Culture of Italy

Cuisine and meal structure

Italian cuisine is a Mediterranean cuisine consisting of the ingredients, recipes, and cooking techniques developed in Italy since Roman times, and later spread around the world together with waves of Italian diaspora. Italian cuisine includes deeply rooted traditions common to the whole country, as well as all the regional gastronomies, different from each other, especially between the north, the centre, and the south of Italy, which are in continuous exchange. Many dishes that were once regional have proliferated with variations throughout the country. The cuisine has influenced several other cuisines around the world, chiefly that of the United States in the form of Italian-American cuisine.

One of the main characteristics of Italian cuisine is its simplicity, with many dishes made up of few ingredients, and therefore Italian cooks rely on the quality of the ingredients, rather than the complexity of preparation. The most popular dishes and recipes, over the centuries, have often been created by ordinary people more so than by chefs, which is why many Italian recipes are suitable for home and daily cooking, respecting regional specificities, privileging only raw materials and ingredients from the region of origin of the dish and preserving its seasonality.

Italian cuisine has developed through centuries of social and political changes, it has its roots in ancient Rome. Artichokes, peas, lettuce, parsley, melons, and apples, as well as wine and cheese, many types of meat, and grains were all enjoyed by ancient Romans. For feasts Roman cooks used many spices, developed recipes for cheesecake and omelets, and roasted all types of meat. From this noble beginning a sophisticated and flavorful cuisine has emerged. Significant changes occurred with the discovery of the New World and the introduction of potatoes, tomatoes, bell peppers, and maize, now central to the cuisine but not introduced in quantity until the 18th century.

Italian cuisine, like other facets of the culture, speaks with highly inflected regional accents. There are certain self-consciously national constants: spaghetti with tomato sauce and pizza are highly common, but this nationalisation of culinary identity didn't start to take hold until after the Second World War, when southern immigrants flooded to the north in search of work, and even those classics vary from place to place; small enclaves still hold fast to their unique local forms of pasta and particular preparations. Classics such as pasta e fagioli, while found everywhere, are prepared differently according to local traditions. Gastronomic explorations of Italy are best undertaken by knowing the local traditions and eating the local foods.

Northern Italy, mountainous in many parts, is notable for the alpine cheeses of the Valle d'Aosta, the pesto of Liguria and, in Piedmont, the Alba truffle. In the Alto Adige, the influence of neighbouring Austria may be found in a regional repertoire that includes speck and dumplings. In the north, risotto and polenta have tended to serve the staple function taken by pasta across the rest of the country. Italy's centre includes the celebrated culinary regions of Tuscany, famous for its olive oil and bean dishes, and Emilia-Romagna, home of foods such as prosciutto di Parma, Parmigiano Reggiano, and ragù alla bolognese. Southern Italy includes the hearty food of Lazio in which meat and offal frequently figure, but also the vegetable-focused fare of Basilicata, historically one of Italy's poorest regions. The islands of Sicily and Sardinia have distinctively different foodways. The former is notable for its many sweet dishes, seafood, and citrus fruit, while Sardinia has traditionally looked to its hilly and mountainous interior with a cuisine centred on lamb, suckling pig, bread, and cheese.

It is in the food of Naples and Campania, however, that many visitors would recognise the foods that have come to be regarded as quintessentially Italian: pizza, spaghetti with tomato sauce, parmigiana, and so on.

Also, Italy exports and produces the highest level of wine, exporting over 2.38 million tonnes in 2011. As of 2005, Italy was responsible for producing approximately one-fifth of the world's wine. Some Italian regions are home to some of the oldest wine-producing traditions in the world. Etruscans and Greek settlers produced wine in the country long before the Romans started developing their own vineyards in the 2nd century BC. Roman grape-growing and winemaking were prolific and well-organised, pioneering large-scale production and storage techniques such as barrel -making and -bottling. Famous and traditional Italian wines include Barbaresco, Barbera, Barolo, Brunello di Montalcino, Chianti, Corvina, Dolcetto, and Nero d'Avola, to name a few.

The country is also famous for its gelato, or traditional ice-cream often known as Italian ice cream abroad. There are gelaterie or ice-cream vendors and shops all around Italian cities, and it is a very popular dessert or snack, especially during the summer. Sicilian granitas, or a frozen dessert of flavoured crushed ice, more or less similar to a sorbet or a snow cone, are popular desserts not only in Sicily or their native towns of Messina and Catania, but all over Italy (although the northern and central Italian equivalent, grattachecca, commonly found in Rome or Milan, is slightly different from the traditional granita siciliana). Italy also boasts an assortment of desserts.

Christmas in Italy (Italian: Natale, Italian: ) begins on 8 December, with the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, the day on which traditionally the Christmas tree is mounted and ends on 6 January, of the following year with the Epiphany (Italian: Epifania, Italian: ). The Christmas cakes pandoro and panettone are popular in the north (pandoro is from Verona, whilst panettone is from Milan); however, they have also become popular desserts in other parts of Italy and abroad. Colomba pasquale is eaten all over the country on Easter day, and is a more traditional alternative to chocolate easter eggs. Tiramisu is a very popular and iconic Italian dessert from Veneto which has become famous worldwide. Other Italian cakes and sweets include cannoli, cassata, fruit-shaped marzipans, and panna cotta.

Coffee, and more specifically espresso, has become highly important to the cuisine of Italy. Cappuccino is also a famous Italian coffee drink, which is usually sweeter and less dark than espresso, and can be served with foam or cream on top, on which chocolate powder and sugar are usually sprinkled. Caffè latte is a mixture of coffee and milk, and is usually drunk at breakfast time (unlike most other Italian coffee types, children and adults drink it). Bicerin is Turin's own coffee, a mix between cappuccino and hot chocolate.

Milan is home to the oldest restaurant in Italy and the second in Europe, the Antica trattoria Bagutto, which has existed since at least 1284. Italian meal structure is typical of the European Mediterranean region and differs from North, Central, and Eastern European meal structure, although it still often consists of breakfast (colazione), lunch (pranzo), and supper (cena). However, much less emphasis is placed on breakfast, and breakfast itself is often skipped or involves lighter meal portions than are seen in non-Mediterranean Western countries. Late-morning and mid-afternoon snacks, called merenda (pl.: merende), are also often included in this meal structure.

Italian cuisine is one of the most popular and copied around the world. The lack or total unavailability of some of its most characteristic ingredients outside of Italy, also and above all to falsifications (or food fraud), leads to the complete denaturalization of Italian ingredients. This phenomenon, widespread in all continents, is better known as "Italian Sounding", consisting in the use of words as well as images, colour combinations (the Italian tricolour), geographical references, brands evocative of Italy to promote and market agri-food products which in reality have nothing to do with Italian cuisine. Italy is home to 395 Michelin star-rated restaurants.

Education

Education in Italy is free and mandatory from ages six to sixteen, and consists of five stages: kindergarten (scuola dell'infanzia), primary school (scuola primaria), lower secondary school (scuola secondaria di primo grado), upper secondary school (scuola secondaria di secondo grado), and university (università).

