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Around 1 million people speak Sardinian, the majority of which live on the island of Sardinia. This indigenous language and has been influenced by Catalan, Byzantine Greek, Spanish, Italian, and pre-Latin languages.

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"Nel Blu Dipinto Di Blu" (Volare) 1958 - Domenico Modugno originale con Testi Lyrics - Cantare

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Deer Drive Legends | First 10 Minutes on Switch

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A new girl, named Elena Potato, arrives in Oldmill Village. She becomes "interested" in meeting Ezekiel Zick after hearing he was able to see monsters. When Purrcy, her cat, goes missing, Zick and Elena try to find him, but end up investigating the mysterious case of dogs being kidnapped around Oldmill Village... with the help of Zick's first supernatural being beyond the monster world... a ghost dog.

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A new girl, named Elena Potato, arrives in Oldmill Village. She becomes "interested" in meeting Ezekiel Zick after hearing he was able to see monsters. When Purrcy, her cat, goes missing, Zick and Elena try to find him, but end up investigating the mysterious case of dogs being kidnapped around Oldmill Village...

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Monster Allergy is based on the international best-selling comic book series of the same name. The series follows 12-year-old Zick who suffers from allergies and discovers that he has the ability to see the invisible, supernatural monsters that live among us. Along with help of his best friend Elena and his talking cat, Timothy, Zick hopes to hone his powers to one day become a Monster Tamer just like his dad.

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Monster Allergy is based on the international best-selling comic book series of the same name. The series follows 12-year-old Zick who suffers from allergies and discovers that he has the ability to see the invisible, supernatural monsters that live among us.

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just game 2019 is a dance/ rhythm type video game, developed by ubisoft. this game was also supported on xbox, wii, switch, and playstation...etc. however, it is a very simple game played, only thing you need to do for able to play the game is to follow the movement it shows on the screen, the accurate your movement are, the higher score you get!

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this is an adventure type video game. published by winter wolves, in 2008. the story background of this video game is about a quiet girl named heileen, she's live in an ordinary life with no real world problem, so one day her uncle took her to a new world (adventure), through the adventure, she discovered a lot of new thing...

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screamer is a racing (car) game published by Virgin Interactive. Gamer known screamer as a real milestone (history) of racing game because it was the first video game that consider high playability and detail animate on PC which was incredible and has never shown on PC before (at the past).

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last day of june is a adventure puzzle video game that is about loss and love (interactive tale) between a couple, carl and june. The animator and the director of this video game is by jess cope, he's also the animator for frankenweenie (a flim).

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Ognissantih is a national (christian) holiday celebrate in Italy on november 1, which is also known as la Festa di Ognissanti (italian) or all saint's day.  Ognissantih is the idea of prayers to dead ancestors.

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Ballet was originate at Italy, during the 15th century. Ballet are performed for celebrating event, especially in wedding. at 16th century a Italian women called Catherine de Medici went to france and fund ballet in the french court, which influence a lot of country learning ballet.

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st.peter's Basillica has a long period history in italy, in 4th century, the italians begin to build st.peter's Basillica, and was  completed in 329.

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italian was originally from Latin, a lot of words from classical Latin are used in sentences and word for italian today.

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this video game is powered by Unreal Engine (an integrated tool), it was developed by Nikola Tesla.  however close to the sun is a simple game to play, firstly, the player will played as a journalist (main character) named rose. then how this game played is really simple, all you do in this game is to  discover things inside a room and unlock the next door. the reason that people love this game is because the animate of the background in this game makes people feel realistic as they're actually viewing the building in their view.

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Grisu is a cartoon created in 1972, by noni pagot and toni pagot (brothers). the cartoon is a about a little dragon dream to become a firefighter.

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Toni Pagot is an itialian comic artist and animator, and he has an elder brother named nino. toni and his brother nino start creating cartoon/ animate after war world II, the first animate they create was called "the dynamite brothers" in 1949.

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The Good, the Bad and the Ugly Main Theme Ennio Morricone

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PowerPoint presentation

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She was a soprano known for her acting ability as well as her voice, becoming the first dive in history of opera

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Farinelli was a stage name of Carlo Maria Michelangelo Nicola Broschi, known or having a incredible vocal rage to soprano, singing the highest note customary at that time, a C6

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The mandolin is a plucked string instrument from the lute family. You play it with a pick and is very similar to a guitar

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Born on October 1686 and died on 1758. He joined the cathedral choir there in 1695. People say he was a powerful, clear,  equal and sweet contralto voice, with a perfect intonation and an excellent shake.

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Usually a very high soprano, female characters

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Male,  leading castrati who possessed extraordinary vocal virtuosity, male hero of story.

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YouTube video

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Italian Music TARANTELLA NAPOLETANA accordion Fisarmonica Akkordeonmusik Acordeon The Godfather

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The scacciapensieri is a mouth harp.  This instrument is played only in northern Italy and in Sicily.

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The quartara is a wind instrument. You blow across the opening at the top.  It is played mostly in the south of Italy.

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Domenico Modugno
"In the blue sky as I was painted blue" or "In the blue-painted blue sky", popularly known as "Volare"

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The accordion is a  woodland instrument, played by pressing buttons on the side

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The zamponga double chartered pipes played in Marche, mostly being played on Christmas

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Brainwash Song (English) -- The SuperVips (1968)

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This film music is from a film called spaghetti directed by sergio leone, in 1966, the good is clint eastwood, Eli wallach is the ugly, and lastly the bad is lee van cleef. however, the good, the bad, and the ugly is a music part in the film.

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Bocce Raffa 2012 Finale Italia x Argentina. 100%

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Teatro Massimo

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VIP my brother superman (italian: vip mi hermano super hombre) is an animate film, the film was 1hr17mins39sec long, create by bruno bozzetto in the 1968.
This film is basically about superheros in the modern society. The main characters are the super-vip and his little brother mini-vip, basically super vip has handsome outlook, tall, powerful , has good manner, therefore everyone loves him. mini vip is the one who has the big thick glasses,  short, and weak. however, this story is about firstly, the treatment between them (the vips), during an adventure!

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A bit of history about the Leonardo's Last Supper

The Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci (Cenacolo Vinciano) is one of the most famous paintings in the world. This artwork was painted between 1494 and 1498 under the government of Ludovico il Moro and represents the last "dinner" between Jesus and his disciples.

In order to create this unique work, Leonardo carried out an exhaustive research creating an infinity of preparatory sketches. Leonardo abandons the traditional method of fresco painting, painting the scene "dry" on the wall of the refectory. Traces of gold and silver foils have been found which testify to the artist's willingness to make the figures in a much more realistic manner, including precious details. After completion, his technique and environmental factor had contributed to the eventual deterioration of the fresco, which had undergone numerous restorations.

The most recent restoration was completed in 1999 where several scientific methods were used to restore the original colors as close as possible, and to eliminate traces of paint applied in previous attempts to restore the fresco.

What is the Leonardo's Last Supper nowadays?

Leonardo's Last Supper is located in its original place, on the wall of the dining room of the former Dominican convent of Santa Maria delle Grazie, exactly in the refectory of the convent and is one of the most celebrated and well known artworks in the world.

Leonardo Da Vinci's "Last Supper", a huge painting of 4.60 meters high and 8.80 meters wide was made with tempera and oil on a gypsum preparation instead of the technique commonly used in the fresco period.

Several measures have now been implemented to protect the paint from deterioration. To ensure that the fresco is maintained at room temperature, since the last restoration, visitor's' entry has been restricted to a group of 25 people every 15 minutes.

Curiosities about the Leonardo's Last Supper

Did you know that the great fame of this masterpiece has awaken the interest of many historians, researchers and novelists who seek to solve the supposed mysteries and enigmas that surround this painting. For example, in the books "The Templar Revelation" by Clive Prince and Lynn Picknett and in the novel Dan Brown's Da Vinci Code, it is affirmed that the figure to the right of Jesus is not the apostle John, but a female figure. The truth is that these mysteries and curiosities have not yet been solved.

Did you know that during the French Revolutionary War Napoleon's troops used the wall of the refectory to make target practice and during the Second World War in 1943 the bombings managed to tear off the roof of the old Dominican dining room leaving the paint in the open for several years.

Why visit the Leonardo's Last Supper?

The Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci is undoubtedly one of the most important works of art of all times, both for its innovative approach and for the impact it has had on artists of all ages. This magnificent work of art has been seeing by Leonardo's contemporary artists as the "painting that speaks," something that had never happened before.

How to visit the Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci?

The Last Supper of Leonardo da Vinci is undoubtedly one of the most interesting attractions in the city of Milan. The availability of tickets is very limited, so the advance reservation is considered "mandatory". Tickets to see this masterpiece can be booked online but must be sold as part of a package, so it is recommended to combine them with a Milan Audioguide, or with entries for the Brera Gallery or for the Pinacoteca Ambrosiana.

Naturally, it is also possible to book a guided tour that may also include visiting other churches or attractions located in the center of Milan.

It is also possible to request a visit with a private guide that includes, in addition to the entrance to the Last Supper, a visit to the adjacent Church of Santa Maria delle Grazie.

Other attractions in the area

Milan is a big city full of surprises. On a short distance from Leonardo da Vinci's Last Supper is the Duomo Square in the historic center of the city. In this square is located the famous gothic Cathedral of Milan and the statue of Victor Emanuel II erected in 1896 in honor to the king of Italy. Here you will also find the wonderful Vittorio Emanuele II Gallery, a shopping center full of cafes, restaurants and shops. After crossing this gallery you will arrive at the luxurious theater of the city of Milan, La Scala. A walk through a historic center simply unforgettable!

You may be interested in:

Colosseum (Rome), St Mark's Basilica (Venice) or Uffizi (Florence).

Book the entrance to the Last Supper with these combined tickets:

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The Last Supper - Leonardo Da Vinci - Useful Information

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Discover the wonderful Last Supper with it's fascinating history, curiosities, useful information and other magnificent museums of Milan

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Oscar winner Ennio Morricone on BBC Newsnight

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Oscar winner Ennio Morricone on BBC Newsnight

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Bruno Bozzetto is an famous cartoonist in Italy, he was bored in milan on march 3 1938.  his first film/ cartoon (tapum the weapon story) was created during the 1958 when he was 20 years old. however, he is one of the most influential cartoonist in italy.

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Photo gallery

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Mr.Rossi is a popular italian male cartoon character, created by Bruno Bozzetto (italian cartoonist). Mr.Rossi's first appearance was in a film called "Un Oscar per il Signor Rossi", at 1960.
Rossi is the most common male surname in italy.

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Tapum! La storia delle armi (Tapum! Weapons history) - Clip - Bruno Bozzetto

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Tapum the weapons story is a short film (this film was about 11 mins short) create by bruno bozzetto, in 1958. the original name (italian) of tapum the weapons story is called Tapum! La storia delle armi means the history of the weapon story. However, this film is basically about the discoveries of ancient weapons, such as sword, throwing weapons, arrows and bow, guns, tanks...etc. Bruno bozzetto also includes some funny motions in this film, which makes the whole film fun and interesting to watch!

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Monest Allery is a cartoon that follows 12-year-old Zick who discovers that he has the ability to see the invisible, monsters that live among us. Along with help of his best friend Elena and his talking cat,, Zick hopes to one day become a Monster Tamer just like his dad.

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Deer Drive Legends is a three-dimensional hunting video game, developed by Raylight s.r.l.

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Only 3.1 percent of the Italian population confessed to Islam, 60% of Muslims living in the North of Italy, 25% in the Centre, and only 15% in the South. When the Abbaised Caliphate took control of Sicily, they  had brought the religion with them. Some Muslims had problem with crucifix and started demanded their removal.
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Editor's Note:

This working paper is part of a multi-year Brookings project-"The One Percent Problem: Muslims in the West and the Rise of the New Populists." Other papers in the series are available here.

Contents:

1. Contextualizing religion and immigration in Italy

2. The League and Italian populism

3. The Five Star Movement and Italian populism

4. Conclusion

The February 2013 parliamentary elections represented a "shock" for Italian politics. Italian citizens punished the traditional mainstream political parties and elected the youngest parliament to date. The striking swing in the Italian voter party preferences is reflected in the highest rate of electoral volatility in the country's history. ¹ This political earthquake brought about the success of a new populist party, the Five Star Movement (M5S) which obtained 25.6 percent of the vote. While populist parties have experienced important breakthroughs in other Western European countries, none matched the impressive performance of M5S. ² The 2018 elections confirmed this trend: M5S increased its vote share to 32 percent. Meanwhile, the right-wing populist party, the League (formerly as the Northern League, re-branded as the League in 2018), claimed an unprecedented 17 percent of the vote. After long negotiations, the two populist parties ultimately joined forces to implement a shared agenda of an "all-populist" government. ³ This intensified a number of concerns about a Eurosceptic turn by the Eurozone's third largest economy. ⁴

This paper aims to illustrate the characteristics and the evolution of right and left-wing populism through the prism of its relationship with Islam and Muslims in Italy. The Italian case offers unique insight into populism in Europe as it reveals how both right-wing and left-wing populism have become increasingly successful in recent years, even to the point of gaining national power. Explanations for this shift are many. According to some scholars, if support for populist parties has steadily increased since 1980 in all European countries, "the 2009-2012 double-dip recession and the ongoing refugee crisis have helped...populist parties gain momentum." ⁵ However, other scholars point to cultural factors. In this reading, the rise of populist parties is a "silent revolution" ⁶ mobilized by a wide range of rapid cultural changes that have eroded the values and customs of Western societies. ⁷ This report draws on a combination of primary and secondary data, including interviews with members and representatives of Italy's populist parties, to investigate those and other explanations. It finds that public officials and supporters of the two populist parties currently governing Italy-the somewhat left-of-center M5S and the right-wing populist League-advance different diagnoses of the relationship between "native Italians" and Muslim minorities, with M5S's being much more tolerant and less xenophobic and chauvinist than that of the League. Nevertheless, they share a kind of law-and-order mentality that-in effect if not in intent-makes their prognoses quite convergent.

