Rome, the Eternal City, has stood along the shores of the Tyrrhenian Sea for thousands of years. Settled millennia ago, the city has since emerged as the third most populous metropolis within the European Union. It is also an incredibly popular destination for cultural heritage travelers, as it hosts some ten million tourists every year. And for good reason, too, for Rome's heritage is quite extensive. While scholars today often have difficulty pinpointing an exact date for Rome’s founding, legends persist that the city first appeared in the 8th century BC. The earliest stories attest that Romulus—a son of the god Mars—created the settlement in his own honor, after killing his twin brother Remus, whom he had seen as a rival. Actual archeological evidence suggests that the city came to exist over generations, settled by disparate bands of ancient people that included the Latins, the Sabines, and the Etruscans. They all administered Rome as petty kings, elected via a large body of local noblemen called the “Senate” that gathered within a complex known today as the “Roman Forum.” Rome expanded steadily for centuries due to their influence, growing from the incorporation of neighboring communities into its own borders. Soon enough, the Rome of antiquity had grown to encompass seven legendary hills: Esquiline, Palatine, Aventine, Capitoline, Quirinal, Viminal, and Caelian. But a popular uprising against the monarchy erupted in 509 BC, resulting in the establishment of a republic managed under the auspices of the Senate. The Senate, in turn, annually elected two magistrates to handle the city government’s executive tasks, although candidates were often picked from among the social elites. Nevertheless, the Senate’s control over the city encountered protests from the common folk, who often fought bitterly for more representation. The Senate eventually acquiesced some of its power in the face of such antagonism, granting the plebians the right to veto legislation through a special group of organizations known as the “tribunes.”  

Conquering the entire Italian peninsula by the 3rd century BC, the Romans (as they were now called) started to challenge other regional powers throughout the Mediterranean. The greatest of those conflicts were the “Punic Wars,” which pitted Rome against the mighty African city-state of Carthage. While both sides saw their fair share of victories—including the Carthaginian general Hannibal’s famous sacking of Rome—the Punic Wars ultimately ended as a resounding victory for the Romans. Including Carthage itself, Rome controlled large swathes of new territory in places like Spain, Sicily, and Sardinia as a result. Now the dominant socioeconomic entity in the area, Rome began to expand even further in the direction of ancient Greece and the Middle East. But the nature of Rome’s internal politics had grown more divisive, especially as the wealth obtained from Rome’s wars did not reach the city’s lower social classes. Despite attempts at reform, the Roman Senate encountered increasingly difficulty to regulate society. Opportunistic warlords emerged as such, who used their vast armies and political connections to vie for influence. One such general, Pompey, eventually seized the city during the 1st century BC, ruling through an uneasy alliance with two other prestigious military commanders named Marcus Licinius Crassus and Julius Caesar. A power struggle quickly developed between Pompey and Caesar, though, especially in the aftermath of Crassus’ untimely death in battle. Using the influence he obtained from his successful campaigns in Spain and France, Caesar eventually overthrew Pompey in a brief, yet destructive civil war.   

Cesar declared himself dictator of the republic in 45 BC. His rule proved to be brief, though, as he was murdered during an assassination plot remembered infamously as the “ides of March.” In Caesar’s absence, his great-nephew and heir, Octavian, managed to seize the reins of government. Assuming the title of “Augustus,” Octavian elevated himself to the status of Rome’s emperor. But he also retained the Senate, which quickly built a cult of personality around him. In fact, the Senate deified Octavian upon his death, thus, establishing the long tradition of hailing the emperor as an incarnated god. Despite brief moments of instability, the Roman Empire flourished for centuries thereafter. Its borders expanded rapidly, too, encompassing locations as far away as southeastern Europe and the British Isles. Rome itself served as the epicenter for this vast realm, becoming replete with all kinds of beautiful municipal buildings and glorious monuments that reflected the empire’s prestige. Among the most outstanding structures built included the Pantheon, the Colosseum, and the Marcati di Traiano (Trajan’s Market). But decline eventually befell the historic Roman Empire, starting with the corruption wrought by Emperor Commodus in the late 2nd century AD. Infighting became frequent yet again, fracturing Rome’s increasingly fragile community. One of Commodus’ distant successors, Constantine, even decided to relocate the empire’s capital to Constantinople (Istanbul today) in an attempt to stop the decay. The Roman Empire split nonetheless during Constantine’s reign, with Rome becoming the capital of the Western Roman Empire. While the eastern half endured as Byzantium for some time, Rome and its reduced western dominions were constantly assailed by Germanic tribes from the north. The Western Roman Empire finally collapsed in the 5th century AD, with its many provinces reverting to the status of independent kingdoms. Rome itself suffered greatly from the continued warfare, its population shrinking significantly by the onset of the Middle Ages.   

The city’s politics then fell under the sway of the Catholic Church, which had been elevated to the status of an official religion by Emperor Constantine years before. Still, contemporary European powers at the time—including the Franks, the Lombards, and the Byzantines—all fought over Rome. As such, the church sought to accommodate the various people that sought to incorporate Rome into its own sphere of influence. Having defeated the Lombards, the Frankish king Pepin the Short eventually bestowed complete local authority onto the Catholic Pope and made Rome the capital of the “Papal States.” Over the next several centuries, the papacy would rule Rome through a complex political system it shared with the city’s nobility. But peace was often short-lived in Rome, especially once the power of the Franks waned considerably at the height of the Middle Ages. The Catholic Church and the local aristocrats clashed regularly, making the city an easy target for foreign armies. But long-term stability finally affected Rome in the 15th century, after Otto Colonna became the new pope. His election marked the beginning of the Renaissance in Rome, as the many popes that followed him began to patronize the arts. Among the historic intellectuals that the Roman Catholic Church sponsored included Michelangelo, Raphael, Ghirlandaio, and Sandro Botticelli. Many of those artists even created great works for the Catholic Church, appearing in buildings like the Cappella Sistina (Sistine Chapel) and Basilica di San Pietro (St. Peter’s Basilica). Rome soon emerged as the heart of the Renaissance, supplanting cities like Florence where it had originally started. But the era was not without its faults, for many Catholic officials were caught up in scandals ranging from corruption to infidelity. Their actions helped spawn the Reformation, which questioned the authority of the Catholic Church throughout Europe. In response, Rome became the bastion for the Counter-Reformation that sought to rehabilitate the papacy’s prestige. Ostentatious architectural styles and extravagant art forms proliferated, giving birth to many gorgeous Baroque structures that still stand in Rome today.   

The Napoleonic Wars of the late 18th and early 19th centuries significantly impacted Rome. Napoleon Bonaparte’s armies conquered the Papal States and made Rome the capital for one of his satellite, the Roman Republic. While the republic was short lived, its legacy inspired future generations of revolutionaries to establish a unified Italian state. As populist revolutions swept across Europe in 1848, a number of Italians attempted to revive the Roman Republic amid a larger campaign to unify the entire peninsula into one nation. Many important revolutionaries fought on behalf of the new government, including the famed general Giuseppe Garibaldi. While the second republic dissolved as well, Garibaldi and other likeminded Italian patriots would eventually found the Kingdom of Italy two decades later. Rome was deemed the capital for the kingdom, with the new Italian monarch, Victor Emmanuel II, headquartered in the city. But the papacy resisted its formation, prompting the new national government to officially wrestle control away by the 1870s. (The papacy would eventually gain independence from Italy in 1929, forming its own nation within Rome called the “Vatican City.”) In the years that followed, Rome was the center for the brief Italian Empire organized due to the political machinations of Benito Mussolini. Mussolini’s fascist state would ultimately fight on the side of the Axis powers during World War II, until Italian partisans ousted the dictator and forced Italy to switch sides in 1943. Rome was even occupied by the Allies a year later, with the first soldiers entering the city just two days before the invasion of Normandy. Rome has since rebounded both economically and culturally, serving as the capital for one of Europe’s most dynamic democracies. Its great ancient history continues to enchant people across the globe, which has even inspired the United Nations to protect large portions of its downtown as a UNESCO World Heritage Site

Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil: Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil, better known to history as “George Sand,” moved through the 19th century with a defiant grace that electrified the contemporary literary world. Born to an aristocratic French family in 1804, she learned early that her life would resist simple classification. Her childhood unfolded between the rigidity of her grandmother’s estate at Nohant and the freer, more bohemian influence of her father, whose sudden death left a lasting imprint on her sense of independence. Even as a girl, she wandered the woods around Nohant, fascinated not only by the natural world but also the freedom it offered from cultural expectations that were ever present. Nevertheless, her eventual marriage to François Casimir Dudevant proved to be stifling, fueling her transformation into an internationally celebrated author. Indeed, she had left the constraints of Dudevant’s household within a few years, venturing to Paris with the determination to carve out an existence defined by her intellect. Yet Parisian society had expectations of its own. A woman seeking to publish serious literature at the time found doors closed before they could be opened. It was in this crucible that Aurore Dupin forged the pseudonym “George Sand” in 1832.   

As George Sand, she wrote with a clarity and emotional depth that startled critics who had never imagined a woman could wield such moral authority through prose. Her novels—lush, philosophical, and fiercely humane—wove together tales of rural life, political idealism, and the struggles of ordinary people. She championed workers and farmers with a tone that sounded both conciliatory and timeless. She lived as she wrote, too, embracing a lifestyle of artistic and political engagement that scandalized her contemporaries: wearing men’s clothing for comfort; smoking cigars in public; and maintaining friendships, mentorships—even romances—with some of the era’s greatest artists (including composer Frédéric Chopin). Beyond her body of work, Sand’s most enduring legacy was her commitment to the then-revolutionary belief that men and women alike deserved intellectual freedom. Nevertheless, she eventually returned to Nohant late in life, where she continued to write with undiminished vigor. There, the woman who had once defied every aspect of her regal status found peace among the landscapes that had shaped her earliest dreams. Amantine Lucile Aurore Dupin de Francueil died in 1876, but her voice has since echoed across centuries, reminding readers that courage sometimes begins with the refusal to remain silent.