Ravenna (ancient world)

A city in northeastern Italy (Cisalpine, Cispadane Gaul) on the river Bedesis (Montone); close to the sea in ancient times (it is now seven miles away), and almost surrounded by streams, canals and marshes

There were traditions of foundation by the Thessalians (under the name of Rene), Sapinates (Umbrians) and Veneti. But the name of Ravenna comes from the Etruscans, who left signs of their habitation (notably bronze statuettes of the sixth to fourth centuries BC); but hill people from Umbria took the town over, together with its harbor. Following on the occupation of northern Italy by the Gauls, Ravenna came within the territory of the Boii.

After Roman control had been subsequently established, it became a station on the Via Popillia (132), linking Atria (and later Aquileia) with Ariminum (Rimini). Presumably receiving Roman citizenship as a municipium along with other Cispadane communities c 90/89 (Cicero's reference to `treaty’ status in 56 is obscure), during the civil war between Sulla and the Marians the city was captured from the latter by Quintus Caecilius Metellus Pius in 82. During Julius Caesar's civil war against Pompey the Great it was the base from which he started his march across the Rubicon into Italy (49); he also established a gladiatorial school in the city.

In the time of Octavian (the future Augustus) it became the headquarters of his Adriatic fleet (c 38), a four-mile canal (the Fossa Augusta) being built to carry the waters of a small tributary of the Padus (Po) to a new harbor established at the coastal suburb Classis, two miles away on the ancient coast (of which the contours have now greatly changed). Ravenna seems to have possessed a unique constitution; although receiving new settlers it did not become a colony, while an inscription records a `controller’ (magister) of its municipium, who was probably more or less subordinate to the fleet commander. The place became a prosperous center of maritime commerce, conducted by a cosmopolitan population consisting largely of sailors from Dalmatia and Thrace, and engaged mainly in shipbuilding, but also promoting the manufacture of linen, and the export of wine, fish, timber and asparagus brought down the Po. The poet Martial remarked that the wine of Ravenna was cheap, but he disliked the taste of its water.

Under Tiberius (AD 14–37) the city was selected for the internment of Arminius' son and Maroboduus, of the tribes of the Cherusci and Marcomanni respectively. In 69 the defection of the Ravenna naval base to Vespasian played a part in the downfall of his rival Vitellius. Ravenna belonged to the district of Aemilia, and in the later empire was capital of the district or province of Flaminia et Picenum Annonarium; its port still housed a fleet, despite silting. In 404, because of its defensibility—strengthened by this silting process—the city was selected by Honorius to replace Mediolanum (Milan) as the capital (and a principal mint) of the western empire, retaining this position until the abdication of Romulus Augustulus (476), the last emperor in Italy, and thereafter under Kings Odoacer the Herulian and Theoderic the Ostrogoth and the Byzantine governors who followed (540–751). It was a town crisscrossed with canals, according to Sidonius Apollinaris (467), where paradoxically `walls fall flat and waters stand, towers float and ships are seated’—and frogs are citizens. But the almost impregnable situation of the habitation center guaranteed seccessive rulers the security they needed.

Ancient sources refer to temples of Jupiter, Apollo and Neptune, and indicate the existence of a theater, amphitheater, circus and lighthouse. But although parts of the street grid are detectable, only very few traces of the earlier imperial epoch are still to be seen, apart from the foundations of a twenty-mile aqueduct erected by Trajan (98–117). The period, however, after Ravenna's subsequent conversion into the western imperial residence produced buildings of very distinguished architectural and artistic quality. This transformation of the city into a capital worthy of the name was initiated in the reign of Valentinian III (425–55) by his mother Galla Placidia (d. 450). Her Church of the Holy Cross (c 425), cruciform in accordance with its name, is only known from excavations. Beside its ruins, however, stands the edifice known as the mausoleum of Placidia, which combines the features of an imperial tomb and martyr's chapel and contains not only her own remains but also those of her husband Constantius III (421) and her half brother Honorius (395–423). The Baptistery of the Orthodox is an octagonal building that was constructed or reconstructed c 400, but given its dome during the bishopric of Neon (c 449–60) for whom it is sometimes named. Both these monuments contain richly colored, brilliantly imaginative decoration created by the leading artists of Constantinople, or under their influence.

The other principal churches of Ravenna, which are of sixth-century date and therefore fall outside the scope of this book, include San Vitale (famous for its portrait mosaics of Justinian I and Theodora) and Sant'Apollinare Nuovo, in which mosaics depict the palace of Theoderic (his mausoleum is also to be seen in the city) and views of the cities of Ravenna and Classis. Air photographs and excavations of Classis have helped to define the position of its fort and harbor basin and beyond its habitation center the sixth century church of Sant'Apollinare in Classe is still to be seen.