In this report, I will first contextualize the Italian case and the nature of the country's issues surrounding religion and immigration. Secondly, I will focus on how the Five Star Movement addresses questions around Islam and Muslims. In the third section, the League and Muslim-related issues will be addressed. In the conclusion, I will reflect on similarities and differences between the two parties. Researchers often disagree on how to define, categorize, and label populist parties, ⁸ and the term is often misused and abused in public discourse. ⁹ Moreover, European populists have become increasingly diversified, since both "left-wing" and "right-wing" organizations have gained visibility in the aftermath of the migration crisis. ¹⁰

There are three sets of traditional explanations for the rise of populist parties: the crisis of representative democracy; ¹¹ socio-economic dislocation; ¹² and a "culture clash" ¹³ resulting from globalization and migration. Immigration and religion are central to the latter, although the division between "natives" and "non-natives" is equally crucial to understanding the role of welfare chauvinism, where cultural and economic grievances interact and amplify each other. While classifying the League as a right-wing populist party is widely accepted, ¹⁴ categorizing M5S on the left-right continuum is much more controversial. Broadly recognized as a populist party within a context of "mutating populism," ¹⁵ M5S has been characterized both as a left-wing and right-wing, sometimes hybrid, populist party. ¹⁶

Complicating any categorization is the fact that M5S adopts varying positions across policy issues which defy the traditional left-right axis. For instance, M5S generally advocates for greater state intervention in the economy and for the introduction of new welfare provisions to cope with long-term unemployment. The "flagship" proposal of M5S in both the 2013 and 2018 elections was the reddito di cittadinanza, a conditional cash-transfer to families living below the relative poverty line. M5S generally holds progressive positions on issues like LGTBQ's rights and abortion, although they are not central to the party's identity. At the same time, the party tends to support anti-union policies (unions are invariably viewed as "castes enjoying unjustified privileges" ¹⁷) while its positions on law and order tend to be more slippery. M5S' "core values"- the struggle against corruption and respect for the law-are used to attack powerful economic actors are also sometimes deployed in more culturally reactionary ways.

With these complexities in mind, for the purpose of this report, I will consider M5S a left-wing party or an inclusive populist party-but with important qualifications. ¹⁸ This paper explores Italian populism in greater detail and aims to unpack what populism means in Italy, and the degree to which religion and immigration have contributed to its remarkable growth. More specifically, it draws on various primary and secondary data-party manifestos, speeches, public statements, and interviews -to assess the extent to which concerns around Islam and Muslims are present in the parties' past and present agendas and political discourse.

Contextualizing Religion and Immigration in Italy

As for any other political actor, the political behavior of right-wing and left-wing populist parties varies considerably depending on context. Therefore, it is worth considering briefly the idiosyncratic nature of the Italian context to better understand how M5S and the League approach religion and immigration. How salient are Islam, Muslims, and religion writ large, in the public and political debate in Italy? More specifically, to what extent have questions around Islam, Muslims, and the role of religion in public life grown into divisive electoral issues-and perhaps the most divisive electoral issue-in recent years as well as in the longer term?

When it comes to religious and cultural controversies, Italy represents a paradigmatic case for two reasons.

When it comes to religious and cultural controversies, Italy represents a paradigmatic case for two reasons. ¹⁹ First, the crucial role the Vatican and an embedded cultural of Catholicism plays in national politics. Second, there are favorable and relatively new opportunities, for right-wing populist mobilization because Italy did not experience significant immigration until the 1990s, which meant that citizens and politicians alike found themselves "unprepared." The country's geographical position further fueled xenophobic rhetoric portraying the recent arrival of refugees on its coasts as an "out-of-control situation" or even an "invasion." As noted above, public controversies regarding the secular-religious divide have long been embedded in Italian politics. These controversies include debates on end-of-life care, religious education in schools, mosque construction, and Muslim dress. ²⁰ For example, ten years prior to the 2015 Charlie Hebdo attack, the original Mohammad cartoons published in Jyllands- Posten were reprinted in several Italian newspapers, including La Padania, the official newspaper of the Northern League, as well as in mainstream outlets such as, La Stampa and La Repubblica. ²¹

Virtually no figure of any prominence explicitly supported or sympathized with the violence against either Charlie Hebdo or Jyllands- Posten. Yet, the controversy ignited the emergence of two opposing camps: ²² supporters claimed that the publication was a legitimate exercise of free speech, underlying the freedom of the press to question religious values and rules, whereas critics questioned the misuses of this freedom, describing the cartoons as Islamophobic, blasphemous, and offensive. ²³ The debate intensified when an Italian priest was murdered in Turkey, presumably in reaction to the publication of the cartoons. The crisis reached its peak in February 2006 when a mob attacked the Italian consulate in Benghazi in reaction to the reproduction of the cartoons on a t-shirt worn by the Northern Leagues' Roberto Calderoli on national television. ²⁴ Therefore, when considering the intersection of populism and Islam in Italy, we are dealing with issues that are not only deeply embedded in recent Italian politics but that are also at the heart of Italian right-wing politics. However, they are no longer solely of or by the right wing.

Over the last 15 years, mainstream parties on both the left and right have become more aligned on immigration issues, converging toward a so called "securitization of immigration issues." ²⁵ In this sense, on migration, nationalism, and religion, the radical right has increasingly shaped the agenda, ²⁶ with issues around identity and culture-framed, for example, in terms of the "Islamization of Europe"-migrating from the far-right to the center. According to a 2016 Eurostat survey, 45 percent of respondents in 28 countries including the UK, chose "immigration" as one of the two most important issues facing the EU, immediately followed by terrorism at 32 percent. ²⁷ In the same survey, 49 percent of the Italian respondents (more than the EU average and the other Mediterranean countries respectively) selected "immigration" as their number one priority, while "terrorism" ranked fourth after "unemployment" and "economic situation" (arguably due to the absence of terrorist attacks in Italy, as well as to a direr economic situation).

Italy has been a key point of access for immigrants, while countries like the Netherlands are among the favored countries for eventual destination. ²⁸ According to official Italian statistics, there are 1,400,000 Muslims in Italy (2.3 percent of the population), making up almost one-third of Italy's foreign population (250,000 have acquired Italian citizenship). ²⁹ Immigration has become a central political issue, as reports of incoming boats of illegal immigrants (or clandestini) dominate news programs, especially in the summertime. Although illegal immigrants form a minority of Muslims in Italy, illegal immigrants do overwhelmingly come from Muslim countries, helping to propel Islam as "an issue" in contemporary Italy. This situation has been used by some political parties to fuel popular anger against immigration, and more specifically illegal immigration. Indeed, "perception matters." ³⁰ In the particular context of Italy-after the refugee crisis in a country already shaken by challenging economic circumstances-negative perceptions and attitudes against immigrants increased significantly. Before 2008, less than 40 percent of the population considered immigrants a threat, compared to more than 70 percent in 2016. ³¹ Conceptualizing the immigrant as enemy can pay off electorally. ³²

The League and Italian Populism

Concerns around Islam and Muslims have figured ever prominently in the League's agenda, but this hasn't always been the case. Over time, there have been significant changes in how the League defines the "other." The League which has long combined regionalism with radical right populism ³³ faced a major internal crisis in 2012 over the corruption scandals of its leader Umberto Bossi and his family. In 2013, Bossi lost the internal party elections against Matteo Salvini, who received 82 percent of the votes. Since then, the League has entered a new phase, and has rapidly moved closer to the populist party ideal, as even the change of the party's name-from Northern League to League-makes evident. Once an ethno-regionalist and even secessionist party, the League is now a nationalist party appealing to the entire country. Salvini clearly and definitively identifies just the EU (and the euro in particular) and migrants as the enemy, while abandoning the anti-Southern Italy rhetoric. In October 2014, the League organized a high-profile march with "stop invasion" as its main slogan. ³⁴

The interviews conducted for this paper reflect this change. To justify the party's hard ideological turn, one supporter explained, "Veneto [a region in Northeastern Italy], if it were an independent state, could compete against the Ruhr. But now, when we have a situation where [European nation-states] are fighting each other through the mechanisms of the Eurozone, if Sicily dies then also Veneto will die because we are in that same black box called Italy." ³⁵ The same interviewee argued, "Islamic penetration in Italy is financed, is planned from above...by the Gulf states, by rich Islamic countries. Otherwise, they would host the refugees, but they aim to change the demography of our societies." Similarly, the leader of the League in Veneto argued, "the West is damaged by a silent invasion...Immigration is something planned to dilute our local identities. France is the example: a multi-ethnic, multicultural, and multi-problematic country."

National Identity and Nationhood

In the political discourse and policies of the League, an exclusive conception of 'people' figures prominently. ³⁶ The League uses an ethnonational definition to describe the in-group and the people that the party wants to defend and represent (the Italian people, the nation, the country) and those deemed to be enemies of the party and the state (all defined in terms of identity and culture as non-Italians, non-Europeans, non-Christians). This dichotomy is even stronger vis-a-vis Muslim immigrants, who are seen as endorsing a culture completely different from both Italy's and Europe's, going as far back as the League's party manifestos for the 2004 and 2009 European elections. ³⁷ In addition to immigrants, Turkey is a recurring enemy in the League's worldview.

For instance, one interviewee claimed, "[You just have to look at] public declarations by leaders like Erdogan...They want to do what they did in Kosovo. At the end of the nineteenth century, five percent of the population was Albanian. Both Albanians and Serbs are not peaceful peoples, I admit, but after a few decades the proportion was the opposite." He also stated that "a Muslim cannot swear on our Constitution, because...he can lie, his religion allows him to lie if it is in the service of spreading Islam." ³⁸ Another representative of the League argued that "the EU gave six billion euros to Erdogan to stop the migrants before they entered Germany, but the EU did not finance Italy." Adding that "fifteen years ago we hosted a community of Argentine migrants, but they were like us, they are Catholic. Now the Muslims are coming. I have nothing against them, but they dress as they want, [I just pretend] they are adapting to our rules." ³⁹

Almost all interviewees agree on the incompatibility between Muslim and Italian identities. Apart from a single exception in which an interviewee said, "you can be both Islamic and Italian, but you cannot be both Italian and Islamist," ⁴⁰ the statements are generally more straightforward in their focus on Islam, the religion. One representative of the League stated, "the first word that comes to my mind when I hear 'Islam' is 'terror'" adding that "from a legal point of view, you can be both Islamic and Italian, but from an identitarian point of view, surely not,...Italy is not a fully secular country, Catholicism is the main faith of the country...you cannot be fully an Italian citizen if you have not been baptized." ⁴¹

At the same time, nearly all interviewees report either being agnostic, atheist, or do not attend religious services. Neither do they share most of the public positions of the Catholic Church. The League's electorate in fact shares the low regular religious service attendance rates of the general Italian population at 20 percent, compared to 63 percent among Muslims. ⁴² "Belonging without believing" is one way of understanding their relationship with Catholicism. Muslims, meanwhile, are "people who are many centuries away from us." ⁴³ Nevertheless, this does not imply that secularization is seen as an unqualified good, since "Catholicism has left some enduring lessons, which are now part of the common sense, of the good sense" ⁴⁴ ("Revolution of Good Sense" is one of Salvini's electoral slogans). In short, Italy provides an example of cultural appropriation of "Catholic heritage," without necessarily sincere belief and with strong positions against the Catholic Church, which is seen as a "hypocritical" institution "detached from the people," ⁴⁵ particularly because of its more open positions on immigration.

Xenophobic attitudes had already been on the rise at the time the Northern League decided to become a national party, rather than a regional one, and shift its definition of the "other," placing immigrants in opposition to the Italian people. ⁴⁶ In fact, Italy had already been exposed to large-scale migratory flows before 2015 (e.g. the end of the 1990s). This partly explains why the Northern League denounced a "boom" of arrivals to Italian shores in 2013 and framed immigration as an urgent national security issue. At first, the Northern League ⁴⁷ asserted the need for increased cooperation between European police forces and border patrol units, though independently from Brussels. Somewhat inconsistently, the Northern League ⁴⁸ later blamed the EU for being ineffective in managing non-EU immigration, proposing to counter illegal immigration "at the source," claiming that the onus should rest on the EU. The party ⁴⁹ further demanded substantial revisions to the Dublin III Regulation, which maintains that asylum applications be processed in the EU country of entry.

The issue of immigration and security gained new impetus with the rise of the Islamic State and the Paris attacks of January 2015, in whose wake the Northern League's populist Euroscepticism appeared both legitimate and prescient. ⁵⁰ The migrant crisis of 2015 served to bridge the issue of security-first crime, now terrorism-with immigration. ⁵¹

Citizenship

Exclusionary populist parties, such as the League, tend to launch platforms and initiatives emphasizing the necessity of "protecting," above all, the natives to the detriment of universal welfare programs that also include immigrant residents who are not citizens. ⁵² One such slogan is " prima gli italiani" (Italians must come first), echoing President Trump's "America first."

Several statements by party activists and members exemplify support for forms of welfare chauvinism. For instance, an interviewee from Tuscany argued, "living together peacefully among Italians and migrants would be good if we enjoyed the same rights and the same duties. Instead, foreigners enjoy [easier access] to public services, to housing, to services like daycare... I think that in Italy there are many forms of discrimination, but it is the Italians who are discriminated [against]." ⁵³ The League leader in Veneto is even more forthright arguing that "[under current conditions like high unemployment], there is not any scenario in which immigration is acceptable. Immigration deserves to be called "immigration" when social integration occurs, and social integration is based on the status of the worker."

