th cent. Malatesta da Verucchio (d. 1312), a powerful Guelph leader, became (1239) podestà, o...

Lombards, ancient Germanic people. By the 1st cent. A.D. the Lombards were settled along the lower Elbe. After obscure migrations they were allowed (547) by Byzantine Emperor Justinian I to se...

Papal States, Ital. Lo Stato della Chiesa, from 754 to 1870 an independent territory under the temporal rule of the popes, also called the States of the Church and the Pontifical States. The t...

Byzantine Empire, successor state to the Roman Empire (see under Rome), also called Eastern Empire and East Roman Empire. It was named after Byzantium, which Emperor Constantine I rebuilt (A.D...

Italy