The Via Aemilia (Italian: Via Emilia, English: Aemilian Way) was a trunk Roman road in the north Italian plain, running from Ariminum (Rimini), on the Adriatic coast, to Placentia (Piacenza) on the River Padus (Po). It was completed in 187 BC. The Via Aemilia connected at Rimini with the Via Flaminia, which had been completed 33 years earlier, to Rome.
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The land today known as northern Italy (Italia settentrionale) was known to the ancient Romans during the republican period (to 44 BC) as Gallia Cisalpina (literally: Gaul on the near – i.e. southern – side of the Alps) because it was then inhabited by Celtic tribes from Gaul, who had colonised the area in the 4th and 5th centuries BC.
Italia meant the area inhabited by Italic tribes: the border between Italia and Gallia Cisalpina was roughly a line between Pisae (Pisa) and Ariminum. Gallia Cisalpina contained the Pianura padana (Po river plain). This vast country, by far the largest fertile plain in the mountainous peninsula, contained potentially its best agricultural land, and offered the Romans the opportunity to expand enormously their population and economic resources by mass colonisation.
The Romans subjugated the Gauls of the Pianura Padana in a series of hard-fought campaigns in the late 3rd century BC. [1] By 220 BC, the Via Flaminia was completed, providing the Romans with ready access to the region. However, Roman expansion was delayed for some twenty years by the Second Punic War. During the Carthaginian general Hannibal's invasion of Italy (218 BC–203 BC), Roman military control of the Pianura Padana was temporarily overthrown. Many of the recently defeated tribes (such as the Insubres and the Boii) rebelled and joined forces with Hannibal in the hope of regaining their independence. [2]
It was not until 189 BC that the rebel tribes had been pacified sufficiently to allow work on the Via Aemilia to begin.
The time-tested Roman method of expansion was to build a brand new road straight through the newly conquered territory, and then establish a string of colonies, either of civilian settlers or of military veterans along its route. The settlers would be allocated fertile plots from lands confiscated from the defeated native peoples. This was the precise function of the Via Aemilia: its period of construction also saw the foundation of Roman colonies along its whole length at Bononia (Bologna) (founded 189 BC), Mutina (Modena), Regium (Reggio Emilia), and Parma (all founded in 183 BC).
The Via Aemilia was completed by, and named after, the Roman consul Marcus Aemilius Lepidus in 187 BC. [3] It was built, on elevated embankments, in part, on top of an older road system that linked the Adriatic to the Tyrrhenian Sea. The consular road ran, largely in a straight line, 176 Roman miles (260 km) NW from Rimini to its termination at Piacenza, connected pre-existing towns, such as Piacenza, Bologna and Rimini. [4]
The road ran along the southern edge of the flat Pianura Padana within sight of the northern foothills of Italy's Apennine Mountains, crossing numerous tributary rivers of the Po, notably the Rubicon near Rimini [4] and the River Trebbia near Piacenza. In the century following the construction of the Via Aemilia, Piacenza became the key Roman road hub in the pianura padana. In 148 BC, the Via Postumia linked Piacenza to Aquileia on the north Adriatic coast. In 109 BC, the consul Marcus Aemilius Scaurus completed the Via Aemilia Scaura to Genua (Genoa) and Pisae (Pisa).
There are the remains of several Roman bridges along the road, including the Ponte d'Augusto, Ponte di Sant'Arcangelo di Romagna, Ponte San Vito, Ponte sul Reno, Ponte sul Rubicone, and Ponte sul Taro.
At Rimini, the starting point of the Via Aemilia, the road's Ponte di Tiberio still exists, [4] a massive structure spanning the River Marecchia, started by the Emperor Augustus and completed by his successor Tiberius. It still bears its twin dedicatory inscriptions. [5]
At Bologna, milestone 78 was found in the bed of the River Reno. It records Augustus' reconstruction of the Aemilia, in 2 BC, from Rimini as far as the River Trebbia. Remains of the Aemilia bridge over the Reno were found in the 1890s, consisting of parts of the parapets from each side. These were originally 38.75 feet apart, of Veronese red marble.
The bed of the river was found to have risen at least 20 feet since this bridge collapsed in the 9th century. [6] Ruins of some of the other ancient Roman bridges still exist.
At Savignano sul Rubicone a Roman bridge survived until it was demolished as recently as World War II. The current bridge is a reconstruction.
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The construction of the Via Aemilia launched the intensive Roman colonisation of the Pianura Padana. The vast agricultural potential of this region soon rendered it the most populous and economically important part of Italy, overshadowing Central Italy, Rome and the South.
The area remains economically preeminent in modern Italy. By the time of the Second Triumvirate (44 BC – 30 BC), Romanisation of this formerly Celtic country was so complete that the province of Gallia Cisalpina was abolished and its territory incorporated into the heartland province of Italia .
The road gave its name to that part of Gallia Cisalpina through which it ran. This area was, before the Roman conquest, the territory of the Gallic tribes Boii (who gave their name to the city of Bologna) and Senones. It was already commonly referred to as Aemilia by the time the Emperor Augustus assumed sole power. In around 7 BC, when Augustus divided the provincia of Italia into 11 regiones (administrative districts), the area became the eighth regio. [7] This initially had the official name of Padus, but was later changed to Aemilia.