The Relationship Between the Majority and Minority

As a right-wing populist party, the League accuses Western governments of being excessively deferential to immigrant cultures, thus posing a threat to the Italian nation and its traditions. Some interviewees are particularly emphatic when arguing about how migrants, particularly Muslim migrants, should behave in their host country with one stating, "we have to behave like Christians. We have to respect them, but when you arrive in a country, you have to come to me hat in hand." ⁵⁴ Nevertheless, most League representatives and members interviewed have an "assimilationist" approach regarding immigrants in general and Muslims in particular. For example, the leader of the League in Veneto argued, "they have to understand that here we have certain rules, and that they have to obey such rules. You don't like the nativity scene? I don't care, it's your problem. There is no possible integration for you. Integration is for Christians, not for Muslims." ⁵⁵

Future of EU Integration and Identity

In 2015, at the height of the refugee crisis, the League endorsed the Hungarian government's decision to close its borders and build a fence. This was congruent with the party's aspiration to defend nation states against the diktats of EU bureaucrats and to prevent "the death of the European culture." ⁵⁶ For example, a provincial party leader in Tuscany argued, "Europe should serve to help the nation states, but this is clearly not the case... The integration process started on the right note. It was a cultural union of different traditions respecting each other, of cooperation [but it evolved in the wrong way]. I don't like homogeneity, I am for respecting local traditions." ⁵⁷ Yet a League activist from Veneto, the Northern region where regional sentiments are particularly strong, expressed this desire for cultural pluralism differently, "I am for a Europe of the Peoples, not of the States... I don't even like Italy because there is not any Italian ethnicity. We are different hearts in different territories." ⁵⁸

The Five Star Movement and Italian Populism

In our interviews, diversity of opinion within the Five Star Movement became evident. Further, at times, we noticed significant gaps between the party's official position and the attitudes of interviewees on topics in question.

The Ethnic vs. Juridical Nation

The story of M5S tends to start with comedian and actor Beppe Grillo, who co-founded the party in 2009. Grillo has increasingly adopted nativist and exclusionary stances on immigration. These positions, articulated on his blog, liken, to a reasonable extent, M5S to the explicitly right-wing League. Grillo began addressing the "taboo" of immigration as early as 2006, denouncing the perils of importing migrant labor and the social disruption it brought. ⁵⁹ The following year, Grillo said, "A country cannot burden its citizens with the problems caused by tens of thousands of Roma that come to Italy from Romania...This is a volcano, a time bomb. It needs to be dismantled. A moratorium could have been adopted for Romania...What's a government that does not guarantee security for its citizens? What does it control?...Once the borders of the Patria were sacred, politicians have desecrated them." ⁶⁰

In terms of national identity, most of the M5S members interviewed demonstrated a strong inclination towards nationalism, very often characterized in terms of culture. The statement "we are Italians" often arose during interviews, with one M5S Member of Parliament stating, "For me, the national identity is primarily a cultural one." He also noted that "our national culture is influenced by our religious culture. This isn't necessarily all positive, as our public institutions should be more secularized...at the same time, it is not necessarily a bad thing, as religion is a source of important values." ⁶¹ The question of "values" is a challenging one since culture, ethnicity, and nationality are intertwined in complex ways. One interviewee, for example, claimed that "being Italian means to be carriers of democratic values, first of all, and also carriers of culture, as we are the heirs of ancient cultures that deeply marked the broader Western culture." ⁶²

Furthermore, when asked if they identify primarily as European, Italian, or with their region, they primarily answer "Italian" or "regional," and only secondarily as "European." As one M5S put it, "I feel Venetian, first of all, then Italian, and then European." ⁶³

Unlike League supporters, immigration is not equated with terrorism or criminal activity according to most M5S activists interviewed. For example, one stated that, "I do not care about immigration because of its supposed link with terrorism. It is true that, if you do not control immigration, as has happened in parts of Belgium or France, you will have problems, like drug trafficking. However, the issue is much broader and more complex." ⁶⁴ Importantly, the M5S interviewees emphasize that immigrants have "rights," in stark contrast with interviewees from the League, who unanimously stressed that immigrants should have "duties, not rights." As M5S activists and officials see it, the problem is not immigration per se, but rather that it is not well regulated by Italian law. For example, a M5S MP stresses that "we should understand we are facing a war between poor peoples...I think that the refugees should have the possibility of working." ⁶⁵ In fact, on the topic of "immigration," the gap between some of the members of the movement and the official position of the party is significant. As one M5S MP told me, "Here I am quite a critic of our own government. The topic is not that important, and...the topic should not be treated as if it was an emergency. Unfortunately, treating every phenomenon as an emergency is one of the worst Italian traits." ⁶⁶

However, the new leader of the M5S, Luigi Di Maio, particularly since joining the League in the "all-populist" government, has underlined his party's strict position on immigration and citizenship. As he declared recently during an interview, "In Italy we risk providing immigrants with a 'pull factor' if we issue a new law on 'citizenship' which is too flexible." ⁶⁷

Citizenship

As in the case of the League, the question of illegal immigration in M5S rhetoric predates Europe's refugee crisis, ⁶⁸ yet it became more central to the party's positioning once the issue became a defining public concern. Beginning in 2015, M5S repeatedly referred to Italy as the "refugee camp of Europe." ⁶⁹

However, within the M5S, opinions differ over the rights immigrants should enjoy. According to some of interviewees, the "basic income guarantee" policy ( reddito di cittadinanza) should exclude immigrants. For instance, as one representative said, "We should ensure that migrants do not come to Italy just to receive economic benefits like our reddito di cittadinanza." ⁷⁰ However, for most of the interviewees, the definition of citizenship is neither ethnic nor identitarian, but rather primarily civic and legal. For example, an M5S mayor reports that "I grant five, six new citizenships per month, and I like it very much. I am very proud of it. All of them are nice people and often I personally know them, since this is a small town." ⁷¹ Similarly, another interviewee stressed that "[immigration is an acceptable phenomenon when we guarantee] some order and some rules in how its managed, instead of the current chaos." ⁷² In the same vein, regarding ius soli (right of the soil), which has been highly debated recently in Italy and within the Italian parties, a M5S MP said ⁷³ that "this is a false dilemma. Children's rights must be always, always guaranteed." ⁷⁴

As we saw, immigration and restrictive notions of citizenship increasingly entered M5S discourse starting in 2012. ⁷⁵ Beppe Grillo, for example, used the long-standing Italian debate over ius soli, framing it in terms of opposition to the "liberalization of births." ⁷⁶ Others in M5S by contrast, are less restrictive on immigration than the the co-founders or current leader of the movement, and think that religion should not be linked with immigration. For example, a M5S activist explained, "in my opinion, it is not religion but the absence of rule-of-law that makes integration more difficult...A few effective rules would permit everyone to live together without major problems. The important thing is to follow common sense and to behave accordingly. What do you care about the God someone prays to in her room or in a place of worship?" In fact, when asked which rights migrants should enjoy, many M5S interviewees answered, "the same rights as us, with the respective duties;" ⁷⁷ all of them agree that the true integration of the children born in Italy from foreign parents can be achieved through public education and their own full inclusion in local communities.

Even if citizenship is still something to be "achieved"-as opposed to a birthright- there is no reference to any self-evident cultural or ethnic requirement. Most interviewees refer to United Nations declarations, including the 1966 International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, to make a universalist argument for their claims. However, when asked about the Western influence over these norms, they either acknowledge some "Eurocentrism" ⁷⁸ or more often, interviewees argue that "we are talking about common sense." But where does this common sense come from, and what makes it common? A mixture of naivete and paternalism comes out in their arguments that "We always have to protect children' rights," ⁷⁹ even if current Italian law makes it difficult for minors born in Italy to foreign citizens to acquire Italian citizenship. ⁸⁰

M5S activists also emphasize "respect of the law," which has the effect of making their concrete policy proposals more in line with League's exclusionary posture, even if M5S members neither share, nor express, the same explicitly nativist attitudes of their League government coalition partners. It seems then that, despite their brand of "naïf universalism" quite at odds with founder Grillo's own declarations, there is more overlap between the two parties than it may initially appear on migration issues. In a peculiar "movement party" such as the M5S, where some autonomy at the local level coincides with strong party discipline enforced by a small elite close to the party's founder, this creates an internal tension as well as a degree of strategic incoherence.

The Relationship Between Majority and Minority Populations in a Democracy

The growing centrality of immigration in Italian politics was further exacerbated by the 2015 refugee crisis and the threat of the Islamic State. As aforementioned, according to Grillo, Italy has turned into "the waiting room of the miserable" ⁸¹ and an "immense refugee camp." ⁸² Therefore, all illegal immigrants should be repatriated. ⁸³ In August 2015, Grillo posted a four-point policy proposal on his blog, ⁸⁴ arguing for cutting down residence permits for humanitarian reasons; establishing an efficient system for forced repatriation when asylum applications are rejected; establishing a specific procedure for the resolution of appeals to the rejection of these applications; and closer surveillance of refugees. ⁸⁵ The substantive content of Grillo's proposal would normally fit within the "law and order" and nativist framing of exclusionary populist parties across Europe. ⁸⁶

However, when speaking with representatives and members of the party, a picture quite different from the official one emerges, where, in daily life, pluralism becomes both possible and desirable on the local level. For example, an M5S mayor who I asked about the differences between Western and Islamic values stressed that in his city, "I know several Muslim families. I got along with them, and I still get along with them, men, women...[Muslim] women are valorized here, they are not relegated into some dark room...Our municipality organizes Italian language courses, many people participate, and we encourage them to actively participate in the life of the community." ⁸⁷ Similarly, another interviewee said, "I personally know people from different Arab countries that are surely not [extremist]...It is the individual that matters. If they follow common sense and show respect, things work well whatever the specific faith." ⁸⁸

This, however, does not necessarily imply "cultural assimilation." "Here, it is a matter of a civic, pluralistic living together and of respect for the rules of the country you live in." ⁸⁹ What this means in concrete policy terms is less clear, and this is where there remains a significant gap in the M5S approach, and a broad misrecognition of the structural and cultural complexities of integration. As already stressed above, "it is the specific person that matters." A good summary of M5S' "post-ideology" is how the emphasis on empowering citizens is always accompanied by calls for their (individual) assumption of responsibilities and for respecting the law whatever one's own cultural origins. ⁹⁰

Future of EU Integration and Identity

The core of M5S criticism on immigration revolves around the Dublin Regulation signed by former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and the League in 2013-a leitmotiv of the migrant crisis. ⁹¹

M5S has repeatedly proposed to redirect humanitarian aid toward the countries of departure to lift the burden imposed on countries of first arrival. ⁹² The party further criticizes EU institutions for their stalemate over decision making ⁹³ as well as the selfishness of member states who arbitrarily decided to suspend the Schengen Agreement (the 1985 treaty which led to the creation of Europe's Schengen Area, in which internal border checks have largely been abolished). According to Di Maio, Grillo's successor as the M5S leader, "If today in Italy the immigration issue is a hot topic, it is because of the 80 percent of immigrants who pass though Italy but then cannot not go in Europe, because of the Dublin agreement, which imposes that they stop in the country of first arrival, signed by the Northern League and the Democratic party[otherwise known as Partito Democratico, the social-democrats]." ⁹⁴ Along similar lines, one interviewee stated that "the current EU policy is widely lacking, and this is one main reason for the negative popular perceptions toward migration. If we desire and think about a European community where the people, through nation-state institutions but also through direct elections, find some agreements and a way to promote their interests-if we want this, I have to admit that we are experiencing huge failures, particularly and sadly on social issues. We have been able to build a strong control over banking system stability, but from a social point of view, we completely lack solidarity. Labor rights, taxation, and fiscal policies are not unified, and on migration issues...well, we witnessed some embarrassing examples. The European countries, with few exceptions, simply refuse to host even a minimum percentage of refugees." ⁹⁵ Similarly, as a national representative of the M5S expressed, "The [European] political class promises a lot of things, but it did not do anything concrete...Italy has been left alone."

In reaction to the EU's stalemate and lack of a unified position, the M5S, as we saw earlier, proposed to restrict the issuance of residence permits on humanitarian grounds, introducing a system of forced repatriation and increasing the surveillance of asylum seekers. ⁹⁶ More recently, the M5S has also criticized the EU for the migrant agreement sealed with the Turkish government. ⁹⁷ However, from the interviews with M5S local representatives and activists, a slightly different picture emerges on the possibility of integrating different cultures in Europe. For example, to the question "could Europe still be called 'Europe' if it were not mostly white and Christian anymore," a local party politician answered that this would be possible, "I think yes, since Europe has a history spanning millennia. I think it is impossible that the European culture will be destroyed, as it is able to absorb different cultures. Yes, we should be careful with the migration fluxes. At the same time, I notice that, in my town, people from Islamic, Asian, and African countries have been able to integrate, to embrace the local culture. This is an example that should be followed everywhere in Europe...Immigration in Europe brings a cultural enrichment...Our culture is not necessarily either superior or perfect...We should take into consideration each person, individually, not 'peoples.'" ⁹⁸

In sum, concerns about Muslims are either not strongly present, or they figure mainly "covertly" among M5S political representatives and activists, through references to culture, demographics, immigration, and particularly, the role of the EU as an enabler of immigration.

On the one hand, when asked about Islam and Muslim immigrants, most M5S interviewees tend to express a universalist vision, which views Islam as potentially compatible with other religions, and do not see any inherent contradiction between Islam and Western values. For example, one M5S representative said "it is possible to be at the same time Italian and Muslim ... If you respect both the rights and the duties of the citizens, being Christian, Buddhist, or Confucian makes no difference." ⁹⁹ A M5S activist even declared that "I am quite sympathetic with Muslim peoples, they have a stronger religiosity than us, something that I personally feel even if I am not Catholic at all." ¹⁰⁰

On the other hand, when discussing other issues, such as gender, interviewees tend to express that some contradictions between Islam and Western values actually do exist and express caution regarding the political involvement of Muslims. For example, when asked if Muslim representatives should have the right to take part in local public institutions, an interviewee replied "yes, if we are talking about Muslim citizens forming part of political parties to be elected into public institutions." When asked about his opinion regarding Muslim minorities in Europe, a M5S member replied, "I do not know any Muslim community from within, I merely know individual Muslim citizens... I do not think they are dangerous. Nevertheless, I do not think that they are particularly open towards their host country." ¹⁰¹ Another interviewee stressed, "yes, we are different obviously. We cannot avoid noticing it ... for example, over gender issues. This is one of the problems we have to deal with." ¹⁰² Most of the interviewees insisted on the need for law (and partly order) and clear immigration regulations that would avoid the dangers relating to immigration (like crime) or radicalization (in the case of Muslims). Regarding Muslim minorities in Italy, one M5S interviewee said, "Any kind of immigration brings some risks, terrorism is not the main danger...However, it is important to ensure that the official religious ceremonies are held in Italian in order to better control them." ¹⁰³

Conclusion

What follows is a brief comparison of the two populist parties on key dimensions relating to immigration and Muslim and Islam in Italy.

When reflecting on the public statements, party manifestos, and interviews with members and officials, we also need to consider the impact that the growing prominence-and political power-of right-wing and ambiguously left-wing populist parties will have on Muslim integration in Italy. For the first time, Italy has an "all populist government," which means that immigration policies and related issues like welfare and citizenship, will be increasingly shaped and determined by populist parties with the views discussed in this paper. For example, on the hotly debated issue of the basic income guarantee ( reddito di cittadinanza), who exactly can and should benefit from the policy is still contested, particularly within M5S. More generally, the unprecedented development of the election of populists to power prompts the following questions: what does the presence of these parties and their effect on rhetoric and policy in public debate mean for the relationship between liberalism and democracy? To what extent can largely liberal democracies accommodate increasing levels of actual (and potential) illiberalism emanating from democratically-elected populist parties?

The European antifascist tradition of pluralism and minority protections (and a strong state role in guaranteeing these protections) and the American tradition of civil liberties and individual rights, such as freedom of speech-including the freedom of hateful speech-are both at stake. In this respect, it is worth noting that populism can benefit from a self-conceived crisis like Islam's "invasion" of Europe. Moreover, it can be understood as "a performer of the crisis." Put differently, rather than being a reaction to a pre-existing crisis, populist actors construct specific failures that resonate with the popular experience and transform them into perceived crises. ¹⁰⁴ What the electoral success and government participation of such populist parties will mean for the health of democracy, and the place of Muslim minorities, will depend on their definition of the "people" and the "other."

Table 1. Summary of Islam/Muslims and Populism in Italy

Concerns around Islam/Muslims explicit in the party agenda Concerns around Islam/Muslim "covert"
Favorable/Open "discursive opportunities" (i.e., on Islam, Muslims, role of religion divisive in public life and electoral arena)

Institutional design influential on populist parties and Islam/Muslims

National identity /nationhood (ethnic vs. juridical)

Citizenship (identitarian/cultural vs. civic)
Relationship between majority and minority populations

Footnotes

1. Gianfranco Pasquino, "Italy: The Triumph of Personalist Parties,"Politics and Policy 42, no.4 (August 2014): 548-566, https://doi.org/10.1111/polp.12079.

2. Filippo Tronconi, "Introduction," in Beppe Grillo's Five Star Movement. Organisation, Communication and Ideology, (Farnham, UK: Ashagate, 2015), 1-7.

3. Andrea Pirro, "The polyvalent populism of the 5 Star Movement," Journal of Contemporary European Studies 26, no.4 (2018): 443-458, https://doi.org/10.1080/14782804.2018.1519484.

4. Ibid.

5. Giovanni Caccavello and Cecilia Sandell, "Timbro Authoritarian Populism Index 2017: A Summary," (Brussels: European Policy Information Center), https://timbro.se/app/uploads/2017/07/briefing-timbro-authoritarian https://timbro.se/app/uploads/2017/07/briefing-timbro-authoritarian-populism-index-2017.pdf populism-index-2017.pdf , 1.

6. Piero Ignazi, "The Silent Counter-Revolution," European Journal of Political Research 22, no.1 (July 1992):3-34.

7. Ronald Inglehart and Pippa Norris, "Trump, Brexit, and the Rise of Populism: Economic Have-Nots and Cultural Backlash," Harvard Kennedy School Faculty Research Working Paper Series RWP16-026 (August 2016): 30.

8. Cas Mudde, "The Populist Zeitgeist," Government and Opposition 39, no. 4 (2004): 541-63, doi:10.1111/j.1477-7053.2004.00135.x.

9. Manuela M. Caiani, "Populism/populist movements," in The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Social and Political Movements, eds. David A Snow, Donatella Della Porta, Bert Klandermans, and Doug McAdam (Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012), 990-4.

10. Sonia Alonso and Cristóbal Rovita Kaltwasser, "Spain: No Country for the Populist Radical Right?" South European Politics & Society 20, no.1 (2015): 21-45.

11. E.g., Paul Taggart, Populism (Buckingham: Open University Press, 2000).

12. European Populism in the Shadow of the Great Recession, eds. Hanspeter Kriesi and Takis S. Pappas, (Colchester: ECPR Press, 2015).

13. Ronald Inglehart and Pippa Norris, "Trump, Brexit, and the rise of Populism," Paper presented at 2016 meeting of the American Political Science Association.

14. E.g., Manuela Caiani and Nicolò Conti, "In the Name of the People: The Euroscepticism of the Italian Radical Right," Perspectives on European Politics and Society 15 no. 2 (2014) 183-197, https://doi.org/10.1080/15705854.2014.885766.

15. Andrea Pirro, "The polyvalent populism of the 5 Star Movement."

16. Davide Vittori, D, "Podemos and the Five-star Movement: populist, nationalist or what?" Contemporary Italian Politics 9 no.2 (2017): 142-161

17. Enrico Padoan, "A LatinAmericanization of Southern Europe? Anti-Neoliberal Populisms in Comparative Perspective," PhD diss., Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile, 2018.

18. See, Mosca and Tronconi, forthcoming, 2019.

19. Gattinara Castelli, "Framing Exclusion in the Public Sphere: Far-Right Mobilisation and the Debate on Charlie Hebdo in Italy," South European Society and Politics 22, no.3 (2017).

20. Ibid.

21. Ibid.

22. Lasse Lindekilde, "In the Name of the Prophet? Danish Muslim Mobilization During the Muhammad Caricatures Controversy," Mobilization: An International Quarterly 13, no. 2 (June 2008): 219-238.

23. Gattinara P. Castelli, "Framing Exclusion in the Public Sphere: Far-Right Mobilisation and the Debate on Charlie Hebdo in Italy."

24. Ibid.

25. Tiziana Caponio, Città italiane e immigrazione. Discorso pubblico e politiche a Milano, Bologna e Napoli, (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2006).

26. Manuela Caiani and Donatella della Porta, "The Elitist Populism of the Extreme Right: A Frame Analysis of Extreme Right-Wing Discourses in Italy and Germany," Acta Politica 46, no.2 (April 2011):180-202, 10.1057/ap.2010.28.

27. European Commission, "Standard Eurobarometer 86" (Autumn 2016), https://ec.europa.eu/commfrontoffice/publicopinion/index.cfm/ResultDoc/download/DocumentKy/79408.

28. Andrea Pirro and Stijn van Kessel, "Populist Eurosceptic trajectories in Italy and the Netherlands during the European crises," Politics 38, no.3, (2018): 327-343, https://doi.org/10.1177/0263395718769511.

29. Fondazione Ismu - Iniziative e Studi sulla Multietnicità, "Immigrazione in Italia 2016: i numeri dell'appartenenza religiosa," ismu.org, July 18, 2016.,ondazione ISMU, s., (ECPR Press, Colchester, 2015). 201

30. Paolo Graziano, Neopopulismi, (Bologna: Il Mulino, 2018).

31. European Commission, "Standard Eurobarometer 86."

32. Manuela Caiani and Paolo Graziano, "Understanding varieties of populism in times of crises," West European Politics 42 no. 6 (2019): 1141-1158, https://doi.org/10.1080/01402382.2019.1598062.

33. E.g., Andrej Zaslove,The Re-invention of the European Radical Right: Populism, Regionalism, and the Italian Lega Nord (Montreal; Kingston; London; Ithaca: McGill-Queen's University Press, 2011).

34. Manuela Caiani and Paolo Graziano, "Understanding varieties of populism in times of crises."

35. Author's interview with League activist and former local executive, Vittorio Veneto, Treviso, October 9, 2018.

36. E.g., Manuela Caiani and Donatella della Porta, "The Elitist Populism of the Extreme Right: A Frame Analysis of Extreme Right-Wing Discourses in Italy and Germany;" Cas Mudde, Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007).

37. Manuela Caiani and Paolo Graziano, "Varieties of Populism: Insights from the Italian Case," Italian Political Science Review 46, no. 2 (2016): 243-267.

38. Author's interview with League activist and former local executive, Miatto Toni.

39. Author's interview with League political representative, September 21, 2018.

40. Author's interview with provincial political League representative, Segretario Massa Carrara Andrea Cella, Skype, November 16, 2018.

41. Author's interview with League representative of Assessore del comune di Cascina, Elena Meini, Skype, November 22, 2018.

42. See, Gianluca Passarelli and Dario Tuorto, "The meanings of party membership. A comparison of three parties," Contemporary Italian Politics 10, no.2 (2018):170-192, https://doi.org/10.1080/23248823.2018.1474566.

43. Author's interview with League activist and former local executive, Miatto Toni.

44. Author's interview with provincial political League representative, Segretario Massa Carrara Andrea Cella.

45. E.g., Author's interview with League political representative, September 21, 2018.

46. Paolo Graziano, Neopopulismi.

47. Northern League, "EU electoral manifesto," 2014a: 29.

48. Northern League, "EU electoral manifesto," 2014a:11.

49. Northern League, internal document, 2015a: 14.

50. Andrea Pirro and Stijn van Kessel, "Populist Eurosceptic trajectories in Italy and the Netherlands during the European crises," Politics 38 no.3 (2018): 327-343: 335, https://doi.org/10.1177/0263395718769511.

51. Ibid.

52. Paolo Graziano, Neopopulismi.

53. Author's interview with League representative and Councilor of the municipality of Cascina, Elena Meini.

54. Author's interview with League political representative, September 21, 2018.

55. Author's interview with League national political representative, Segretario nazionale per il Veneto Da Re Toni, Rome, September 19, 2018.

56. Andrea Pirro and Stijn van Kessel, "Populist Eurosceptic trajectories in Italy and the Netherlands during the European crises."

57. Author's interview with provincial political League representative, Segretario Massa Carrara Andrea Cella .

58. Author's interview with League activist and former local executive Miatto Toni.

59. Andrea Pirro and Stijn van Kessel, "Populist Eurosceptic trajectories in Italy and the Netherlands during the European crises."

60. Ibid.

61. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative, former local Veneto politician, Skype, September 26, 2018.

62. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative Vanin Orietta, Skype, September 27, 2018.

63. Author's interview with Five Star local political representative, Mayor of Vigonovo Venezia Danieletto Alberto, Vigonovo, Venezia, October 19, 2018.

64. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative, former local Veneto politician.

65. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative Vanin Orietta.

66. Author's interview with Five Star activist, Skype, September 28, 2019.

67. La Repubblica, "Ius soli, Di Maio: 'Strumento di propaganda'. Grillo: 'Pastrocchio invotabile,'" June 17, 2017, https://www.repubblica.it/politica/2017/06/17/news/ius_soli_grillo_di_maio_orfini-168339835/.

68. E.g., Beppe Grillo," Kabobo d'Italia," Il Blog Di Beppe Grillo, Maggio 16, 2013, http://www.beppegrillo.it/kabobo-ditalia/.

69. Andrea Pirro, "The polyvalent populism of the 5 Star Movement."

70. Author's interview with Five Star activist, Five Star Turin Meetup, Torino, October 26, 2018. See also: Author's interview with Five Star local political representative, Consigliere comunale Scandicci Valerio Bencini, Firenze, September 26, 2018; Author's interview with Five Star activist Zelati Nicola, Scandicci Meetup, Firenze, September 26, 2018.

71. Author's interview with Five Star local political representative, Mayor of Vigonovo, Venezia Danieletto Alberto.

72. Author's interview with Five Star activist, organizer of Vittorio Veneto Meetup, September 25, 2018, Treviso.

73. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative Vanin Orietta.

74. The "Ius soli bill" aimed to grant Italian citizenship to all born on Italian soil, thus derogating the existing principle which gives citizenship only to those with Italian origins. The bill was actively backed by the center-left, overtly opposed by right-of-center parties, and initially supported-and then opposed, arguably in view of the 2018 general elections-by the M5S.

75. Andrea Pirro, "The polyvalent populism of the 5 Star Movement."

76. Ibid.

77. E.g., Author's interview with Five Star activist, organizer of Vittorio Veneto Meetup.

78. Author's interview with Five Star activist, Skype, September 28, 2019.

79. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative Vanin Orietta,

80. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Italy, "Citizenship," https://www.esteri.it/mae/en/servizi/stranieri/cittadinanza_0.html.

81. Beppe Grillo, "Qualcosa è cambiato," Il Blog Di Beppe Grillo, Ottobre 20, 2014, http://www.beppegrillo.it/qualcosa-e-cambiato/.

82. Beppe Grillo, "Immigrati, Italia? No grazie," Il Blog Di Beppe Grillo, Giugno 10, 2015, http://www.beppegrillo.it/immigrati-italia-no-grazie/.

83. Beppe Grillo, M5S electoral program, 2014.

84. See, Andrea Pirro, "The polyvalent populism of the 5 Star Movement."

85. Beppe Grillo, "Quattro proposte sull'immigrazione, di Vittorio Bertola," Il Blog Di Beppe Grillo,2015, http://www.beppegrillo.it/quattro-propostesullimmigrazione-di-vittorio-bertola/.

86. Andrea Pirro, "The polyvalent populism of the 5 Star Movement."

87. Author's interview with Five Star local political representative, Mayor of Vigonovo, Venezia Danieletto Alberto .

88. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative, Maniero Alvise, Skype, September 26, 2018.

89. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative Vanin Orietta.

90. We found "anti-Italian prejudices" in some interviews. For example, Vanin Orietta expressed that "I am Italian, for better or for worse...lack of secularization, lack of civic sense, lack of honesty are Italian common traits."

91. Andrea Pirro, "The polyvalent populism of the 5 Star Movement."

92. Beppe Grillo, M5S electoral program, 2014.

93. Beppe Grillo, "Quattro proposte sull'immigrazione, di Vittorio Bertola."

94. Repubblica, "Ius soli, Di Maio: 'Strumento di propaganda'. Grillo: 'Pastrocchio invotabile,'" June the 17 2017, https://www.repubblica.it/politica/2017/06/17/news/ius_soli_grillo_di_maio_orfini-168339835.

95. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative Maniero Alvise.

96. Beppe Grillo, "Referendum sull'euro: consegna delle firme in Senato," Il Blog Di Beppe Grillo, June 8, 2015, http://www.beppegrillo.it/referendum-sull%C2%92euro-consegna-delle-firme-in-senato/.

97. Andrea Pirro and Stijn van Kessel, "Populist Eurosceptic trajectories in Italy and the Netherlands during the European crises," 336.

98. Author's interview with Five Star local political representative Danieletto Alberto.

99. Ibid.

100. Author's interview with Five Star activist, Five Star Turin Meetup.

101. Author's interview with Five Star activist, organizer of Vittorio Veneto Meetup.

102. Author's interview with Five Star national political representative Vanin Orietta.

103. Author's interview with Five Star activist, Five Star Turin Meetup.

104. Benjamin Moffitt, "How to Perform Crisis: A Model for Understanding the Key Role of Crisis in Contemporary Populism," Government and Opposition 50, no.2 (2015): 189-217.

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Muslims in the West and the rise of the new populists: The case of Italy

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Editor's Note: This working paper is part of a multi-year Brookings project-"The One Percent Problem: Muslims in the West and the Rise of the New Populists." Other papers in the series are available here. Contextualizing religion and immigration in Italy The League and Italian populism The Five Star Movement and Italian populism Conclusion The February 2013 parliamentary elections represented a "shock" for Italian politics.

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start from learning the alphabet like:

M - Emme

N = Enne

O = O

P = Pi

Q = Cu

R = Erre

S = Esse

T = Ti

U = U

V = Vi/Vu

Z = Zeta

after you're familiar with the pronunciation, you can start practicing some basic phrases in a sentence!!

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The Bogias family was very cruel,  exerting a grip on Renaissance Rome. However, they had a part to play in the cultural impact of Music and Arts.

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Borgia Family: Borgia Family, , descendants of a noble line, originally from Valencia, Spain, that established roots in Italy and became prominent in ecclesiastical and political affairs in the 1400s and 1500s. The house of the Borgias produced two popes and many other political and church leaders. Some members

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Ennio Morricone is a famous Italian composer, born in Rome, 1928, November 10, currently 91 years old. He has written scores for over 400 films, 100 classical works. Ennio Morricone has received 27 gold discs, seven platinum discs, three Golden Plates and the Critica discografica award for the music of the film Il Prato. Also done a lot of folk music.
Biography

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As Bernard Herrmann is to Hitchcock, Nino Rota to Fellini, John Barry to James Bond and John Williams to Spielberg, Ennio Morricone is to Sergio Leone. It is impossible to recall Leone's films in the mind's eye or ear - from A Fistful of Dollars (1964) via The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (1966) to the very different Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) and Once Upon a Time in America (1984) - without Morricone's music.

So close was the creative partnership of composer and director that Leone once described it as "a marriage like Catholics used to be married before the divorce laws". Morricone returned the complement by saying, "Leone wanted more from music than other directors - he always gave it more space". The resulting films were mythical melodramas, with Morricone supplying the melo.

From the early whipcracks, bells, whistles, Italian folk instruments, incomprehensible lyrics and Fender Stratocaster riffs - which may have been distant spin-offs from Morricone's researches into John Cage and the idea that all sounds can belong to the realm of music - to the romantic score from America with its wistful Eastern European pan-pipes and dense orchestral textures, the work of these two artists ran on parallel lines.

The opening bars of The Good, The Bad and The Ugly, with their "Ay-ee-ay-ee-ay" coyote howl, are among the most instantly recognisable in the history of the movies. But Morricone has often been at pains to point out that even during his most prolific period in the 1960s and 1970s - when as Bernardo Bertolucci once joked "you barely saw a major Italian movie without music by Ennio" - he only scored thirty-five Westerns out of four hundred and fifty films, just over eight percent of his astonishing output. Only thirty-five! That's more than Elmer Bernstein, Dimitri Tiomkin and Jerome Moross combined.

No-one is quite sure exactly how many films Morricone has scored in total, since his first credit in 1961; certainly over 400, maybe as many as 450. Since he always writes down every note himself (unlike some film composers I could mention) and sees composition and orchestration as part of a single process, the achievement really is astonishing - more mainstream film scores than any other composer, ever.

Apart from the Westerns, there have been revolutionary anthems for Queimada (1969) and Novecento (1976), horrors for Argento and Carpenter, gangster films from The Sicilian Clan (1969) to The Untouchables (1987), plus countless love themes which tend to go for baroque, atonal action sequences, nostalgic elegies, lyrical hymns, ominous strings, strident adventures, and an Italian hit parade of main title songs. He seems equally at home with genre films (allgenres) as with smaller-scale, more personal projects. In The Mission (1986), he created a beautiful score which is about the power of music itself - as a means of salvation on the one hand, and of colonial oppression on the other: the film ends with a broken violin floating down river.

Throughout his near 50 year career as a film composer, across the board, his signature ideas have included simple ideas (easy to hum) in complex arrangements, unusual instrumentation, concrete sounds, the use of the human voice as part of the orchestra, long silences, musical gags and single notes sustained for ever.

Giuseppe Tornatore, of Cinema Paradiso fame, has said of him "he is not just a great film composer he is a great composer".
By Sir Christopher Frayling, Former Chairman, Arts Council England

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As Bernard Herrmann is to Hitchcock, Nino Rota to Fellini, John Barry to James Bond and John Williams to Spielberg, Ennio Morricone is to Sergio Leone.

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The Colosseum ( KOL-ə-SEE-əm; Italian: Colosseo [kolosˈsɛːo]) is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre ever built, and is still the largest standing amphitheatre in the world, despite its age. Construction began under the emperor Vespasian ( r. 69-79 AD) in 72 and was completed in AD 80 under his successor and heir, Titus (). Further modifications were made during the reign of Domitian (). The three emperors who were patrons of the work are known as the Flavian dynasty, and the amphitheatre was named the Flavian Amphitheatre ( Latin: Amphitheatrum Flavium; Italian: Anfiteatro Flavio [aɱfiteˈaːtroˈflaːvjo]) by later classicists and archaeologists for its association with their family name ( Flavius).

The Colosseum is built of travertine limestone, tuff (volcanic rock), and brick-faced concrete. It could hold an estimated 50,000 to 80,000 spectators at various points in its history, having an average audience of some 65,000; it was used for gladiatorial contests and public spectacles including animal hunts, executions, re-enactments of famous battles, and dramas based on Roman mythology, and briefly mock sea battles. The building ceased to be used for entertainment in the early medieval era. It was later reused for such purposes as housing, workshops, quarters for a religious order, a fortress, a quarry, and a Christian shrine.

Although substantially ruined by earthquakes and stone robbers taking , the Colosseum is still a renowned symbol of Imperial Rome and was listed as one of the New 7 Wonders of the World. It is one of Rome's most popular tourist attractions and has links to the Catholic Church, as each Good Friday the Pope leads a torchlit "Way of the Cross" procession that starts in the area around the Colosseum. The Colosseum is depicted on the Italian version of the 5 euro cent coin.

Originally, the building's Latin name was simply amphitheatrum, 'amphitheatre'. Though the modern name Flavian Amphitheatre ( Latin: Amphitheatrum Flavium) is often used, there is no evidence it was used in classical antiquity. This name refers to the patronage of the Flavian dynasty, during whose reigns the building was constructed, but the structure is better known as the Colosseum. In antiquity, Romans may have referred to the Colosseum by the unofficial name Amphitheatrum Caesareum (with Caesareum an adjective pertaining to the title ), but this name may have been strictly poetic as it was not exclusive to the Colosseum; Vespasian and Titus, builders of the Colosseum, also constructed a Flavian Amphitheatre in Puteoli (modern Pozzuoli).

The name Colosseum is believed to be derived from a colossal statue of Nero on the model of the Colossus of Rhodes. The giant bronze sculpture of Nero as a solar deity was moved to its position beside the amphitheatre by the emperor Hadrian (). The word colosseum is a neuter Latin noun formed from the adjective colosseus, meaning "gigantic" or "colossean". By the year 1000 the Latin name "Colosseum" had been coined to refer to the amphitheatre from the nearby "Colossus Solis".

The spelling was sometimes altered in Medieval Latin: coloseum and coliseum are attested from the 12th and 14th centuries respectively. In the 12th century, the structure was recorded as the amphitheatrum colisei, 'Amphitheatre of the Colossus'. In the High Middle Ages, the Flavian amphitheatre is attested as the late 13th-century Old French: colosé, and in Middle French as: colisée by the early 16th century, by which time the word could be applied to any amphitheatre. From Middle French: colisée derived the Middle English: colisee, in use by the middle of the 15th century and employed by John Capgrave in his Solace of Pilgrims, in which he remarked: Middle English: collise eke is a meruelous place ... þe moost part of it stant at þis day. An English translation by John Bourchier, 2nd Baron Berners, of Antonio de Guevara's biography of Marcus Aurelius () in about 1533 referred to Middle English: this Emperour, beynge with the Senate at Collisee .... Similarly, the Italian: colosseo, or coliseo, are attested as referring first to the amphitheatre in Rome, and then to any amphitheatre (as Italian: culiseo in 1367). By 1460, an equivalent existed in Catalan: coliseu; by 1495 had appeared the Spanish: coliseo, and by 1548 the Portuguese: coliseu.

The earliest citation for the name Colosseum in Early Modern English is the 1600 translation, by Philemon Holland, of the Urbis Romae topographia of Bartolomeo Marliani, which he used in the preparation of his translation of Livy's Augustan era Ab Urbe Condita Libri. The text states: "This Amphitheatre was commonly called Colosseum, of Neroes Colossus, which was set up in the porch of Neroes house." Similarly, John Evelyn, translating the Middle French name: le Colisée used by the architectural theorist Roland Fréart de Chambray, wrote "And 'tis indeed a kind of miracle to see that the Colosseum ... and innumerable other Structures which seemed to have been built for Eternity, should be at present so ruinous and dilapidated".

Related to the Colossus of Nero statue

After Nero's suicide and the civil wars of the Year of the Four Emperors, the Colossus of Nero statue was remodeled by the condemned emperor's successors into the likeness of Helios ( Sol) or Apollo, the sun god, by adding the appropriate solar crown. It was then commonly referred to as the "Colossus solis". Nero's head was also replaced several times with the heads of succeeding emperors. Despite its pagan links, the statue remained standing well into the Middle Ages and was credited with magical powers. The emperor Constantine the Great remodeled the statue's face as his own.

In the 8th century, an epigram attributed to the Venerable Bede celebrated the symbolic significance of the statue in a prophecy that is variously quoted: Quamdiu stat Colisæus, stat et Roma; quando cadet colisæus, cadet et Roma; quando cadet Roma, cadet et mundus ("as long as the Colossus stands, so shall Rome; when the Colossus falls, Rome shall fall; when Rome falls, so falls the world"). This is often mistranslated to refer to the Colosseum rather than the Colossus (as in, for instance, Byron's poem Childe Harold's Pilgrimage). However, at the time that the Pseudo-Bede wrote, the masculine noun coliseus was applied to the statue rather than to the amphitheatre.

The Colossus did eventually fall, possibly being pulled down to reuse its bronze. The statue itself was largely forgotten and only its base survives, between the Colosseum and the nearby Temple of Venus and Roma.

Construction, inauguration, and Roman renovations

The site chosen was a flat area on the floor of a low valley between the Caelian, Esquiline and Palatine Hills, through which a canalised stream ran as well as an artificial lake/marsh. By the 2nd century BC the area was densely inhabited. It was devastated by the Great Fire of Rome in 64 AD, following which Nero seized much of the area to add to his personal domain. He built the grandiose Domus Aurea on the site, in front of which he created an artificial lake surrounded by pavilions, gardens and porticoes. The existing Aqua Claudia aqueduct was extended to supply water to the area and the gigantic bronze Colossus of Nero was set up nearby at the entrance to the Domus Aurea.

Although the Colossus was preserved, much of the Domus Aurea was torn down. The lake was filled in and the land reused as the location for the new Flavian Amphitheatre. Gladiatorial schools and other support buildings were constructed nearby within the former grounds of the Domus Aurea. Vespasian's decision to build the Colosseum on the site of Nero's lake can be seen as a populist gesture of returning to the people an area of the city which Nero had appropriated for his own use. In contrast to many other amphitheatres, which were on the outskirts of a city, the Colosseum was constructed in the city centre, in effect, placing it both symbolically and geographically at the heart of Rome.

Construction was funded by the opulent spoils taken from the Jewish Temple after the First Jewish-Roman War in 70 AD led to the Siege of Jerusalem. According to a reconstructed inscription found on the site, "the emperor Vespasian ordered this new amphitheatre to be erected from his general's share of the booty." It is often assumed that Jewish prisoners of war were brought back to Rome and contributed to the massive workforce needed for the construction of the amphitheatre, but there is no ancient evidence for that; it would, nonetheless, be commensurate with Roman practice to add humiliation to the defeated population. Along with this free source of unskilled labor, teams of professional Roman builders, engineers, artists, painters and decorators undertook the more specialized tasks necessary for building the Colosseum. The Colosseum was constructed with several different materials: wood, limestone, tuff, tiles, cement, and mortar.

Construction of the Colosseum began under the rule of Vespasian in around 70-72 AD (73-75 AD according to some sources). The Colosseum had been completed up to the third story by the time of Vespasian's death in 79. The top level was finished by his son, Titus, in 80, and the inaugural games were held in 80 or 81 AD. Dio Cassius recounts that over 9,000 wild animals were killed during the inaugural games of the amphitheatre. Commemorative coinage was issued celebrating the inauguration. The building was remodelled further under Vespasian's younger son, the newly designated Emperor Domitian, who constructed the , a series of tunnels used to house animals and slaves. He also added a gallery to the top of the Colosseum to increase its seating capacity.

In 217, the Colosseum was badly damaged by a major fire (caused by lightning, according to Dio Cassius), which destroyed the wooden upper levels of the amphitheatre's interior. It was not fully repaired until about 240 and underwent further repairs in 250 or 252 and again in 320. Honorius banned the practice of gladiator fights in 399 and again in 404. Gladiatorial fights are last mentioned around 435. An inscription records the restoration of various parts of the Colosseum under Theodosius II and Valentinian III (reigned 425-455), possibly to repair damage caused by a major earthquake in 443; more work followed in 484 and 508. The arena continued to be used for contests well into the 6th century. Animal hunts continued until at least 523, when Anicius Maximus celebrated his consulship with some venationes, criticised by King Theodoric the Great for their high cost.

The Colosseum underwent several radical changes of use. By the late 6th century a small chapel had been built into the structure of the amphitheater, though this apparently did not confer any particular religious significance on the building as a whole. The arena was converted into a cemetery. The numerous vaulted spaces in the arcades under the seating were converted into housing and workshops, and are recorded as still being rented out as late as the 12th century. Around 1200 the Frangipani family took over the Colosseum and fortified it, apparently using it as a castle. In the early to mid 14th century, the Pope's relocation to Avignon caused a population decline in Rome that left the region insecure. The colosseum was largely abandoned by the public and became a popular den for bandits.

Severe damage was inflicted on the Colosseum by the great earthquake in 1349, causing the outer south side, lying on a less stable alluvial terrain, to collapse. Much of the tumbled stone was reused to build palaces, churches, hospitals and other buildings elsewhere in Rome. In 1377, after the Pope's return to Rome, the Colosseum was restored by a religious order called Arciconfraternita del SS. Salvatore ad Sancta Sanctorum, who then inhabited a northern portion of it until as late as the early 19th century. The interior of the amphitheater was extensively stripped of stone, which was reused elsewhere, or (in the case of the marble façade) was burned to make quicklime. The iron clamps which held the stonework together were pried or hacked out of the walls, leaving numerous pockmarks which still scar the building today.

During the 16th and 17th century, Church officials sought a productive role for the Colosseum. Pope Sixtus V (1585-1590) planned to turn the building into a wool factory to provide employment for Rome's prostitutes, though this proposal fell through with his premature death. In 1671 Cardinal Altieri authorized its use for bullfights; a public outcry caused the idea to be hastily abandoned.

In 1749, Pope Benedict XIV endorsed the view that the Colosseum was a sacred site where early Christians had been martyred. He forbade the use of the Colosseum as a quarry and consecrated the building to the Passion of Christ and installed Stations of the Cross, declaring it sanctified by the blood of the Christian martyrs who perished there ( see Significance in Christianity). However, there is no historical evidence to support Benedict's claim, nor is there even any evidence that anyone before the 16th century suggested this might be the case; the Catholic Encyclopedia concludes that there are no historical grounds for the supposition, other than the reasonably plausible conjecture that some of the many martyrs may well have been.

Interior of the Colosseum, Rome (1832) by Thomas Cole, showing the Stations of the Cross around the arena and the extensive vegetation

Later popes initiated various stabilization and restoration projects, removing the extensive vegetation which had overgrown the structure and threatened to damage it further. The façade was reinforced with triangular brick wedges in 1807 and 1827, and the interior was repaired in 1831, 1846 and in the 1930s. The arena substructure was partly excavated in 1810-1814 and 1874 and was fully exposed under Benito Mussolini in the 1930s.

The Colosseum is today one of Rome's most popular tourist attractions, receiving millions of visitors annually. The effects of pollution and general deterioration over time prompted a major restoration programme carried out between 1993 and 2000, at a cost of Lire 40 billion ($19.3m / €20.6m at 2000 prices).

In recent years, the Colosseum has become a symbol of the international campaign against capital punishment, which was abolished in Italy in 1948. Several anti-death penalty demonstrations took place in front of the Colosseum in 2000. Since that time, as a gesture against the death penalty, the local authorities of Rome change the color of the Colosseum's night time illumination from white to gold whenever a person condemned to the death penalty anywhere in the world gets their sentence commuted or is released, or if a jurisdiction abolishes the death penalty. Most recently, the Colosseum was illuminated in gold in November 2012 following the abolishment of capital punishment in the American state of Connecticut in April 2012.

Because of the ruined state of the interior, it is impractical to use the Colosseum to host large events; only a few hundred spectators can be accommodated in temporary seating. However, much larger concerts have been held just outside, using the Colosseum as a backdrop. Performers who have played at the Colosseum in recent years have included Ray Charles (May 2002), Paul McCartney (May 2003), Elton John (September 2005), and Billy Joel (July 2006).

Physical description

Unlike Roman theatres that were built into hillsides, the Colosseum is an entirely free-standing structure. It derives its basic exterior and interior architecture from that of two theatres back to back. It is elliptical in plan and is 189 meters (615 ft / 640 Roman feet) long, and 156 meters (510 ft / 528 Roman feet) wide, with a base area of 24,000 square metres (6 acres). The height of the outer wall is 48 meters (157 ft / 165 Roman feet). The perimeter originally measured 545 meters (1,788 ft / 1,835 Roman feet). The central arena is an ellipse 87 m (287 ft) long and 55 m (180 ft) wide, surrounded by a wall 5 m (15 ft) high, above which rose tiers of seating.

The outer wall is estimated to have required over 100,000 cubic metres (3.5 million cubic feet) of travertine stone which were set without mortar; they were held together by 300 tons of iron clamps. However, it has suffered extensive damage over the centuries, with large segments having collapsed following earthquakes. The north side of the perimeter wall is still standing; the distinctive triangular brick wedges at each end are modern additions, having been constructed in the early 19th century to shore up the wall. The remainder of the present-day exterior of the Colosseum is in fact the original interior wall.

The surviving part of the outer wall's monumental façade comprises three superposed storeys surmounted by a podium on which stands a tall attic, both of which are pierced by windows interspersed at regular intervals. The arcades are framed by half-columns of the Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian orders, while the attic is decorated with Corinthian pilasters. Each of the arches in the second- and third-floor arcades framed statues, probably honoring divinities and other figures from Classical mythology.

Two hundred and forty mast corbels were positioned around the top of the attic. They originally supported a retractable awning, known as the , that kept the sun and rain off spectators. This consisted of a canvas-covered, net-like structure made of ropes, with a hole in the center. It covered two-thirds of the arena, and sloped down towards the center to catch the wind and provide a breeze for the audience. Sailors, specially enlisted from the Roman naval headquarters at Misenum and housed in the nearby Castra Misenatium, were used to work the .

The Colosseum's huge crowd capacity made it essential that the venue could be filled or evacuated quickly. Its architects adopted solutions very similar to those used in modern stadia to deal with the same problem. The amphitheatre was ringed by eighty entrances at ground level, 76 of which were used by ordinary spectators. Each entrance and exit was numbered, as was each staircase. The northern main entrance was reserved for the Roman Emperor and his aides, whilst the other three axial entrances were most likely used by the elite. All four axial entrances were richly decorated with painted stucco reliefs, of which fragments survive. Many of the original outer entrances have disappeared with the collapse of the perimeter wall, but entrances XXIII (23) to LIIII (54) survive.

Spectators were given tickets in the form of numbered pottery shards, which directed them to the appropriate section and row. They accessed their seats via (singular vomitorium), passageways that opened into a tier of seats from below or behind. These quickly dispersed people into their seats and, upon conclusion of the event or in an emergency evacuation, could permit their exit within only a few minutes. The name vomitoria derived from the Latin word for a rapid discharge, from which English derives the word vomit.

Interior seating

According to the Codex-Calendar of 354, the Colosseum could accommodate 87,000 people, although modern estimates put the figure at around 50,000. They were seated in a tiered arrangement that reflected the rigidly stratified nature of Roman society. Special boxes were provided at the north and south ends respectively for the Emperor and the Vestal Virgins, providing the best views of the arena. Flanking them at the same level was a broad platform or podium for the senatorial class, who were allowed to bring their own chairs. The names of some 5th century senators can still be seen carved into the stonework, presumably reserving areas for their use.

The tier above the senators, known as the maenianum primum, was occupied by the non-senatorial noble class or knights (). The next level up, the maenianum secundum, was originally reserved for ordinary Roman citizens () and was divided into two sections. The lower part (the immum) was for wealthy citizens, while the upper part (the summum) was for poor citizens. Specific sectors were provided for other social groups: for instance, boys with their tutors, soldiers on leave, foreign dignitaries, scribes, heralds, priests and so on. Stone (and later marble) seating was provided for the citizens and nobles, who presumably would have brought their own cushions with them. Inscriptions identified the areas reserved for specific groups.

Another level, the maenianum secundum in legneis, was added at the very top of the building during the reign of Domitian. This comprised a gallery for the common poor, slaves and women. It would have been either standing room only, or would have had very steep wooden benches. Some groups were banned altogether from the Colosseum, notably gravediggers, actors and former gladiators.

Each tier was divided into sections ( maeniana) by curved passages and low walls ( praecinctiones or baltei), and were subdivided into cunei, or wedges, by the steps and aisles from the vomitoria. Each row ( gradus) of seats was numbered, permitting each individual seat to be exactly designated by its gradus, cuneus, and number.

Arena and hypogeum

The arena itself was 83 meters by 48 meters (272 ft by 157 ft / 280 by 163 Roman feet). It comprised a wooden floor covered by sand (the Latin word for sand is harena or arena), covering an elaborate underground structure called the (literally meaning "underground"). The hypogeum was not part of the original construction but was ordered to be built by Emperor Domitian. Little now remains of the original arena floor, but the hypogeum is still clearly visible. It consisted of a two-level subterranean network of tunnels and cages beneath the arena where gladiators and animals were held before contests began. Eighty vertical shafts provided instant access to the arena for caged animals and scenery pieces concealed underneath; larger hinged platforms, called hegmata, provided access for elephants and the like. It was restructured on numerous occasions; at least twelve different phases of construction can be seen.

The hypogeum was connected by tunnels to a number of points outside the Colosseum. Animals and performers were brought through the tunnel from nearby stables, with the gladiators' barracks at the Ludus Magnus to the east also being connected by tunnels. Separate tunnels were provided for the Emperor and the Vestal Virgins to permit them to enter and exit the Colosseum without needing to pass through the crowds.

Substantial quantities of machinery also existed in the hypogeum. Elevators and pulleys raised and lowered scenery and props, as well as lifting caged animals to the surface for release. There is evidence for the existence of major hydraulic mechanisms and according to ancient accounts, it was possible to flood the arena rapidly, presumably via a connection to a nearby aqueduct. However, the construction of the hypogeum at Domitian's behest put an end to the practise of flooding, and thus also to naval battles, early in the Colosseum's existence. There is however wide debate over the practicality and logistics of this phenomenon which leads to speculation over its actuality. This is mostly because there is no physical evidence of naumachiae at the Colosseum remains.

Supporting buildings

The Colosseum and its activities supported a substantial industry in the area. In addition to the amphitheatre itself, many other buildings nearby were linked to the games. Immediately to the east is the remains of the Ludus Magnus, a training school for gladiators. This was connected to the Colosseum by an underground passage, to allow easy access for the gladiators. The Ludus Magnus had its own miniature training arena, which was itself a popular attraction for Roman spectators. Other training schools were in the same area, including the Ludus Matutinus (Morning School), where fighters of animals were trained, plus the Dacian and Gallic Schools.

Also nearby were the Armamentarium, comprising an armory to store weapons; the Summum Choragium, where machinery was stored; the Sanitarium, which had facilities to treat wounded gladiators; and the Spoliarium, where bodies of dead gladiators were stripped of their armor and disposed of.

Around the perimeter of the Colosseum, at a distance of 18 m (59 ft) from the perimeter, was a series of tall stone posts, with five remaining on the eastern side. Various explanations have been advanced for their presence; they may have been a religious boundary, or an outer boundary for ticket checks, or an anchor for the or awning.

Ave Imperator, morituri te salutant (Hail, Cesar, those who will die salute you), by Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1859

The Colosseum was used to host gladiatorial shows as well as a variety of other events. The shows, called munera, were always given by private individuals rather than the state. They had a strong religious element but were also demonstrations of power and family prestige and were immensely popular. Another major attraction was the animal hunt, or . This utilized a great variety of wild beasts, mainly imported from Africa and the Middle East, and included creatures such as rhinoceros, hippopotamuses, elephants, giraffes, aurochs, wisents, Barbary lions, panthers, leopards, bears, Caspian tigers, crocodiles and ostriches. Battles and hunts were often staged amid elaborate sets with movable trees and buildings. These events could be huge in scale; Trajan is said to have celebrated his victories in Dacia in 107 with contests involving 11,000 animals and 10,000 gladiators over the course of 123 days. During lunch intervals, executions would be staged. Those condemned to death would be sent into the arena, naked and unarmed, to face the beasts of death which would literally tear them to pieces. Acrobats and magicians would also perform, usually during the intervals.

Pollice Verso (Thumbs Down) by Jean-Léon Gérôme, 1872

During the early days of the Colosseum, ancient writers recorded that the building was used for naumachiae (more properly known as navalia proelia) or simulated sea battles. Accounts of the inaugural games held by Titus in AD 80 describe it being filled with water for a display of specially trained swimming horses and bulls. There is also an account of a re-enactment of a famous sea battle between the Corcyrean (Corfiot) Greeks and the Corinthians. This has been the subject of some debate among historians; although providing the water would not have been a problem, it is unclear how the arena could have been waterproofed, nor would there have been enough space in the arena for the warships to move around. It has been suggested that the reports either have the location wrong or that the Colosseum originally featured a wide floodable channel down its central axis (which would later have been replaced by the hypogeum).

Sylvae or recreations of natural scenes were also held in the arena. Painters, technicians and architects would construct a simulation of a forest with real trees and bushes planted in the arena's floor, and animals would then be introduced. Such scenes might be used simply to display a natural environment for the urban population, or could otherwise be used as the backdrop for hunts or dramas depicting episodes from mythology. They were also occasionally used for executions in which the hero of the story - played by a condemned person - was killed in one of various gruesome but mythologically authentic ways, such as being mauled by beasts or burned to death.

