Italy (Italian: Italia) is a republic in southern Europe, on the northern shore of the Mediterranean Sea.

Italy was the heart of the ancient Roman Empire, which united the lands bordering the Mediterranean Sea and spread the civilizations of ancient Greece and Rome through much of Europe. After the Roman Empire collapsed in the 5th century AD, Italy’s political unity was lost. But Rome, under the Roman Catholic Church, remained the spiritual center of western Europe.

In the late Middle Ages, northern Italian cities such as Florence, Venice, and Milan became prosperous commercial centers. In these cities the rebirth of classical culture known as the Renaissance began in the 14th century. Italian Renaissance painters, sculptors, writers, and architects were admired and imitated all over Europe, while Italy’s many small states became pawns in power struggles between France, Spain and Austria.

Italian nationalism emerged as a powerful force in the 19th century, and a united Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed in 1861 when the regional states of the peninsula, along with Sardinia and Sicily, were united under King Victor Emmanuel II.

An era of parliamentary government came to a close in the early 1920s when Benito Mussolini established a Fascist dictatorship. His disastrous alliance with Nazi Germany led to Italy’s defeat in World War II.

In 1946, after World War II, the monarchy was abolished and the democratic Italian Republic was established and economic revival followed. Since then, Italy has had a succession of governments, dominated during most of that period by the center-right, with the left in opposition. Rome is the capital and largest city of Italy, but nearly all of Italy’s towns and cities retain artistic treasures and other reminders of Italy’s cultural heritage.

Italy was a charter member of NATO and the European Economic Community (EEC). It has been at the forefront of European economic and political unification, joining the Economic and Monetary Union in 1999.

Persistent problems include illegal immigration, organized crime, corruption, high unemployment, sluggish economic growth, and the low incomes and technical standards of southern Italy compared with the prosperous north.