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The most incredible places in Italy, a country that is much more than Rome, Venice, Florence and Pisa. It is the birthplace of the Roman Empire, one of the fundamental pillars of Western civilization. Since its mythical founding by Romulus and Remus in 753 BC, Rome grew from a small city-state to become a colossus that dominated Europe, North Africa and the Middle East for centuries. The fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 AD marked the beginning of the Middle Ages and a period of political and social fragmentation, but also of artistic and architectural flourishing with the Carolingian Renaissance and then the full Renaissance. The Italian Renaissance, which began in the 14th century, drove an unprecedented cultural renaissance, where geniuses such as Da Vinci, Michelangelo and Galileo changed the perception of art, science and philosophy. Modern Italy began to take shape in the 19th century with the Risorgimento movement, which culminated in Italian unification under the leadership of figures such as Garibaldi and Cavour. The country was proclaimed a kingdom in 1861, and Rome joined as its capital in 1870. ______ Original or licensed content.