Beneath the Colosseum, a network of subterranean passageways that were once used for transporting wild animals and gladiators to the arena, opened to the public in summer 2010.

The Colosseum is also the site of Roman Catholic ceremonies in the 20th and 21st centuries. For instance, Pope Benedict XVI led the Stations of the Cross called the Scriptural Way of the Cross (which calls for more meditation) at the Colosseum on Good Fridays.

Restoration

In 2011 Diego Della Valle, head of the shoe firm Tod's, entered into an agreement with local officials to sponsor a €25 million restoration of the Colosseum. Work was planned to begin at the end of 2011, taking up to two and a half years. Due to the controversial nature of using a public-private partnership to fund the restoration, work was delayed and began in 2013. The restoration is the first full cleaning and repair in the Colosseum's history. The first stage is to clean and restore the Colosseum's arcaded façade and replace the metal enclosures that block the ground-level arches. After three years, the work was completed on 1 July 2016, when the Italian minister of culture, Dario Franceschini, also announced that the funds have been committed to replace the floors by the end of 2018. These will provide a stage that Franceschini says will be used for "cultural events of the highest level." The project also includes creating a services center and restoring the galleries and underground spaces inside the Colosseum. Since 1 November 2017, the top two levels have been opened for guided visits. The fourth level held the marketplace, and the top fifth tier is where the poorest citizens, the plebeians, gathered and watched the show, bringing picnics for the day-long event.

Significance in Christianity

The Colosseum is generally regarded by Christians as a site of the martyrdom of large numbers of believers during the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire, as evidenced by Church history and tradition. On the other hand, other scholars believe that the majority of martyrdoms may have occurred at other venues within the city of Rome, rather than at the Colosseum, citing a lack of still-intact physical evidence or historical records. These scholars assert that "some Christians were executed as common criminals in the Colosseum-their crime being refusal to reverence the Roman gods", but most Christian martyrs of the early Church were executed for their faith at the Circus Maximus. According to Irenaeus (died about 202), Ignatius of Antioch was fed to the lions in Rome around 107 A.D and although Irenaeus says nothing about this happening at the Colosseum, tradition ascribes it to that place.

In the Middle Ages, the Colosseum was not regarded as a monument, and was used as what some modern sources label a "quarry," which is to say that stones from the Colosseum were taken for the building of other sacred sites. This fact is used to support the idea that, at a time when sites associated with martyrs were highly venerated the Colosseum was not being treated as a sacred site. It was not included in the itineraries compiled for the use of pilgrims nor in works such as the 12th century Mirabilia Urbis Romae ("Marvels of the City of Rome"), which claims the Circus Flaminius - but not the Colosseum - as the site of martyrdoms. Part of the structure was inhabited by a Christian religious order, but it is not known whether this was for any particular religious reason.

Pope Pius V (1566-1572) is said to have recommended that pilgrims gather sand from the arena of the Colosseum to serve as a relic, on the grounds that it was impregnated with the blood of martyrs, although some of his contemporaries did not share his conviction. A century later Fioravante Martinelli listed the Colosseum at the head of a list of places sacred to the martyrs in his 1653 book Roma ex ethnica sacra. Martinelli's book evidently had an effect on public opinion; in response to Cardinal Altieri's proposal some years later to turn the Colosseum into a bullring, Carlo Tomassi published a pamphlet in protest against what he regarded as an act of desecration. The ensuing controversy persuaded Pope Clement X to close the Colosseum's external arcades and declare it a sanctuary.

At the insistence of St. Leonard of Port Maurice, Pope Benedict XIV (1740-1758) forbade the quarrying of the Colosseum and erected Stations of the Cross around the arena, which remained until February 1874. Benedict Joseph Labre spent the later years of his life within the walls of the Colosseum, living on alms, before he died in 1783. Several 19th century popes funded repair and restoration work on the Colosseum, and it still retains its Christian connection today. A Christian cross stands in the Colosseum, with a plaque, stating:

The amphitheater, one consecrated to triumphs, entertainments, and the impious worship of pagan gods, is now dedicated to the sufferings of the martyrs purified from impious superstitions.

Other Christian crosses stand in several points around the arena and every Good Friday the Pope leads a Via Crucis procession to the amphitheater.

The Colosseum has a wide and well-documented history of flora ever since Domenico Panaroli made the first catalogue of its plants in 1643. Since then, 684 species have been identified there. The peak was in 1855 (420 species). Attempts were made in 1871 to eradicate the vegetation, because of concerns over the damage that was being caused to the masonry, but much of it has returned. Two hundred forty-two species have been counted today and of the species first identified by Panaroli, 200 remain.

The variation of plants can be explained by the change of climate in Rome through the centuries. Additionally, bird migration, flower blooming, and the growth of Rome that caused the Colosseum to become embedded within the modern city centre rather than on the outskirts of the ancient city, as well as deliberate transport of species, are also contributing causes. Another reason often given is their seeds being unwittingly transported either on the fur or in the feces of animals brought there from all corners of the empire.

In popular culture

Several architectural works have also been modelled on or inspired by, the Colosseum. These include:

The Kongresshalle, or "Congress Hall", (1935, unfinished) at the Nazi Party Rally grounds, Nuremberg, Germany

The Summer Olympic Games medal from 1928 to 2000, designed by Giuseppe Cassioli, features a depiction of the Colosseum. At the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens the Colosseum was replaced by a depiction of the Panathinaiko Stadium

The exterior of the Vancouver Public Library in British Columbia resembles the current state of the Colosseum. It was designed by Moshe Safdie.

The Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum entrance was inspired by the Colosseum.

The Palazzo della Civiltà Italiana was very closely modelled on the Colosseum. It was built for Mussolini for the Universal Exhibition of 1942 but the exhibition never happened due to the outbreak of World War II. The architects were Giovanni Guerrini, Ernesto Bruno La Padula, and Mario Romano.

McCaig's Tower, overlooking Oban, Scotland.

References

Bibliography

External links

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The Colosseum ( KOL-ə-SEE-əm ; Italian: Colosseo [kolosˈsɛːo]) is an elliptical amphitheatre in the centre of the city of Rome, Italy, just east of the Roman Forum. It is the largest ancient amphitheatre ever built, and is still the largest standing amphitheatre in the world, despite its age.

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Video on the different building in Italy

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Video on the different building in Italy

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Beach Tennis Under 16 Years Aruba X Venezuela Aruba 50k 2019

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The Last Supper is another one of the famous paintings of Leonardo. The painting represents the scene of the Last Supper of Jesus with his apostles, as it is told in the Gospel of John, 13:21. It's still located on the wall of the dining room of the former Dominican convent of Santa Maria Delle Grazie.

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Bocce Volo is a simple game. It consists of a pallino, and 8 other bocce balls. 4 per person or team. The rules are to put the pallino at about ten feet or so away and the players have to try to get their balls as close to the pallino as possible. The first team throws the ball, then the second. They try to get as close as possible. Hitting the other team's balls and pallino is permitted.

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beach tennis is a fast and simple game to play with, especially if your a beach sport love or tennis fan, you will definitely want to try this sport (beach tennis). Beach tennis was first discovered in 1978, by a group of tennis player that went to Italy for a vacation. the reason that they discovered beach tennis was because they try to play tennis with volleyball net on the beach. therefore the Italian invent the beach tennis.

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tamburello is a sport that is really simple to play with, because to play this game/ sport basically you only need with a racket and a ball. however, italy was the origin country that created this type of sport during 16th century, the original purpose of inventing tamburello is  because they want to change the way of playing Pallone col bracciale (a type of ball game), therefore they invent tamburello which in another word, tamburello is the improved version of Pallone col bracciale.

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Mona Lisa might be the most famous painting in history.  Painted by Leonardo during the Renaissance, Mona Lisa is the most expensive painting, the price is at $852,139,072.85 USD
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"Why Is This Woman So Famous?" — Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci

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Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni, known as Michelangelo for simplicity, he was a famous Italian sculptor, known for his work on 'David'. He was a sculptor, painter, architect, and poet of the High Renaissance. He was born in the Republic of Florence, which exerted an influence on the development of Western art.

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A form of singing which takes place in a oprea house. Performed by a voice ensemble. Although similar to a musical, it was never classified as one

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Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librettist and incorporates a number of the performing arts, such as acting, scenery, costume, and sometimes dance or ballet. The performance is typically given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble, which since the early 19th century has been led by a conductor. Although musical theatre is closely related to opera, the two are considered to be distinct from one another.

Opera is a key part of the Western classical music tradition. Originally understood as an entirely sung piece, in contrast to a play with songs, opera has come to include numerous genres, including some that include spoken dialogue such as and Opéra comique. In traditional number opera, singers employ two styles of singing: recitative, a speech-inflected style, and self-contained arias. The 19th century saw the rise of the continuous music drama.

Opera originated in Italy at the end of the 16th century (with Jacopo Peri's mostly lost , produced in Florence in 1598) especially from works by Claudio Monteverdi, notably , and soon spread through the rest of Europe: Heinrich Schütz in Germany, Jean-Baptiste Lully in France, and Henry Purcell in England all helped to establish their national traditions in the 17th century. In the 18th century, Italian opera continued to dominate most of Europe (except France), attracting foreign composers such as George Frideric Handel. Opera seria was the most prestigious form of Italian opera, until Christoph Willibald Gluck reacted against its artificiality with his "reform" operas in the 1760s. The most renowned figure of late 18th-century opera is Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, who began with opera seria but is most famous for his Italian comic operas, especially The Marriage of Figaro ( Le nozze di Figaro), Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte, as well as Die Entführung aus dem Serail ( The Abduction from the Seraglio), and The Magic Flute ( Die Zauberflöte), landmarks in the German tradition.

The first third of the 19th century saw the high point of the bel canto style, with Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti and Vincenzo Bellini all creating signature works of that style. It also saw the advent of grand opera typified by the works of Daniel Auber and Giacomo Meyerbeer as well as Carl Maria von Weber's introduction of German Romantische Oper (German Romantic Opera). The mid-to-late 19th century was a golden age of opera, led and dominated by Giuseppe Verdi in Italy and Richard Wagner in Germany. The popularity of opera continued through the verismo era in Italy and contemporary French opera through to Giacomo Puccini and Richard Strauss in the early 20th century. During the 19th century, parallel operatic traditions emerged in central and eastern Europe, particularly in Russia and Bohemia. The 20th century saw many experiments with modern styles, such as atonality and serialism ( Arnold Schoenberg and Alban Berg), neoclassicism ( Igor Stravinsky), and minimalism ( Philip Glass and John Adams). With the rise of recording technology, singers such as Enrico Caruso and Maria Callas became known to much wider audiences that went beyond the circle of opera fans. Since the invention of radio and television, operas were also performed on (and written for) these media. Beginning in 2006, a number of major opera houses began to present live high-definition video transmissions of their performances in cinemas all over the world. Since 2009, complete performances can be downloaded and are live streamed.

The words of an opera are known as the libretto (meaning "small book"). Some composers, notably Wagner, have written their own libretti; others have worked in close collaboration with their librettists, e.g. Mozart with Lorenzo Da Ponte. Traditional opera, often referred to as " number opera", consists of two modes of singing: recitative, the plot-driving passages sung in a style designed to imitate and emphasize the inflections of speech, and aria (an "air" or formal song) in which the characters express their emotions in a more structured melodic style. Vocal duets, trios and other ensembles often occur, and choruses are used to comment on the action. In some forms of opera, such as singspiel, opéra comique, operetta, and semi-opera, the recitative is mostly replaced by spoken dialogue. Melodic or semi-melodic passages occurring in the midst of, or instead of, recitative, are also referred to as arioso. The terminology of the various kinds of operatic voices is described in detail below. During both the Baroque and Classical periods, recitative could appear in two basic forms, each of which was accompanied by a different instrumental ensemble: secco (dry) recitative, sung with a free rhythm dictated by the accent of the words, accompanied only by basso continuo, which was usually a harpsichord and a cello; or accompagnato (also known as strumentato) in which the orchestra provided accompaniment. Over the 18th century, arias were increasingly accompanied by the orchestra. By the 19th century, accompagnato had gained the upper hand, the orchestra played a much bigger role, and Wagner revolutionized opera by abolishing almost all distinction between aria and recitative in his quest for what Wagner termed "endless melody". Subsequent composers have tended to follow Wagner's example, though some, such as Stravinsky in his The Rake's Progress have bucked the trend. The changing role of the orchestra in opera is described in more detail below.

The Italian word opera means "work", both in the sense of the labour done and the result produced. The Italian word derives from the Latin word , a singular noun meaning "work" and also the plural of the noun . According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the Italian word was first used in the sense "composition in which poetry, dance, and music are combined" in 1639; the first recorded English usage in this sense dates to 1648.

by Jacopo Peri was the earliest composition considered opera, as understood today. It was written around 1597, largely under the inspiration of an elite circle of literate Florentine humanists who gathered as the " Camerata de' Bardi". Significantly, Dafne was an attempt to revive the classical Greek drama, part of the wider revival of antiquity characteristic of the Renaissance. The members of the Camerata considered that the "chorus" parts of Greek dramas were originally sung, and possibly even the entire text of all roles; opera was thus conceived as a way of "restoring" this situation. Dafne, however, is lost. A later work by Peri, , dating from 1600, is the first opera score to have survived until the present day. However, the honour of being the first opera still to be regularly performed goes to Claudio Monteverdi's , composed for the court of Mantua in 1607. The Mantua court of the Gonzagas, employers of Monteverdi, played a significant role in the origin of opera employing not only court singers of the concerto delle donne (till 1598), but also one of the first actual "opera singers", Madama Europa.