Primary education lasts five years. Students are given a basic education in Italian, English, mathematics, natural sciences, history, geography, social studies, physical education, and visual and musical arts. Secondary education lasts for five years and includes three traditional types of schools focused on different academic levels: the liceo prepares students for university studies with a classical or scientific curriculum, while the istituto tecnico and the istituto professionale prepare pupils for vocational education.

In 2018, the Italian secondary education was evaluated as below the OECD average. Italy scored below the OECD average in reading and science, and near OECD average in mathematics. Trento and Bolzano scored above the national average in reading. A wide gap exists between northern schools, which perform near average, and schools in the south, that had much poorer results.

Tertiary education in Italy is divided between public universities, private universities, and the prestigious and selective superior graduate schools, such as the Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. 33 Italian universities were ranked among the world's top 500 in 2019, the third-largest number in Europe after the United Kingdom and Germany. Bologna University, founded in 1088, is the oldest university in continuous operation, and the first university in the sense of a higher-learning and degree-awarding institute, as the word universitas was coined at its foundation, as well as one of the leading academic institutions in Italy and Europe. The Sapienza University of Rome, founded with the Papal bull In supremae praeminentia dignitatis issued on 20 April 1303 by Pope Boniface VIII, is the largest EU university by enrollments, and at the same time it is present in all major international university rankings.

Milan's Bocconi University has been ranked among the top 20 best business schools in the world by The Wall Street Journal international rankings, especially thanks to its Master of Business Administration program, which in 2007 placed it no. 17 in the world in terms of graduate recruitment preference by major multinational companies. In addition, Forbes has ranked Bocconi no. 1 worldwide in the specific category Value for Money. In May 2008, Bocconi overtook several traditionally top global business schools in the Financial Times executive education ranking, reaching no. 5 in Europe and no. 15 in the world. Other top universities and polytechnics include the Polytechnic University of Milan and Polytechnic University of Turin.

In 2009, an Italian research ranked the Sapienza University of Rome and the University of Milan as the best in Italy (over indicators such as scientific production, attraction of foreign students, and others), whose research and teaching activities have developed over the years and have received important international recognitions. The University of Milan is the only Italian member of the League of European Research Universities, a prestigious group of twenty research-intensive European Universities. Sapienza is member of several international groups, such as European Spatial Development Planning, Partnership of a European Group of Aeronautics and Space Universities, CINECA, Santander Network, Institutional Network of the Universities from the Capitals of Europe, and Mediterranean Universities Union.

Folklore and mythology

Folklore of Italy refers to the folklore and urban legends of Italy. On the Italian territory, in fact, different peoples have followed one another over time, each of which has left its traces in the popular imagination. Some tales also come from Christianization, especially those concerning demons, which are sometimes recognised by Christian demonology.

In Italian folklore, the Befana is an old woman who delivers gifts to children throughout Italy on Epiphany Eve (the night of 5 January) in a similar way to Santa Claus or the Three Magi Kings. A popular belief is that her name derives from the Feast of Epiphany (Italian: Festa dell'Epifania). In popular folklore, the Befana visits all the children of Italy on the eve of the Feast of the Epiphany to fill their socks with candy and presents if they are good, or a lump of coal or dark candy if they are bad. In many poorer parts of Italy and in particular rural Sicily, a stick in a stocking was placed instead of coal. Being a good housekeeper, many say she will sweep the floor before she leaves. To some, the sweeping meant the sweeping away of the problems of the year. The child's family typically leaves a small glass of wine and a plate with a few morsels of food, often regional or local, for the Befana.

The Badalisc is a mythical creature of the Val Camonica in the southern central Alps. The Badalisc is represented today as a creature with a big head covered with a goat skin, two small horns, a huge mouth and glowing eyes. According to legend the Badalisc lives in the woods around the village of Andrista (comune of Cevo) and is supposed to annoy the community: each year it is captured during the period of Epiphany (5 & 6 January) and led on a rope into the village by musicians and masked characters, including il giovane ('the young man'), il vecchio ('the old man'), la vecchia ('the old woman'), and la signorina ('the young woman'), who is "bait" for the animal's lust. There are also some old witches, who beat drums, and bearded shepherds, and a hunchback (un torvo gobetto) who has a "rustic duel" with the animal. Traditionally only men take part, although some are dressed as women. In medieval times women were prohibited from participating in the exhibition, or even seeing or hearing the Badalisc's Speech; if they did so they would be denied Holy Communion the following day.

An egg of Columbus refers to a brilliant idea or discovery that seems simple or easy after the fact. The expression refers to an apocryphal story, dating from at least the 16th century, in which it is said that Christopher Columbus, having been told that finding a new trade route was inevitable and no great accomplishment, challenges his critics to make an egg stand on its tip. After his challengers give up, Columbus does it himself by tapping the egg on the table to flatten its tip. The story is often alluded to when discussing creativity. The term has also been used as the trade name of a tangram puzzle and several mechanical puzzles.

Alberto da Giussano is a legendary character of the 12th century who would have participated, as a protagonist, in the battle of Legnano on 29 May 1176. In reality, according to historians, the actual military leader of the Lombard League in the famous military battle with Frederick Barbarossa was Guido da Landriano. Historical analyses made over time have indeed shown that the figure of Alberto da Giussano never existed. In the past, historians, attempting to find a real confirmation, hypothesised the identification of his figure with Albertus de Carathe (Alberto da Carate) and Albertus Longus (Alberto Longo), both among the Milanese who signed the pact in Cremona in March 1167 which established the Lombard League, or in an Alberto da Giussano mentioned in an appeal of 1196 presented to Pope Celestine III on the administration of the church-hospital of San Sempliciano. These, however, are all weak identifications, given that they lack clear and convincing historical confirmation.

The Val Camonica witch trials were two large witch trials which took place in Val Camonica, in Italy, in 1505–1510 and 1518–1521. They were among the biggest Italian witch trials, and caused the deaths of about 60 persons, in each trial: 110 in total. The best source for the trials is considered to be the Venetian Marin Sanudo, who was the chronicler to the Council of Ten from 1496 to 1536. The documentary evidence was destroyed by order of Giacinto Gaggia, the bishop of Brescia, to prevent it from being used by the anticlerical opposition.

Mythology of Italy refers to the mythology of people living in Italy. Major pantheons belong to Roman mythology and Etruscan mythology. Roman mythology is the body of myths of ancient Rome as represented in the literature and visual arts of the Romans. One of a wide variety of genres of Roman folklore, Roman mythology may also refer to the modern study of these representations, and to the subject matter as represented in the literature and art of other cultures in any period. Roman mythology draws from the mythology of the Italic peoples and ultimately from Proto-Indo-European mythology. Roman mythology also draws directly on Greek mythology, potentially as early as Rome's protohistory, but primarily during the Hellenistic period of Greek influence and through the Roman conquest of Greece, via the artistic imitation of Greek literary models by Roman authors.