The western part of this area is still known as Emilia today. The boundaries of the Roman VIII regio roughly corresponded to those of the modern Italian administrative region of Emilia-Romagna. Its inhabitants are today known as Emiliani. The modern Italian State Road 9 is still officially called Via Emilia and follows the Roman route over much of its length. Indeed, the modern road in many parts lies directly above the Roman road.
Rimini is a city in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy and capital city of the province of Rimini. It sprawls along the Adriatic Sea, on the coast between the rivers Marecchia and Ausa. It is one of the most notable seaside resorts in Europe with revenue from both internal and international tourism forming a significant portion of the city's economy. It is also near San Marino, a small nation within Italy. The first bathing establishment opened in 1843. Rimini is an art city with ancient Roman and Renaissance monuments, and is also the birthplace of the film director Federico Fellini.
Emilia-Romagna is an administrative region of northern Italy, comprising the historical regions of Emilia and Romagna. Its capital is Bologna. It has an area of 22,446 km2 (8,666 sq mi), and a population of 4.4 million.
The Rubicon is a shallow river in northeastern Italy, just south of Cesena and north of Rimini. It was known as Fiumicino until 1933, when it was identified with the ancient river Rubicon, famously crossed by Julius Caesar in 49 BCE.
Ticinum was an ancient city of Gallia Transpadana, founded on the banks of the river of the same name a little way above its confluence with the Padus (Po).
Romagna is an Italian historical region that approximately corresponds to the south-eastern portion of present-day Emilia-Romagna, North Italy. Traditionally, it is limited by the Apennines to the south-west, the Adriatic to the east, and the rivers Reno and Sillaro to the north and west. The region's major cities include Cesena, Faenza, Forlì, Imola, Ravenna, Rimini and City of San Marino. The region has been recently formally expanded with the transfer from the Marche region of nine comuni where the Romagnol language is spoken.
Padania is an alternative name and proposed independent state encompassing Northern Italy, derived from the name of the Po River, whose basin includes much of the region, centered on the Po Valley, the major plain of Northern Italy.
Cisalpine Gaul was the name given, especially during the 4th and 3rd centuries BC, to a region of land inhabited by Celts (Gauls), corresponding to what is now most of northern Italy.
The Via Aurelia is a Roman road in Italy constructed in approximately 241 BC. The project was undertaken by Gaius Aurelius Cotta, who at that time was censor. Cotta had a history of building roads for Rome, as he had overseen the construction of a military road in Sicily connecting Agrigentum and Panormus.
Regio VI Umbria is the name for one of the 11 administrative regions into which the emperor Augustus divided Italy. The main source for the regions is the Historia Naturalis of Pliny the Elder, who informs his readers he is basing the geography of Italy on the descriptio Italiae, "division of Italy," made by Augustus. The Regio Sexta is called Umbria complexa agrumque Gallicam citra Ariminium, "Umbria including the Gallic country this side of Rimini."
Italia, also referred to as Roman Italy, was the homeland of the ancient Romans. According to Roman mythology, Italy was the ancestral home promised by Jupiter to Aeneas of Troy and his descendants, Romulus and Remus, who were the founders of Rome. Aside from the legendary accounts, Rome was an Italic city-state that changed its form of government from Kingdom to Republic and then grew within the context of a peninsula dominated by the Gauls, Ligures, Veneti, Camunni and Histri in the North, the Etruscans, Latins, Falisci, Picentes and Umbri tribes in the Centre, and the Iapygian tribes, the Oscan tribes and Greek colonies in the South.
The Via Popilia is the name of two different ancient Roman roads begun in the consulship of Publius Popilius Laenas. One was in southern Italy and the other was in north-eastern Italy.
The Via Postumia was an ancient military Roman road of northern Italy constructed in 148 BC by the consul Spurius Postumius Albinus Magnus.
The Via Julia Augusta is the name given to the Roman road formed by the merging of the Via Aemilia Scauri with the Via Postumia.
The Insubres or Insubri were an ancient Celtic population settled in Insubria, in what is now the Italian region of Lombardy. They were the founders of Mediolanum (Milan). Though completely Gaulish at the time of Roman conquest, they were the result of the fusion of pre-existing Ligurian and Celtic population with Gaulish tribes.
The Reno is a river of Emilia-Romagna, northern Italy. It is the tenth longest river in Italy and the most important of the region apart from the Po.
Emilia is a historical region of northern Italy, which approximately corresponds to the western and the north-eastern portions of the modern region of Emilia-Romagna, with the area of Romagna forming the remainder of the modern region.
Le Strade dei vini e dei sapori is the name for the collection of routes in and around Italy, that lead to and through major regional food and wine production areas.
The Bologna–Ancona railway is an Italian railway that connects the city of Bologna with the city of Ancona, passing through the Po Valley to Rimini and along the Adriatic coast for the rest of the line.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Rimini in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Piacenza in the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy.