Calabria

Calabria (the foot of the Italian boot) is one of the southern regions of Italy. Its territory comprises hundreds of miles of coastline as well as mountainous areas like the imposing Pollino chain in the North, the Sila forested plateau in the center, and the Serre and Aspromonte chains in the South. With the mountains being fairly close to the sea, the rivers that run through this region are all very short and stay dry for long parts of the year.

Catanzaro is its capital city.

Population

Traditionally a land of emigration due to the scarcity of good arable lands, Calabria has a population of just over 2 million people, who mainly live on the plains and along the coast.

Calabria is divided in five provinces here ordered by number of residents:

• province of Cosenza (CS)
• province of Reggio Calabria (RC)
• province of Catanzaro (CZ)
• province of Crotone (KR)
• province of Vibo Valentia (VV)

Economy

Tourism is Calabria's main viable industry, one which has been steadily on the rise in the last few decades. Industrial development is low and agriculture is not very productive, because of the rugged terrain.

The discovery of the Riace Bronzes, the two Greek statues dredged from the sea and exhibited since the early 1980s in the Museo Nazionale della Magna Grecia in Reggio Calabria, revived the interest for this region and attracted hundreds of thousands of tourists.

History

In the 8th century BCE Calabria became a Greek colony and the cities of Reggio Calabria, Sibari and Crotone were founded.

Four centuries later it was occupied by the Bruttii, who during the Punic wars sided with Hannibal against the Romans.

In 132 BCE it was conquered by the Romans and included in the Third Region as Brutium, while the name Calabria was used only for the Salento Peninsula.

After the division of the Roman Empire into the Western and the Byzantine Empire, which was the predominantly Greek-speaking eastern Roman Empire of the Middle Ages, Calabria remained under Byzantium until the Lombards occupied it in the 7th century CE.

Later on it was conquered by the Normans (1060), then by the Swabians, the Anjou and the Aragonese, under whose domination there were peasants' riots in 1459 and the famous rebellion led by Tommaso Campanella in 1599.

The Spanish occupation was especially tyrannical for the region, and the 19th century saw the rise of patriot movements (the Carboneria) and riots, until in 1860 the population rose to support Garibaldi after he landed with his red shirts at Melito.

As all the Kingdom of Naples, Calabria was then united to the newly established Kingdom of Italy. The decades that followed saw an increase in poverty and emigration, also due to the great disparity between the rich industrial regions of Northern Italy and the agricultural, poorer South.

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