Italophilia

Ancient Italy is identified with Rome and the so-called Romanophilia. Despite the fall of the Roman Empire, its legacy continued to have a significant impact on the cultural and political life in Europe. For the medieval mind, Rome came to constitute a central dimension of the European traditionalist sensibility. The idealisation of this Empire as the symbol of universal order led to the construction of the Holy Roman Empire. Writing before the outbreak of the First World War, the historian Alexander Carlyle noted that "we can without difficulty recognise" not only "the survival of the tradition of the ancient empire", but also a "form of the perpetual aspiration to make real the dream of the universal commonwealth of humanity".

During much of the Middle Ages (about the 5th century through the 15th century), the Roman Catholic Church had great political power in Western Europe. Throughout its history, the Catholic faith has inspired many great works of architecture, art, literature, and music. These works include French medieval Gothic cathedrals, the Italian artist Michelangelo's frescoes in the Vatican, the Italian writer Dante's epic poem Divine Comedy, and the Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Requiem.

As for Italian artists they were in demand almost all over Europe. Torrigiano and Zuccari worked in England, Masolino in Hungary, Luca Cambiasi and Pellegrino Tibaldi in Spain, Jacopo Sansovino in Portugal, Morando, and others in Poland. The demand seems to have been greatest in France, more especially at the French court, which employed (among others) Leonardo da Vinci, Rosso, Primaticcio, Niccolò dell'Abbate, and Sebastiano Serlio. Italian craftsmen were engaged to work on building sites from Munich to Zamość. Italian actors performed at the courts of France, Spain, Poland, and elsewhere.

The Italian language was fashionable, at court for example, as well as Italian literature and art. The famous lexicographer John Florio of Italian origin was the most important humanist in Renaissance England. and contributed to the English language with over 1,969 words. William Shakespeare's works show an important level of Italophilia, a deep knowledge of Italy and the Italian culture, like in Romeo and Juliet and The Merchant of Venice. According to Robin Kirkpatrick, Professor of Italian and English Literatures at Cambridge University, Shakespeare shared "with his contemporaries and immediate forebears a fascination with Italy". In 16th-century Spain, cultural Italophilia was also widespread (while the Spanish influence in southern Italy was also great) and king Philip IV himself considered Italian as his favourite foreign language.

The movement of "international Italophilia" around 1600 certainly held the German territories in its sway, with one statistic suggesting that up to a third of all books available in Germany in the early 17th century were in Italian. Themes and styles from Il pastor fido were adapted endlessly by German artists, including Opitz, who wrote several poems based on Guarini's text, and Schütz himself, whose settings of a handful of passages appeared in his 1611 book of Italian madrigals. Emperors Ferdinand III and Leopold I were great admirers of Italian culture and made Italian (which they themselves spoke perfectly) a prestigious language at their court. German baroque composers or architects were also very much influenced by their Italian counterparts.

During the 18th century, Italy was in the spotlight of the European grand tour, a period in which learned and wealthy foreign, usually British or German, aristocrats visited the country due to its artistic, cultural and archaeological richness. Since then, throughout the centuries, many writers and poets have sung of Italy's beauty; from Goethe to Stendhal to Byron, Italy's natural beauty and her people's creativity inspired their works. Percy Bysshe Shelley famously said that Italy is "the paradise of exiles".

Italiophilia was not uncommon in the United States. Thomas Jefferson was a great admirer of Italy and ancient Rome. Jefferson is largely responsible for the neo-classical buildings in Washington, D.C. that echo Roman and Italian architectural styles.

Spain provided an equally telling example of Italian cultural admiration in the 18th century. The installation of a team of Italian architects and artists, headed by Filippo Juvarra, has been interpreted as part of Queen Elisabeth Farnese's conscious policy to mould the visual culture of the Spanish court along Italian lines. The engagement of Corrado Giaquinto from Molfetta and eventually the Venetian Jacopo Amigoni as the creators of the painted decorative space for the new seat of the Spanish court was a clear indication of this aesthetic orientation, while the later employment of Giovanni Battista Tiepolo and his son Giovanni Domenico confirmed the Italophile tendency.

The Victorian era in Great Britain saw Italophilic tendencies. Britain supported its own version of the imperial Pax Romana, called Pax Britannica. John Ruskin was a Victorian Italophile who respected the concepts of morality held in Italy. Also the writer Henry James has exhibited Italophilia in several of his novels. However, Ellen Moers writes that, "In the history of Victorian Italophilia no name is more prominent than that of Elizabeth Barrett Browning....[She places] Italy as the place for the woman of genius ..."

Italian patriot Giuseppe Garibaldi, along with Giuseppe Mazzini and Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, led the struggle for Italian unification in the 19th century. For his battles on behalf of freedom in Europe and Latin America, Garibaldi has been dubbed the "Hero of Two Worlds". Many of the greatest intellectuals of his time, such as Victor Hugo, Alexandre Dumas, and George Sand showered him with admiration. He was so appreciated in the United States that Abraham Lincoln offered him a command during the Civil War (Garibaldi turned it down).

During the Fascist era, several leaders in Europe and Latin America modelled their government and economic system on Italian Fascism. Adolf Hitler was an avid admirer of Benito Mussolini. To justify his Italophilia, Hitler had to convince himself that northern Italians were somehow racially Aryan—"from the cultural point of view", he once remarked, "we are more closely linked with the Italians than with any other people"—and that the veins of Mussolini, Dante and other heroes pulsed with no contaminating blood from the inferior "Mediterranean race". Or "The Italians have a splendid foundation of the peasantry. Once when I was travelling to Florence, I thought, as I passed through it, what a paradise this land of southern France is! But when I reached Italy – then I realised what a paradise on earth can really be!". The Führer also dreamed of touring Tuscany and Umbria: "my dearest wish would be to be able to wander about Italy as an unknown painter."

In 1940 Walt Disney Productions produced Pinocchio based on the 1883 Italian children's novel The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi, the most translated non-religious book in the world and one of the best-selling books ever published, as well as a canonical piece of children's literature. The film was the second animated feature film produced by Disney.

After World War II, such brands as Ferrari and Alfa Romeo became well known for racing and sports cars. Since then Italy has experienced strong economic growth, particularly in the 1950s and 1960s, which lifted the country to the position of being one of the most industrialised nations in the world. Italian product design, fashion, film, and cuisine and the notion of Italy as the embodiment of La dolce vita for German tourism—all left an imprint on contemporary Italophilia.

Italian people

The Italian Peninsula has been at the heart of Western cultural development at least since Roman times. Important poets of the Roman republic and empire were Lucretius, Catullus, Virgil, Horace, and Ovid. Also prominent in Latin literature were the orator-rhetorician Cicero, the satirist Juvenal, the prose writers Pliny the Elder and his nephew Pliny the Younger, and the historians Sallust, Livy, and Suetonius. Julius Caesar, renowned as a historian and prose stylist, is even more famous as a military and political leader. Roman jurists founded and developed Roman law, which still today represents the basic framework of civil law, the most widespread legal system in the world. Among the most famous jurists are Gaius, Ulpianus, Papinianus, and Paulus. Italy, as the center of Magna Graecia, was also the land that gave birth to personalities such as Archimedes, Pythagoras, Parmenides, Zeno, and Gorgia. The first of the Roman emperors was Octavian, better known by the honorific Augustus. Noteworthy among later emperors are the tyrants Caligula and Nero, the philosopher-statesman Marcus Aurelius, and Constantine I, who was the first to accept Christianity. The history of the Christian Church during the medieval period would not be complete without mention of such men of Italian birth as Benedict of Nursia, Pope Gregory I, Francis of Assisi, and the philosopher-theologians Anselm of Canterbury, Joachim of Fiore, and Thomas Aquinas.

Sicilian kings and emperors such as Roger II of Sicily and Frederick II of the Kingdom of Sicily had a significant impact on Italian culture and unified Italy for the first time. No land has made a greater contribution to the visual arts. In the 13th and 14th centuries there were the sculptors Nicola Pisano and his son Giovanni; the painters Cimabue, Duccio, and Giotto; and, later in the period, the sculptor Andrea Pisano. Among the many great artists of the 15th century—the golden age of Florence and Venice—were the architects Filippo Brunelleschi, Lorenzo Ghiberti, and Leon Battista Alberti; the sculptors Donatello, Luca della Robbia, Desiderio da Settignano, and Andrea del Verrocchio; and the painters Fra Angelico, Stefano di Giovanni, Paolo Uccello, Masaccio, Frà Filippo Lippi, Piero della Francesca, Giovanni Bellini, Andrea Mantegna, Antonello da Messina, Antonio del Pollaiuolo, Luca Signorelli, Pietro Perugino, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio, and Vittore Carpaccio.

During the 16th century, the High Renaissance, Rome shared with Florence the leading position in the world of the arts. Major masters included the painter-designer-inventor Leonardo da Vinci; the painter-sculptor-architect Michelangelo Buonarroti; the architects Donato Bramante and Andrea Palladio; the sculptor Benvenuto Cellini; and the painters Titian, Giorgione, Raphael, Andrea del Sarto, and Antonio da Correggio. Among the great painters of the late Renaissance were Tintoretto and Paolo Veronese. Giorgio Vasari was a painter, architect, art historian, and critic.

Among the leading artists of the Baroque period were the sculptors-architects Gian Lorenzo Bernini and Francesco Borromini; the architects Bartolomeo Rastrelli, Filippo Juvarra, and Luigi Vanvitelli; and the painters Caravaggio, Guido Reni, Annibale Carracci, Pietro da Cortona, Luca Giordano, Andrea Pozzo, Guercino, Domenichino, Giovanni Battista Tiepolo, Canaletto, Pietro Longhi, and Francesco Guardi. Leading figures in modern painting were Umberto Boccioni, Amedeo Modigliani, Giorgio de Chirico, Lucio Fontana, Alberto Burri, and Giorgio Morandi. A noted contemporary architect were Giuseppe Terragni, Marcello Piacentini, Adalberto Libera, Pier Luigi Nervi, Gio Ponti, Aldo Rossi, and Renzo Piano.

Music, an integral part of Italian life, owes many of its forms as well as its language to Italy. The inventor of Gregorian chant was the Roman Pope Gregory I. The musical staff was either invented or established by Guido of Arezzo. A leading 14th-century composer was the blind Florentine organist Francesco Landini. Leading composers of the High Renaissance and early Baroque periods were Giovanni Pierluigi da Palestrina; the madrigalists Luca Marenzio and Carlo Gesualdo, prince of Venosa; the Venetian organists Andrea Gabrieli and Giovanni Gabrieli; Claudio Monteverdi, one of the founders of opera; organist-composer Girolamo Frescobaldi; and Giacomo Carissimi. One of the father of French opera, and master of French baroque style, was the Italian composer, after naturalised French, Jean-Baptiste Lully. Important figures of the later Baroque era were Arcangelo Corelli, Antonio Vivaldi, Luigi Boccherini, Alessandro Scarlatti, and his son Domenico Scarlatti. Italian-born Luigi Cherubini was the central figure of French music in the Napoleonic era, while Antonio Salieri and Gaspare Spontini played important roles in the musical life of Vienna and Berlin, respectively.

Composers of the 19th century who made their period the great age of Italian opera were Gioacchino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti, Vincenzo Bellini, and, above all, Giuseppe Verdi. Niccolò Paganini was the greatest violinist of his time. More recent operatic composers include Ruggero Leoncavallo, Giacomo Puccini, and Pietro Mascagni. Renowned operatic singers include Enrico Caruso, Luisa Tetrazzini, Titta Ruffo, Amelita Galli-Curci, Beniamino Gigli, Ezio Pinza, and Luciano Pavarotti. Ferruccio Busoni, Ottorino Respighi, Luigi Dallapiccola, Alfredo Casella, Luigi Nono, and Luciano Berio. Arturo Toscanini is generally regarded as one of the greatest operatic and orchestral conductors of his time; two noted contemporary conductors are Claudio Abbado and Riccardo Muti. In the field of music for cinema, great Italian composers were Ennio Morricone, Nino Rota, Armando Trovajoli, and Giorgio Moroder, the father of disco music. The foremost makers of stringed instruments were Gasparo da Salò of Brescia, Nicolò Amati, Antonio Stradivari, and Giuseppe Guarneri of Cremona. Bartolomeo Cristofori invented the piano.

Italian literature and literary language began with Dante Alighieri, author of Divine Comedy. Literary achievements—such as the poetry of Petrarch, Torquato Tasso, and Ludovico Ariosto, and the prose of Giovanni Boccaccio, Niccolò Machiavelli, and Baldassare Castiglione—exerted a huge and lasting influence on the subsequent development of Western culture. Outstanding film directors are Federico Fellini, Sergio Leone, Pier Paolo Pasolini, Luchino Visconti, Vittorio De Sica, Michelangelo Antonioni, Roberto Rossellini, Paolo Sorrentino, Franco Zeffirelli, Bernardo Bertolucci, Lina Wertmüller, and Italian-born Frank Capra. Famous film stars include Italian-born Rudolph Valentino, Marcello Mastroianni, Gina Lollobrigida, and Sophia Loren.

In philosophy, exploration, and statesmanship, Italy has produced many world-renowned figures: the traveler Marco Polo; the statesman and patron of the arts Cosimo de' Medici; the statesman, clergyman, and artistic patron Rodrigo Borgia, who became Pope Alexander VI; the soldier, statesman, and artistic patron Lorenzo de' Medici, the son of Cosimo; the explorer John Cabot; the explorer Christopher Columbus; the explorer Amerigo Vespucci, after whom the Americas are named; the admiral and statesman Andrea Doria; Caterina de medici, queen of France; Niccolò Machiavelli, author of The Prince and the outstanding political theorist of the Renaissance; the statesman and clergyman Cesare Borgia, the son of Rodrigo; the explorer Sebastian Cabot, the son of John; the historian Francesco Guicciardini; the explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano; the explorer Pietro Savorgnan di Brazzà, who gave his name to the city of Brazzaville, capital of the Republic of Congo; the philosopher Bernardino Telesio; the explorer, missionary, and sinologist Matteo Ricci; the mathematician, astronomer, and philosopher Giordano Bruno; the scholar Paolo Sarpi, so well versed in many fields of human knowledge to be called the "Oracle of the century"; the philosopher Tommaso Campanella; the Cardinal Mazarin, a statesman, diplomat, and prime minister of France under Louis XIV; the imperial field marshal and statesman Prince Eugene of Savoy; the political philosopher Giambattista Vico; the noted jurist Cesare Beccaria; Giuseppe Mazzini, the leading spirit of the Risorgimento; Camillo Benso, Count of Cavour, its prime statesman; and Giuseppe Garibaldi, its foremost soldier and man of action.

The French military and political leader Napoleon was of Italian family and was born in the same year that the Republic of Genoa (former Italian state) ceded the region of Corsica to France.

Notable intellectual and political leaders of more recent times include the Nobel Peace Prize winner in 1907, Ernesto Teodoro Moneta; the sociologist and economist Vilfredo Pareto; the political theorist Gaetano Mosca; the educator Maria Montessori; the philosopher, critic, and historian Benedetto Croce, with his idealistic antagonist Giovanni Gentile; Benito Mussolini, the founder of Fascism and dictator of Italy from 1922 to 1943; Carlo Sforza, Alcide De Gasperi, and Giulio Andreotti, famous latter-day statesmen; and the Communist leaders Antonio Gramsci, Palmiro Togliatti, and Enrico Berlinguer.

Princess Marie-José was one of the very few diplomatic channels between the German/Italian camp and the other European countries involved in the war; she sympathised with the partisans and, while she was a refugee in Switzerland, smuggled weapons, money, and food for them. Virginia Oldoini, mistress of Emperor Napoleon III of France, was a significant figure in the early history of photography.

Italian scientists and mathematicians of note include Galileo Galilei, Fibonacci, Guglielmo Marconi, Antonio Meucci, Italian-American Enrico Fermi, Gerolamo Cardano, Bonaventura Cavalieri, Evangelista Torricelli, Francesco Maria Grimaldi, Marcello Malpighi, Giuseppe Luigi Lagrangia, Luigi Galvani, Alessandro Volta, Amedeo Avogadro, Stanislao Cannizzaro, Giuseppe Peano, Angelo Secchi, Camillo Golgi, Ettore Majorana, Emilio Segrè, Tullio Levi-Civita, Gregorio Ricci-Curbastro, Daniel Bovet, Giulio Natta, Rita Levi-Montalcini, Italian-American Riccardo Giacconi, and Giorgio Parisi. Elena Cornaro Piscopia was the first female Ph.D. graduate in the world history.

Languages

The Romantic English poet Lord Byron described the Italian language as «that soft bastard Latin, which melts like kisses from a female mouth, and sounds as if it should be writ on satin». Byron's description is not an isolated expression of poetic fancy but, in fact, a popular view of the Italian language across the world, often called the language of "love", "poetry", and "song".

Italian evolved from a dialect spoken in Tuscany, which is the birthplace of writers such as Dante, Boccaccio, and Petrarch. Thanks to its cultural prestige, this dialect was progressively adopted by the Italian states and then, upon their unification in 1861, by the Kingdom of Italy. It may be considered somewhat intermediate, linguistically and geographically, between the Italo-Dalmatian languages of the centre-south and the Gallo-Italic languages of the north, becoming the centre of a dialect continuum. Its development was also influenced by the other Italian languages and by the Germanic language of post-Roman invaders.

There are only a few communities in Italy in which Italian is not spoken as the first language, but many speakers are native bilinguals of both Italian and Italy's regional languages, which historically predate today's national language. These include native communities of non-Romance and Indo-European languages such as Albanian, Croatian, and Greek in southern Italy, Slovene and German varieties in northern Italy, as well as dozens of various Romance languages, such as Arpitan, Catalan, Friulan, Ladin, Lombard, Neapolitan, Occitan, Sardinian, Sicilian, and many others.

Italian is often natively spoken in a regional variety, not to be confused with Italy's regional and minority languages; however, the establishment of a national education system led to a decrease in variation in the languages spoken across the country during the 20th century. Standardisation was further expanded in the 1950s and 1960s due to economic growth and the rise of mass media and television (the state broadcaster RAI helped set a standard Italian).

Libraries and museums

Italy is one of the world's greatest centres of architecture, art, and books. Among its many libraries, the most important are in the national library system, which contains two central libraries, in Florence (5.3 million volumes) and Rome (5 million), and four regional libraries, in Naples (1.8 million volumes), Milan (1 million), Turin (973,000), and Venice (917,000). The existence of two national central libraries, while most nations have one, came about through the history of the country, as Rome was once part of the Papal States and Florence was one of the first capitals of the unified Kingdom of Italy. While both libraries are designated as copyright libraries, Florence now serves as the site designated for the conservation and cataloguing of Italian publications and the site in Rome catalogues foreign publications acquired by the state libraries.

Media

Internet

In 1986, the first internet connection in Italy was experimented in Pisa, the third in Europe after Norway and the United Kingdom. Already in the late 1970s, Pisan researchers, firstly with Luciano Lenzini, were in contact with U.S. researchers who had written the history of the Internet. Among them were Vint Cerf and Bob Kahn, who were the first to invent TCP and IP, the two protocols at the heart of the internet, and are hence considered the "Fathers of the Internet".

Currently, Internet access is available to businesses and home users in various forms, including dial-up, cable, DSL, and wireless. The .it is the Internet country code top-level domain (ccTLD) for Italy. The .eu domain is also used, as it is shared with other European Union member states.

According to data released by the fibre-to-the-home (FTTH) Council Europe, Italy represents one of the largest FTTH markets in Europe, with more than 2,5 million homes passed by fibre at end-December 2010; at the same date the country reported around 348,000 fibre subscribers. The "Fibre for Italy" project (with the participation of providers Fastweb, Vodafone, and Wind in a co-investment partnership) aims to reach 20 million people in Italy's 15 largest cities by 2015, and Telecom Italia plans to connect 138 cities by 2018. The government has also started the Italia Digitale project, which aims to provide at least 50% of Italians with high-speed internet access by 2020. The government aims to extend the fibre-optic network to rural areas.

Figures published by the National Institute of Statistics showed at end-2011 that 58,8% of Italian families had a personal computer (up slightly from 57,6% in 2010); 54,5% had access to the internet (up from 52,4%); and 45,8% had broadband access (up from 43,4%). Over one-fourth (26,3%, down slightly from 26,4% in 2010) of Italian internet users aged 14 and older made an online purchase during 2011.

Newspapers and periodicals

As of 2002, there were about 90 daily newspapers in the country, but not all of them had national circulation. According to Audipress statistics, the major daily newspapers (with their political orientations and estimated circulations) are: la Repubblica, left-wing, 3,276,000 in 2011; Corriere della Sera, independent, 3,274,000 in 2011; La Stampa, liberal, 2,132,000 in 2011; Il Messaggero, left of centre, 1,567,000 in 2011; il Resto del Carlino, right of centre, 1,296,000 in 2011; Il Sole 24 Ore, a financial news paper, 1,015,000 in 2011; il Giornale, independent, 728,000 in 2011; and l'Unità, Communist, 291,000 in 2011. TV Sorrisi e Canzoni is the most popular news weekly with a circulation of 677,658 in July 2012. The periodical press is becoming increasingly important. Among the most important periodicals are the pictorial weeklies—Oggi, L'Europeo, L'Espresso, and Gente. Famiglia Cristiana is a Catholic weekly periodical with a wide readership.

The majority of papers are published in northern and central Italy, and circulation is highest in these areas. Rome and Milan are the most important publication centres. A considerable number of dailies are owned by political parties, the Roman Catholic Church, and various economic groups.

The law provides for freedom of speech and the press, and the government is said to respect these rights in practice.

Radio

Of all the claimants to the title of the "Father of Radio", the one most associated with it is the Italian inventor Guglielmo Marconi. He was the first person to send radio communication signals in 1895. By 1899 he flashed the first wireless signal across the English Channel and two years later received the letter "S", telegraphed from England to Newfoundland. This was the first successful transatlantic radiotelegraph message in 1902.

Today, radio waves that are broadcast from thousands of stations, along with waves from other sources, fill the air around us continuously. Italy has three state-controlled radio networks that broadcast day and evening hours on both AM and FM. Program content varies from popular music to lectures, panel discussions, as well as frequent newscasts and feature reports. In addition, many private radio stations mix popular and classical music. A short-wave radio, although unnecessary, aids in the reception of VOA, BBC, Vatican Radio in English and the Armed Forces Network in Germany and in other European stations.

Television

The first form of televised media in Italy was introduced in 1939, when the first experimental broadcasting began. However, this lasted for a very short time: when fascist Italy entered World War II in 1940, all the transmissions were interrupted, and were resumed in earnest only nine years after the end of the conflict, in 1954.

There are two main national television organisations responsible for most viewing: state-owned RAI, funded by a yearly mandatory licence fee and Mediaset, a commercial network founded by Silvio Berlusconi. Currently La7 is considered the third major network in Italy, it is owned by Telecom Italia Media, the media branch of the telephone company Telecom Italia, which also owns 51% of MTV Italia. While many other networks are also present, both nationally and locally, RAI and Mediaset together, with their six traditional ex-analogue stations plus a number of new free to air digital channels, reach almost 70% of the TV ratings.

The television networks offer varied programs, including news, soap operas, reality TV shows, dating shows, game shows, sitcoms, cartoons, and films-all in Italian. All programs are in colour, except for the old black-and-white films. Most Italians still depend on VHF/UHF reception, but both cable systems and direct satellite reception is increasingly common. Conventional satellite dishes can pick up European broadcasts, including some in English.

National symbols

National symbols of Italy are the symbols that uniquely identify Italy reflecting its history and culture. They are used to represent the Nation through emblems, metaphors, personifications, and allegories, which are shared by the entire Italian people.

The three main official symbols, are:

• the flag of Italy, that is, the national flag in green, white and red, as required by article 12 of the Constitution of the Italian Republic;
• the emblem of Italy, which is the iconic symbol identifying the Italian Republic;
• The "Il Canto degli Italiani" by Goffredo Mameli and Michele Novaro, the Italian national anthem, which is performed in all public events.

Of these only the flag is explicitly mentioned in the Italian Constitution; this puts the flag under the protection of the law, with criminal penalties for contempt of it.

Other official symbols, as reported by the Presidency of the Italian Republic, are:

• the presidential standard of Italy, that is the distinctive standard representing the Presidency of the Italian Republic;
• the Altare della Patria, or the national monument dedicated to King Vittorio Emanuele II of Savoy, the first Sovereign of a united Italy and founder of the Fatherland, which houses the shrine of the Italian tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
• the Festa della Repubblica, which is the national celebratory day established to commemorate the birth of the Italian Republic, which is celebrated every year on 2 June, the date of the institutional referendum of 1946 with which the monarchy was abolished;

The teaching in the schools of the "Il Canto degli Italiani", an account of the Risorgimento events, and on the adoption of the flag of Italy are prescribed by law n. 222 of 23 November 2012.

There are also other symbols or emblems of Italy which, although not defined by law, are part of the Italian identity:

• the Italia turrita, which is the national personification of Italy in the appearance of a young woman with her head surrounded by a wall crown completed by towers (hence the term turrita);
• the cockade of Italy, or the national ornament of Italy, obtained by folding a green, white and red ribbon into plissé using the technique called plissage ("pleating");
• the Italian wolf, which inhabits Apennine Mountains and the Western Alps, features prominently in Latin and Italian cultures, such as in the legend of the founding of Rome. It is unofficially considered the national animal of Italy.
• the national colours of Italy are green, white, and red, collectively known in Italian as il tricolore (lit. 'the tricolour'). In sport in Italy, savoy azure has been used or adopted as the colour for many national teams, the first being the men's football team in 1910. The national auto racing colour of Italy is instead rosso corsa (lit. 'racing red'), while in other disciplines such as cycling and winter sports, which often use white.
• the strawberry tree, or the small tree chosen as a national tree because of its green leaves, its white flowers and its red berries, colours that recall the Italian flag; The flower of the strawberry tree is the national flower of Italy.
• the Italian sparrow, considered the national bird of Italy.
• the Stella d'Italia, the most ancient identity symbol of Italian land, since it dates back to Graeco-Roman tradition.
• the Frecce Tricolori, or the national aerobatic team of the Italian Air Force.

Public holidays

Public holidays celebrated in Italy include religious, national, and regional observances. Italy's National Day, the Festa della Repubblica ('Republic Day'), is celebrated on 2 June each year, with the main celebration taking place in Rome, and commemorates the birth of the Italian Republic in 1946. The ceremony of the event organised in Rome includes the deposition of a laurel wreath as a tribute to the Italian Unknown Soldier at the Altare della Patria by the president of the Italian Republic and a military parade along Via dei Fori Imperiali in Rome.

Liberation Day is a national holiday in Italy that commemorates the victory of the Italian resistance movement against Nazi Germany and the Italian Social Republic, puppet state of the Nazis and rump state of the fascists, in the Italian Civil War, a civil war in Italy fought during World War II, which takes place on 25 April. The date was chosen by convention, as it was the day of the year 1945 when the National Liberation Committee of Upper Italy (CLNAI) officially proclaimed the insurgency in a radio announcement, propounding the seizure of power by the CLNAI and proclaiming the death sentence for all fascist leaders (including Benito Mussolini, who was shot three days later).

National Unity and Armed Forces Day is an Italian national day since 1919 which commemorates the victory in World War I, a war event considered the completion of the process of unification of Italy. It is celebrated every 4 November, which is the anniversary of the armistice of Villa Giusti becoming effective in 1918, declaring Austria-Hungary's surrender. Italy entered the World War I in 1915 with the aim of completing national unity: for this reason, the Italian intervention in the World War I is also considered the Fourth Italian War of Independence, in a historiographical perspective that identifies in the latter the conclusion of the unification of Italy, whose military actions began during the revolutions of 1848 with the First Italian War of Independence. The Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye (1919) and the Treaty of Rapallo (1920) allowed the annexation of Trentino Alto-Adige, Julian March, Istria, and Kvarner, as well as the Dalmatian city of Zara; the subsequent Treaty of Rome (1924) led to the annexation of the city of Fiume to Italy.

The Anniversary of the Unification of Italy is a national day that falls annually on 17 March and celebrates the birth of Italy as modern nation state, which took place following the proclamation of the Kingdom of Italy on 17 March 1861; however, the complete unification of Italy took place only in the following years. In 1866, Veneto and the province of Mantua were annexed after the Third Italian War of Independence, then in 1870 Lazio after the capture of Rome, and finally in 1918 Trentino-Alto Adige and Julian March after the World War I. The anniversary of the birth of the Italian state was solemnly celebrated in 1911 (50 years), in 1961 (100 years), and in 2011 (150 years).

The Tricolour Day, officially National Flag Day, is the flag day of Italy. Celebrated on 7 January, it was established by Law 671 on 31 December 1996. It is intended as a celebration, although not a public holiday. The official celebration of the day is held in Reggio Emilia, the city where the Italian tricolour was first adopted by an Italian sovereign state, the Cispadane Republic, on 7 January 1797. In Rome, at the Quirinal Palace, the ceremonial foresees instead the change of the Guard of honour in solemn form with the deployment and the parade of the Corazzieri Regiment in gala uniform and the Fanfare of the Carabinieri Cavalry Regiment. This solemn rite is carried out only on three other occasions, during the celebrations of the Anniversary of the Unification of Italy (17 March), of the Festa della Repubblica (2 June), and of the National Unity and Armed Forces Day (4 November).

The National Memorial Day of the Exiles and Foibe is an Italian celebration for the memory of the victims of the Foibe and the Istrian–Dalmatian exodus, which led to the emigration of hundreds of thousands (between 230,000 and 350,000) of local ethnic Italians (Istrian Italians and Dalmatian Italians) from Yugoslavia after the end of the World War II. The Italian Law 92 of 30 March 2004 instituted a Day of Remembrance on 10 February to commemorate the victims of Foibe and the forced exodus of nearly the entire population of Italian origin living in Dalmatia and Julian March brought about by Yugoslavia. The law also instituted a special medal to be conferred on relatives of victims. The date of 10 February is the day on which the peace treaties of Paris were signed. These treaties transferred the previously Italian areas of Istria, Kvarner, the Dalmatian city of Zadar, and most of Julian March to Yugoslavia.

Natale di Roma, historically known as Dies Romana and also referred to as Romaia, is the festival linked to the foundation of Rome, celebrated on 21 April. According to legend, Romulus is said to have founded the city of Rome on 21 April, 753 BC. From this date, the Roman chronology derived its system, known by the Latin phrase Ab urbe condita, meaning 'from the founding of the city', which counted the years from this presumed foundation.

Religion

In 2017, the proportion of Italians who identified themselves as Roman Catholic Christians was 74.4%. Since 1985, Catholicism is no longer officially the state religion. Italy has the world's fifth-largest Catholic population, and is the largest Catholic nation in Europe.

The Holy See, the episcopal jurisdiction of Rome, contains the central government of the Catholic Church. It is recognised by other subjects of international law as a sovereign entity, headed by the pope, who is also the bishop of Rome, with which diplomatic relations can be maintained. Often incorrectly referred to as "the Vatican", the Holy See is not the same entity as the Vatican City State because the Holy See is the jurisdiction and administrative entity of the pope. The Vatican City came into existence only in 1929.

In 2011, minority Christian faiths in Italy included an estimated 1.5 million Orthodox Christians, or 2.5% of the population, 500,000 Pentecostals and Evangelicals (of whom 400,000 are members of the Assemblies of God), 251,192 Jehovah's Witnesses, 30,000 Waldensians, 25,000 Seventh-day Adventists, 26,925 Latter-day Saints, 15,000 Baptists (plus some 5,000 Free Baptists), 7,000 Lutherans, and 4,000 Methodists (affiliated with the Waldensian Church).

One of the longest-established minority religious faiths in Italy is Judaism, Jews having been present in ancient Rome since before the birth of Christ. Italy has for centuries welcomed Jews expelled from other countries, notably Spain. However, about 20% of Italian Jews were killed during the Holocaust. This, together with the emigration which preceded and followed World War II, has left only around 28,400 Jews in Italy.

Soaring immigration in the last two decades has been accompanied by an increase in non-Christian faiths. Following immigration from the Indian subcontinent, in Italy there are 120,000 Hindus, 70,000 Sikhs, and 22 gurdwaras across the country.

The Italian state, as a measure to protect religious freedom, devolves shares of income tax to recognised religious communities, under a regime known as Eight per thousand. Donations are allowed to Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, and Hindu communities; however, Islam remains excluded, since no Muslim communities have yet signed a concordat with the Italian state. Taxpayers who do not wish to fund a religion contribute their share to the state welfare system.

The Italian Renaissance has had a seminal effect on church art in Italy, which includes works by Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Sandro Botticelli, Gian Lorenzo Bernini, Fra Carnevale, Tintoretto, Titian, Raphael, Giotto, and others. Italian church architecture is includes historical landmarks of Western culture, notably St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, Cathedral of St. Mark's in Venice, and Brunelleschi's Florence Cathedral, which includes the "Gates of Paradise" doors at the Baptistery by Lorenzo Ghiberti.

Sports

The most popular sport in Italy is football. Italy's men's national football team is one of the world's most successful teams, with four FIFA World Cup victories (1934, 1938, 1982, and 2006). Italian clubs have won 48 major European trophies, making Italy the second most successful country in European football. Italy's top-flight club football league is named Serie A and is followed by millions of fans around the world.

Other popular team sports in Italy include basketball, volleyball, and rugby. Italy's male and female national volleyball teams are often featured among the world's best. The Italian national basketball team's best results were gold at Eurobasket 1983 and EuroBasket 1999, as well as silver at the Olympics in 2004. Lega Basket Serie A is widely considered one of the most competitive in Europe. Italy's rugby national team competes in the Six Nations Championship, and is a regular at the Rugby World Cup. The men's volleyball team won three consecutive World Championships (in 1990, 1994, and 1998) and earned the Olympic silver medal in 1996, 2004, and 2016.

Italy has a long and successful tradition in individual sports as well. Bicycle racing is a familiar sport in the country. Italians have won the UCI World Championships more than any other country, except Belgium. The Giro d'Italia is a cycling race held every May, and constitutes one of the three Grand Tours. Alpine skiing is also a widespread sport in Italy, and the country is a popular international skiing destination, known for its ski resorts. Italian skiers achieved good results in Winter Olympic Games, Alpine Ski World Cup, and tennis has a significant following in Italy, ranking as the fourth most practised sport in the country. The Rome Masters, founded in 1930, is one of the most prestigious tennis tournaments in the world. Italian professional tennis players won the Davis Cup in 1976 and the Fed Cup in 2006, 2009, 2010, and 2013.

Motorsports are also extremely popular in Italy. Italy has won, by far, the most MotoGP World Championships. Italian Scuderia Ferrari is the oldest surviving team in Grand Prix racing, having competed since 1948, and statistically the most successful Formula One team in history with a record of 232 wins. The Italian Grand Prix of Formula 1 is the fifth oldest surviving Grand Prix, having been held since 1921. It is also one of the two Grand Prix present in every championship since the first one in 1950. Every Formula 1 Grand Prix (except for the 1980) has been held at Autodromo Nazionale Monza. Formula 1 was also held at Imola (1980–2006, 2020–2024) and Mugello (2020). Other successful Italian car manufacturers in motorsports are Alfa Romeo, Lancia, Maserati, and Fiat.

Historically, Italy has been successful in the Olympic Games, taking part from the first Olympiad and in 47 Games out of 48, not having officially participated in the 1904 Summer Olympics. Italian sportsmen have won 522 medals at the Summer Olympic Games, and another 106 at the Winter Olympic Games, for a combined total of 628 medals with 235 golds, which makes them the fifth most successful nation in Olympic history for total medals. The country hosted two Winter Olympics and will host a third (in 1956, 2006, and 2026), and one Summer games (in 1960).

Traditions

Italian traditions reflect a rich cultural tapestry woven from religious, seasonal, and local celebrations that have evolved over centuries. These traditions blend ancient rituals, religious observances, and local customs, creating a vibrant cultural landscape that varies significantly across different regions of the country.

Religious and seasonal traditions

Christmas and Epiphany

Christmas in Italy is a major holiday beginning on 8 December with the Immaculate Conception and ending on 6 January with the Epiphany. The term Natale derives from Latin, with traditional greetings including buon Natale ('Merry Christmas') and felice Natale ('Happy Christmas').

The nativity scene tradition originates in Italy, attributed to Saint Francis of Assisi. His 1223 living nativity scene in Greccio is commemorated in Catholic, Lutheran, and Anglican liturgical calendars.

The Epiphany features the Befana, a folkloric figure who brings gifts to children, while Saint Lucy's Day (13 December) is celebrated in some regions as a children's holiday similar to Christmas.

New Year's traditions

New Year's Eve in Italy is marked by traditional rituals, including wearing red underwear and a rarely followed custom of discarding old items by dropping them from windows. Dinner is traditionally shared with family and friends, typically featuring zampone or cotechino with lentils. At 20:30, the president of Italy delivers a television greeting, and at midnight fireworks illuminate the country. A folklore tradition involves eating one spoonful of lentil stew per bell stroke, symbolising good fortune and prosperity.

Local festivals and cultural celebrations

Sagre: local food and cultural festivals

A sagra is a local festival typically celebrating regional cuisine or honouring a patron saint. These festivals often showcase specific local foods, such as the Sagra dell'uva in Marino or the Sagra della Cipolla in Cannara. Common sagre celebrate local products such as olive oil, wine, pasta, chestnuts, and cheese.

Patron saint days and regional festivals

The national patronal day on 4 October honours Saints Francis and Catherine. Each city also celebrates its patron saint's day, such as Rome (Saints Peter and Paul), Milan (Saint Ambrose), and Naples (Saint Januarius). Notable festivals include the Palio di Siena horse race, Holy Week rites, and the Festival of Saint Agatha.

In 2013, UNESCO recognised several Italian festivals as intangible cultural heritage, including the Varia di Palmi and the faradda di li candareri in Sassari. The unique calcio storico fiorentino, an early form of football originating in the Middle Ages, continues to be played annually in Florence.

Carnival traditions

Carnival traditions vary across Italy. In the Ambrosian rite regions around Milan, Carnival ends on the first Sunday of Lent. The Carnival of Venice and Carnival of Viareggio are particularly renowned, featuring sophisticated masquerades and parades. In Sardinia, a distinct carnival form survives, possibly rooted in pre-Christian winter rituals of awakening the earth.

Seasonal celebrations

Ferragosto on 15 August marks the peak of the summer vacation period, coinciding with the Assumption of Mary.

UNESCO World Heritage Sites

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage Sites are places of exceptional cultural or natural heritage as defined in the UNESCO World Heritage Convention of 1972. The convention defines cultural heritage as including monuments, architectural works, archaeological sites, and groups of buildings, while natural heritage encompasses geological formations, biological landscapes, and sites of scientific or conservation significance. Italy ratified the convention on 23 June 1978.

The first Italian site, the Rock Drawings in Valcamonica, was listed during the World Heritage Committee's 3rd Session in Cairo and Luxor, Egypt, in 1979. Italy currently holds the world's highest concentration of UNESCO World Heritage Sites. As of 2026, Italy has 62 inscribed sites—the most of any country—with 56 cultural and 6 natural sites.

Notable Italian UNESCO World Heritage Sites include significant cultural and natural landmarks such as:

• Archaeological sites:
  • Sassi di Matera
  • Pompeii, Torre Annunziata, and Herculaneum
  • Etruscan necropolises of Cerveteri and Tarquinia
• Architectural marvels:
  • Valle dei Templi
  • Alberobello
  • Castel del Monte
  • Royal Palace of Caserta
  • Arab-Norman Palermo and the Cathedral Churches of Cefalù and Monreale
• Artistic treasures:
  • Santa Maria delle Grazie and The Last Supper
  • Scrovegni Chapel
• Natural landscapes:
  • Dolomites
  • Aeolian Islands
  • Amalfi Coast
  • Langhe-Roero and Montferrat
• Historic sites:
  • Cinque Terre
  • Syracuse and Necropolis of Pantalica
  • Val d'Orcia
  • Early Christian monuments of Ravenna

Seven sites are transnational. The Historic Centre of Rome is shared with the Vatican; Monte San Giorgio and the Rhaetian Railway with Switzerland; the Venetian Works of Defence with Croatia and Montenegro; the Prehistoric pile dwellings around the Alps with 5 other countries; the Great Spa Towns of Europe with 6 other countries; and the Ancient and Primeval Beech Forests of the Carpathians and Other Regions of Europe are shared with 17 other countries.