Italy
Italy(see map: Italy) The name Italia, probably a Graecized form of Italic Vitelia (=‘calf-land’), was originally restricted to the southern half of the ‘toe’ but was gradually extended. By 450 BC it meant the region subsequently inhabited by the Bruttii (Theophrastus Historia plantarum 5. 8); by 400 it embraced Lucania as well (Thucydides 6. 4, 7. 33); Campania was included after 325, and by Pyrrhus' day (early 3rd cent. bc) Italia as a geographical expression meant everything south of Liguria and Cisalpine Gaul (Zonar. 8. 17; see Gaul (Cisalpine)); this area, however, only acquired political unity after the Social War of 91–89 BC (see Rome (history), §1.5). Cisalpine Gaul was not officially incorporated until Augustus' time when, accordingly, Italy reached its natural Alpine frontiers. Unofficially,...
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