Pope moves to Avignon under pressure from the French king. As the Catholic church splits, the competing line of papal pretenders in Rome are known as ‘antipopes’
800 BCE
Charlemagne, King of the Franks, is crowned Holy Roman Emperor giving him, along with the pope, supreme rule over the Empire
753 BCE
Romulus found Rome
625 BCE
Ancient Rome
509 BCE
The Etruscan Tarquinius Superbus, last king of Rome, is run out of the city and the Republic is established
475 BCE
he last Emperor of the West, Romulus Augustulus, abdicates and Rome is taken over by the Goths
410 BCE
Rome sacked by the Goths under Alaric
312 BCE
Constantine defeats the rival emperor Maxentius and converts to Christianity, starts to build Christian basilicas in Rome
264 BCE
Punic Wars fought by Rome against the Carthaginian general Hannibal. Rome gains control of Sicily, parts of Spain and north Africa
125 BCE
Pantheon constructed by Hadrian as a temple to all the gods, later to become the first Roman temple to be Christianised
95 BCE
the ‘Five Good Emperors’, including Marcus Aurelius whose equestrian statue stands on the Capitoline Hill,maintain the Pax Romana (era of peace) that began under Augustus
65 BCE
St Peter martyred under Nero, and buried on the site of the present St Peter’s Basilica
44 BCE
Julius Caesar murdered on the Ides of March and cremated in the Forum
31 BCE
Octavian (later Augustus), Caesar’s adopted son, ends the struggle for power when he triumphs over the forces of Mark Antony and Cleopatra
1503
Julius II founds the Swiss Guard, and commissions Michelangelo to paint the Sistine Chapel ceiling
The reign of Alexander VII sees the completion of St Peter’s by his chief architect Gian Lorenzo Bernini
Napoleon Bonaparte leads the French armies into Rome
Republic of Italy established by Mazzini and Garibaldi in Rome, only for French troops to regain control of the city later that same year
Rome is proclaimed capital of the new Kingdom of Italy. Pope Pius IX no longer wields temporal power and is confined to the Vatican
Mussolini marches on Rome and seizes power
taly one of the six founder nations signing the Treaty of Rome establishing the European Economic Community (later EU) at the Palazzo dei Conservatori on the Capitoline Hill
Rome hosts the XVII Olympic Games
Death of the Polish Pope John Paul II after a ponitificate of 27 years, succeeded by the German Benedict XVI. John Paul II was the first non-Italian pope since 1523.
