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Key to images
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An Etruscan bust |
| 2. |
il Correggio's
'The Virgin adoring the Child' |
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The History of Tuscany
Although the experts can't quite agree on
the original inhabitants of the Tuscany region it seems probable that
there has been a human population from as far back as the second millennium
BC.
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Bronze and Iron Age History
Indeed, many reliable traces of an ancient Bronze and Iron Age
population have been found in recent years that indicate a structured
and reasonably well organised civilisation. Towards the end
of the eighth century BC Tuscany was populated by a race known
as the Etruscans who appear to have built an advanced infrastructure
of roads and cities as well as a vast necropolis to house their
dead. This mysterious race held on to the region until being
ousted by the Romans in the late part of the third century BC.
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The Etruscans
So if the Etruscans conceived and instigated a civilised infrastructure,
the Romans certainly built on it. For nearly eight hundred years the
region flourished under Roman rule and the early road networks were
extended throughout Tuscany facilitating a golden age of transport
and trade. This affluence expedited settlements on the sites of modern
Florence, Lucca, Arezzo, Pisa and Pistoia, and even today the Roman
imprint on these towns is very much in evidence. Building and architecture
were not the only contribution that the Romans made - although the
Etruscans gave them the arch - and by the turn of the millennium the
denizens of the whole region were using the Latin language.
Tuscany and the Roman Empire
With the collapse of the
Roman Empire in the fifth century AD, the region of Tuscany had
a quiet few hundred years. Although the land is reasonably fertile
in the area, it was agriculturally eclipsed by richer regions and
it wasn't until the beginning of the seventh century A.D. that the
constellation of Tuscan economic power was in the ascendant. Tuscany's
unique geographic location, at the centre of the trade routes of
the Mediterranean basin, meant it was ideally placed to capa1talise
on the massive growth in maritime commerce and remained one of Italy's
and indeed Europe's dominant economic powers until the discovery
of the new-world trade routes across the Atlantic and around Africa.
In particular the towns of Florence, Lucca, Pisa and Siena flourished
during this period. The Florentines became the bankers of Southern
Europe, the Sienese grew rich by growing and exporting wool, the
Lucchesi specialised in fine silks, whilst the Pisans had their
fingers in all manner of nautically related commercial pies.
Tuscany and the Renaissance
Obviously one of the greatest attractions that Tuscany has to
offer is its wealth of renaissance art. Around the middle of
the fifteenth century the whole region was consolidated under
the Republican communes of Florence, Lucca, Siena and Pisa.
Although the rivalry between the districts was still intense,
the relative peace that this agreement instilled was the catalyst
for the prolific artistic embellishment that identifies the
area today. Painters, sculptors, poets and architects, inspired
by this European-wide movement away from the barbarism of the
middle ages, fuelled an era that took the world towards the
enlightenment of the modern age and gifted Tuscany with the
rich artistic heritage that it enjoys today. |
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