Updates? Judith Herrin's book [Ravenna] explains by recounting the city's life from 402, when it became the capital of the Roman Empire in the West, to 751, when the Lombards took over. Some have speculated that "Ravenna" is related to "Rasenna" (or "Rasna"), the term that the Etruscans used for themselves, but there is no agreement on this point. The first time it became capital of the Western Roman Empire in the 5thcentury AD, then under the reign of Theodoric, king of the Goths, and lastly of the Byzantine Empire in Europe, up until the 8th century AD. Odoacer ruled as King of Italy for 13 years, but in 489 the Eastern Emperor Zeno sent the Ostrogoth King Theodoric the Great to re-take the Italian peninsula. Odoacer became the first barbarian king of the western empire. At that time, the construction of imperial churches and palaces started. Shortly after, the Migration Period, involving large invasions by Germanic peoples and by the Huns of Attila, led to the decline of the Western Roman Empire. Ravenna is a small Italian city with glorious golden mosaics, and the full colour pictures really help this book. Of the monuments dating from the rule of the Arian Ostrogothic king Theuderic (d. 526), the most impressive is his mausoleum. Now, although the empire may have fallen in the west, consider that it continued to exist in the east, since Constantine’s move and creation of the city Constantinople, which became the new capitol of the entirety of the Roman empire. The Roman empire had collapsed in 476 but, wonderfully, a part of it survived and flourished — the eastern half, with its great capital at Constantinople and the Italic outpost of Ravenna as its gateway into northern Adriatic coastlands and beyond into present-day Sicily. The historical Italian football of the city is Ravenna F.C. It was originally an Arian cathedral but became a Catholic church in 570. Ravenna railway station has direct Trenitalia service to Bologna, Ferrara, Lecce, Milan, Parma, Rimini, and Verona. King Pepin of the Franks attacked the Lombards under orders of Pope Stephen II. This church also has impressive capitals in its nave and a fine apse mosaic depicting the Transfiguration of Christ. [8] This harbor, protected at first by its own walls, was an important station of the Roman Imperial Fleet. In ancient times the Adriatic lay nearer Ravenna, which rested on … Ravenna is a place with a truly prestigious past, even though you may never have heard of the city before. Afterwards, the city formed the centre of the Byzantine Exarchate of Ravenna until the invasion of the Lombards in 751. "Ravenna: Capital of Empire, Crucible of Europe. The Church of San Vitale, the masterpiece of Byzantine art in Ravenna, was completed during the reign of the emperor Justinian. By 27 BC, Emperor Caesar Augustus had established a permanent port in Ravenna as a base for the fleet. The city annually hosts the Ravenna Festival, one of Italy's prominent classical music gatherings. The northern Italian city of Ravenna, situated on the Adriatic coast, south of Venice, is famous for both its late Roman architecture and its masterpieces of mosaic art, derived from its time as the capital of the Western Roman Empire (c.402-76), and later as an imperial Exarchate of the Byzantine Empire … After the conquest of Italy was completed in 554, Ravenna became the seat of Byzantine government in Italy. In 1441 Venice was able to establish direct rule over Ravenna, but in 1509 the city was returned to the Papal States. Here, in Ravenna on the coast of Italy, Arian Goths and Catholic Romans competed to produce an unrivaled concentration of buildings and astonishing mosaics. Although Jordanes writes of Odoacer as invading Italy "as leader of the Sciri, the Heruli and allies of various races", modern writers describe him as being part of the Roman military establishment, based on John of Antioch's statement that Odoacer was on the side of Ricimer at the beginning of his battle with the emperor Anthemiusin 472. It came under Roman control in 191 bc and soon became important because it possessed one of the few good port sites on the northeastern coast of Italy. The church was begun by Bishop Ecclesius under the Ostrogothic queen Amalasuntha (d. 535) and was consecrated in 547. As the capital city of the Western Roman Empire for 250 years and a major port of entry for the Eastern (Byzantine) Empire, Ravenna reflects in its art and architecture a fusion of Roman architectural forms with Byzantine mosaics and other decoration. An interesting book written about the history of Ravenna during it's centuries of political importance from the fifth to the ninth centuries AD. Only those of the highest ranks in Roman society could be drawn from to provide the leaders required for this fleet and most would have come from the … During the Marcomannic Wars, Germanic settlers in Ravenna revolted and managed to seize possession of the city. Ravenna Airport is located in Ravenna. It was the capital city of the Western Roman Empire from 402 until the empire collapsed in 476. Shortly after his appointment, Orestes launched a rebellion and captured Ravenna, the capital of the Western Roman Empire since 402, on 28 August 475. Ravenna's Orthodox bishops carried out notable building projects, of which the sole surviving one is the Capella Arcivescovile. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. The president is Marcello Missiroli and the manager is Enrico Zaccaroni. Honorius did so because it was easily defended from its location on the lagoon. Ravenna became the capital of the Western Roman Empire in 402 when the Emperor Honorius moved the imperial capital to escape Alaric and his Visigoths. Ravenna was important in history as the capital of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century ad and later (6th–8th century) of Ostrogothic and Byzantine Italy. Although it is an inland city, Ravenna is connected to the Adriatic Sea by the Candiano Canal. The entire upper surface of the mausoleum’s interior is covered with mosaics on a blue ground. Chicago Symphony Orchestra music director Riccardo Muti, a longtime resident of the city, regularly participates in the festival, which invites orchestras and other performers from around the world. A total of 937 Commonwealth soldiers who died in the winter of 1944-45 are buried in Ravenna War Cemetery, including 438 Canadians. Over the next 300 years, a network of canals diverted nearby rivers and drained nearby swamps, thus reducing the possibility of flooding and creating a large belt of agricultural land around the city. [12] The town suffered very little damage. Pope Adrian I authorized Charlemagne to take away anything from Ravenna that he liked, and an unknown quantity of Roman columns, mosaics, statues, and other portable items were taken north to enrich his capital of Aachen. Nowadays the city is landlocked, but Ravenna remained an important seaport on the Adriatic until the early Middle Ages. Theodoric, following his imperial predecessors, also built many splendid buildings in and around Ravenna, including his palace church Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, an Arian cathedral (now Santo Spirito) and Baptistery, and his own Mausoleum just outside the walls. From the era of Venetian dominion there remain various palaces and a fortress, the Rocca Brancaleona. As such, Ravenna was embellished with magnificent monuments. After losing the Battle of Verona, Odoacer retreated to Ravenna, where he withstood a siege of three years by Theodoric, until the taking of Rimini deprived Ravenna of supplies. Afterwards, the city formed the centre of the Byzantine Exarchate of Ravenna until the invasion of the Lombards in 751. Ravenna was henceforth the capital of the Western Roman Empire until its dissolution in 476. The Battle of Ravenna took place on the 2 September 476 and was a minor confrontation between the Heruli under their King Odoacer and the remnants of the Western Roman Army in Italy.. Herulians were foederati of the Western Roman Empire; they were mercenary troops of the Roman Army of Italy. For other uses, see, Dante's tomb exterior and interior, built in 1780, Generally speaking, adjectival "Ravenna" and "Ravennate" are more common for most adjectival uses—the, Deborah M. Deliyannis, Ravenna in Late Antiquity (Cambridge University Press, 2010), for this and much of the information that follows, Learn how and when to remove this template message, the last person to hold the title of emperor in the West, List of twin towns and sister cities in Italy, "Superficie di Comuni Province e Regioni italiane al 9 ottobre 2011", "Popolazione Residente al 1° Gennaio 2018", Tourism in Ravenna – Official site – History, https://www.academia.edu/1166147/_The_Fall_and_Decline_of_the_Roman_Urban_Mind_, https://www.veterans.gc.ca/eng/remembrance/history/second-world-war/canada-Italy-1943-to-1945, "Sito Ufficiale – Ufficio Turismo del Comune di Ravenna – I grandi scrittori", https://www.theguardian.com/books/2015/oct/23/jrr-tolkien-middle-earth-annotated-map-blackwells-lord-of-the-rings?CMP=fb_gu, Ravenna's early history and its monuments - Catholic Encyclopedia, City of Vicenza and the Palladian Villas of the Veneto, Arab-Norman Palermo and the Cathedral Churches of Cefalù and Monreale, Longobards in Italy, Places of Power (568–774 A.D.), Prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps, Venetian Works of Defence between 15th and 17th centuries, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Ravenna&oldid=998832259, Municipalities of the Province of Ravenna, Mediterranean port cities and towns in Italy, Articles needing additional references from September 2014, All articles needing additional references, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles containing Romagnol-language text, Articles containing Italian-language text, Pages using collapsible list with both background and text-align in titlestyle, Pages using infobox settlement with possible demonym list, Pages using infobox settlement with image map1 but not image map, Articles with unsourced statements from April 2010, Articles with Italian-language sources (it), Wikipedia articles with MusicBrainz area identifiers, Wikipedia articles with SUDOC identifiers, Wikipedia articles with WORLDCATID identifiers, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. 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