Milan - History
Channel: The Storyteller
Date: 2020-05-12

Milan - History
The Celtic Insubres, the inhabitants of the region of northern Italy called Insubria, appear to have founded Milan around 600 BC. According to the legend reported by Livy , the Gaulish king Ambicatus sent his nephew Bellovesus into northern Italy at the head of a party drawn from various Gaulish tribes; this Bellovesus allegedly founded Mediolanum in the time of Tarquinius Priscus, who traditionally reigned from 616 to 579 BC, according to this legend. The Romans, led by consul Gnaeus Cornelius Scipio Calvus, fought the Insubres and captured the city in 222 BC; the chief of the Insubres submitted to Rome, giving the Romans control of the city. They eventually conquered the entirety of the region, calling the new  province "Cisalpine Gaul"  – "Gaul this side of the Alps" – and may have given the site its  Latinized Celtic name of Mediolanum: in Gaulish *medio- meant "middle, center" and the name element -lanon is the Celtic equivalent of Latin -planum "plain", thus *Mediolanon  meant " in the midst of the plain". In 286 the Roman Emperor Diocletian moved the capital of the Western Roman Empire from Rome to Mediolanum.


______________________________________
* Text taken from the English Wikipedia at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milan
* Pictures from Wikipedia or public domain.