Baroque era

Opera did not remain confined to court audiences for long. In 1637, the idea of a "season" (often during the carnival) of publicly attended operas supported by ticket sales emerged in Venice. Monteverdi had moved to the city from Mantua and composed his last operas, Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria and L'incoronazione di Poppea, for the Venetian theatre in the 1640s. His most important follower Francesco Cavalli helped spread opera throughout Italy. In these early Baroque operas, broad comedy was blended with tragic elements in a mix that jarred some educated sensibilities, sparking the first of opera's many reform movements, sponsored by the Arcadian Academy, which came to be associated with the poet Metastasio, whose libretti helped crystallize the genre of opera seria, which became the leading form of Italian opera until the end of the 18th century. Once the Metastasian ideal had been firmly established, comedy in Baroque-era opera was reserved for what came to be called opera buffa. Before such elements were forced out of opera seria, many libretti had featured a separately unfolding comic plot as sort of an "opera-within-an-opera". One reason for this was an attempt to attract members of the growing merchant class, newly wealthy, but still not as cultured as the nobility, to the public opera houses. These separate plots were almost immediately resurrected in a separately developing tradition that partly derived from the commedia dell'arte, a long-flourishing improvisatory stage tradition of Italy. Just as intermedi had once been performed in between the acts of stage plays, operas in the new comic genre of intermezzi, which developed largely in Naples in the 1710s and 1720s, were initially staged during the intermissions of opera seria. They became so popular, however, that they were soon being offered as separate productions.

Opera seria was elevated in tone and highly stylised in form, usually consisting of secco recitative interspersed with long da capo arias. These afforded great opportunity for virtuosic singing and during the golden age of opera seria the singer really became the star. The role of the hero was usually written for the high-pitched male castrato voice, which was produced by castration of the singer before puberty, which prevented a boy's larynx from being transformed at puberty. Castrati such as Farinelli and Senesino, as well as female sopranos such as Faustina Bordoni, became in great demand throughout Europe as opera seria ruled the stage in every country except France. Farinelli was one of the most famous singers of the 18th century. Italian opera set the Baroque standard. Italian libretti were the norm, even when a German composer like Handel found himself composing the likes of and Giulio Cesare for London audiences. Italian libretti remained dominant in the classical period as well, for example in the operas of Mozart, who wrote in Vienna near the century's close. Leading Italian-born composers of opera seria include Alessandro Scarlatti, Antonio Vivaldi and Nicola Porpora.

Gluck's reforms and Mozart

Opera seria had its weaknesses and critics. The taste for embellishment on behalf of the superbly trained singers, and the use of spectacle as a replacement for dramatic purity and unity drew attacks. Francesco Algarotti's Essay on the Opera (1755) proved to be an inspiration for Christoph Willibald Gluck's reforms. He advocated that opera seria had to return to basics and that all the various elements-music (both instrumental and vocal), ballet, and staging-must be subservient to the overriding drama. In 1765 Melchior Grimm published " Poème lyrique", an influential article for the Encyclopédie on lyric and opera librettos. Several composers of the period, including Niccolò Jommelli and Tommaso Traetta, attempted to put these ideals into practice. The first to succeed however, was Gluck. Gluck strove to achieve a "beautiful simplicity". This is evident in his first reform opera, Orfeo ed Euridice, where his non-virtuosic vocal melodies are supported by simple harmonies and a richer orchestra presence throughout.

Gluck's reforms have had resonance throughout operatic history. Weber, Mozart, and Wagner, in particular, were influenced by his ideals. Mozart, in many ways Gluck's successor, combined a superb sense of drama, harmony, melody, and counterpoint to write a series of comic operas with libretti by Lorenzo Da Ponte, notably Le nozze di Figaro, Don Giovanni, and Così fan tutte, which remain among the most-loved, popular and well-known operas. But Mozart's contribution to opera seria was more mixed; by his time it was dying away, and in spite of such fine works as and La clemenza di Tito, he would not succeed in bringing the art form back to life again.

Bel canto, Verdi and verismo

The bel canto opera movement flourished in the early 19th century and is exemplified by the operas of Rossini, Bellini, Donizetti, Pacini, Mercadante and many others. Literally "beautiful singing", bel canto opera derives from the Italian stylistic singing school of the same name. Bel canto lines are typically florid and intricate, requiring supreme agility and pitch control. Examples of famous operas in the bel canto style include Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia and La Cenerentola, as well as Bellini's , La sonnambula and and Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor, L'elisir d'amore and Don Pasquale.

Following the bel canto era, a more direct, forceful style was rapidly popularized by Giuseppe Verdi, beginning with his biblical opera . This opera, and the ones that would follow in Verdi's career, revolutionized Italian opera, changing it from merely a display of vocal fireworks, with Rossini's and Donizetti's works, to dramatic story-telling. Verdi's operas resonated with the growing spirit of Italian nationalism in the post- Napoleonic era, and he quickly became an icon of the patriotic movement for a unified Italy. In the early 1850s, Verdi produced his three most popular operas: , Il trovatore and La traviata. The first of these, Rigoletto, proved the most daring and revolutionary. In it, Verdi blurs the distinction between the aria and recitative as it never before was, leading the opera to be "an unending string of duets". La traviata was also novel. It tells the story of courtesan, and is often cited as one of the first "realistic" operas,[citation needed ] because rather than featuring great kings and figures from literature, it focuses on the tragedies of ordinary life and society. After these, he continued to develop his style, composing perhaps the greatest French grand opera, , and ending his career with two Shakespeare-inspired works, and , which reveal how far Italian opera had grown in sophistication since the early 19th century. These final two works showed Verdi at his most masterfully orchestrated, and are both incredibly influential, and modern. In Falstaff, Verdi sets the preeminent standard for the form and style that would dominate opera throughout the twentieth century. Rather than long, suspended melodies, Falstaff contains many little motifs and mottos, that, rather than being expanded upon, are introduced and subsequently dropped, only to be brought up again later. These motifs never are expanded upon, and just as the audience expects a character to launch into a long melody, a new character speaks, introducing a new phrase. This fashion of opera directed opera from Verdi, onward, exercising tremendous influence on his successors Giacomo Puccini, Richard Strauss, and Benjamin Britten.

After Verdi, the sentimental "realistic" melodrama of verismo appeared in Italy. This was a style introduced by Pietro Mascagni's Cavalleria rusticana and Ruggero Leoncavallo's that came to dominate the world's opera stages with such popular works as Giacomo Puccini's , , and Madama Butterfly. Later Italian composers, such as Berio and Nono, have experimented with modernism.

The first German opera was , composed by Heinrich Schütz in 1627, but the music score has not survived. Italian opera held a great sway over German-speaking countries until the late 18th century. Nevertheless, native forms would develop in spite of this influence. In 1644, Sigmund Staden produced the first , , a popular form of German-language opera in which singing alternates with spoken dialogue. In the late 17th century and early 18th century, the Theater am Gänsemarkt in Hamburg presented German operas by Keiser, Telemann and Handel. Yet most of the major German composers of the time, including Handel himself, as well as Graun, Hasse and later Gluck, chose to write most of their operas in foreign languages, especially Italian. In contrast to Italian opera, which was generally composed for the aristocratic class, German opera was generally composed for the masses and tended to feature simple folk-like melodies, and it was not until the arrival of Mozart that German opera was able to match its Italian counterpart in musical sophistication. The theatre company of Abel Seyler pioneered serious German-language opera in the 1770s, marking a break with the previous simpler musical entertainment.

Mozart's Singspiele, Die Entführung aus dem Serail (1782) and Die Zauberflöte (1791) were an important breakthrough in achieving international recognition for German opera. The tradition was developed in the 19th century by Beethoven with his (1805), inspired by the climate of the French Revolution. Carl Maria von Weber established German Romantic opera in opposition to the dominance of Italian bel canto. His Der Freischütz (1821) shows his genius for creating a supernatural atmosphere. Other opera composers of the time include Marschner, Schubert and Lortzing, but the most significant figure was undoubtedly Wagner.

Wagner was one of the most revolutionary and controversial composers in musical history. Starting under the influence of Weber and Meyerbeer, he gradually evolved a new concept of opera as a Gesamtkunstwerk (a "complete work of art"), a fusion of music, poetry and painting. He greatly increased the role and power of the orchestra, creating scores with a complex web of leitmotifs, recurring themes often associated with the characters and concepts of the drama, of which prototypes can be heard in his earlier operas such as Der fliegende Holländer, Tannhäuser and ; and he was prepared to violate accepted musical conventions, such as tonality, in his quest for greater expressivity. In his mature music dramas, Tristan und Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Der Ring des Nibelungen and , he abolished the distinction between aria and recitative in favour of a seamless flow of "endless melody". Wagner also brought a new philosophical dimension to opera in his works, which were usually based on stories from Germanic or Arthurian legend. Finally, Wagner built his own opera house at Bayreuth with part of the patronage from Ludwig II of Bavaria, exclusively dedicated to performing his own works in the style he wanted.

Opera would never be the same after Wagner and for many composers his legacy proved a heavy burden. On the other hand, Richard Strauss accepted Wagnerian ideas but took them in wholly new directions, along with incorporating the new form introduced by Verdi. He first won fame with the scandalous and the dark tragedy , in which tonality was pushed to the limits. Then Strauss changed tack in his greatest success, Der Rosenkavalier, where Mozart and Viennese waltzes became as important an influence as Wagner. Strauss continued to produce a highly varied body of operatic works, often with libretti by the poet Hugo von Hofmannsthal. Other composers who made individual contributions to German opera in the early 20th century include Alexander von Zemlinsky, Erich Korngold, Franz Schreker, Paul Hindemith, Kurt Weill and the Italian-born Ferruccio Busoni. The operatic innovations of Arnold Schoenberg and his successors are discussed in the section on modernism.

During the late 19th century, the Austrian composer Johann Strauss II, an admirer of the French-language operettas composed by Jacques Offenbach, composed several German-language operettas, the most famous of which was Die Fledermaus. Nevertheless, rather than copying the style of Offenbach, the operettas of Strauss II had distinctly Viennese flavor to them.

In rivalry with imported Italian opera productions, a separate French tradition was founded by the Italian-born French composer Jean-Baptiste Lully at the court of King Louis XIV. Despite his foreign birthplace, Lully established an Academy of Music and monopolised French opera from 1672. Starting with Cadmus et Hermione, Lully and his librettist Quinault created tragédie en musique, a form in which dance music and choral writing were particularly prominent. Lully's operas also show a concern for expressive recitative which matched the contours of the French language. In the 18th century, Lully's most important successor was Jean-Philippe Rameau, who composed five tragédies en musique as well as numerous works in other genres such as opéra-ballet, all notable for their rich orchestration and harmonic daring. Despite the popularity of Italian opera seria throughout much of Europe during the Baroque period, Italian opera never gained much of a foothold in France, where its own national operatic tradition was more popular instead. After Rameau's death, the German Gluck was persuaded to produce six operas for the Parisian stage in the 1770s. They show the influence of Rameau, but simplified and with greater focus on the drama. At the same time, by the middle of the 18th century another genre was gaining popularity in France: opéra comique. This was the equivalent of the German singspiel, where arias alternated with spoken dialogue. Notable examples in this style were produced by Monsigny, Philidor and, above all, Grétry. During the Revolutionary and Napoleonic period, composers such as Étienne Méhul, Luigi Cherubini and Gaspare Spontini, who were followers of Gluck, brought a new seriousness to the genre, which had never been wholly "comic" in any case. Another phenomenon of this period was the 'propaganda opera' celebrating revolutionary successes, e.g. Gossec's Le triomphe de la République (1793).

By the 1820s, Gluckian influence in France had given way to a taste for Italian bel canto, especially after the arrival of Rossini in Paris. Rossini's Guillaume Tell helped found the new genre of grand opera, a form whose most famous exponent was another foreigner, Giacomo Meyerbeer. Meyerbeer's works, such as Les Huguenots, emphasised virtuoso singing and extraordinary stage effects. Lighter opéra comique also enjoyed tremendous success in the hands of Boïeldieu, Auber, Hérold and Adam. In this climate, the operas of the French-born composer Hector Berlioz struggled to gain a hearing. Berlioz's epic masterpiece Les Troyens, the culmination of the Gluckian tradition, was not given a full performance for almost a hundred years.

In the second half of the 19th century, Jacques Offenbach created operetta with witty and cynical works such as Orphée aux enfers, as well as the opera Les Contes d'Hoffmann; Charles Gounod scored a massive success with ; and Georges Bizet composed , which, once audiences learned to accept its blend of Romanticism and realism, became the most popular of all opéra comiques. Jules Massenet, Camille Saint-Saëns and Léo Delibes all composed works which are still part of the standard repertory, examples being Massenet's , Saint-Saëns' Samson et Dalila and Delibes' . Their operas formed another genre, the Opera Lyrique, combined opera comique and grand opera. It is less grandiose than grand opera, but without the spoken dialogue of opera comique. At the same time, the influence of Richard Wagner was felt as a challenge to the French tradition. Many French critics angrily rejected Wagner's music dramas while many French composers closely imitated them with variable success. Perhaps the most interesting response came from Claude Debussy. As in Wagner's works, the orchestra plays a leading role in Debussy's unique opera Pelléas et Mélisande (1902) and there are no real arias, only recitative. But the drama is understated, enigmatic and completely un-Wagnerian.

Other notable 20th-century names include Ravel, Dukas, Roussel, Honegger and Milhaud. Francis Poulenc is one of the very few post-war composers of any nationality whose operas (which include Dialogues des Carmélites) have gained a foothold in the international repertory. Olivier Messiaen's lengthy sacred drama Saint François d'Assise (1983) has also attracted widespread attention.

In England, opera's antecedent was the 17th-century jig. This was an afterpiece that came at the end of a play. It was frequently libellous and scandalous and consisted in the main of dialogue set to music arranged from popular tunes. In this respect, jigs anticipate the ballad operas of the 18th century. At the same time, the French masque was gaining a firm hold at the English Court, with even more lavish splendour and highly realistic scenery than had been seen before. Inigo Jones became the quintessential designer of these productions, and this style was to dominate the English stage for three centuries. These masques contained songs and dances. In Ben Jonson's Lovers Made Men (1617), "the whole masque was sung after the Italian manner, stilo recitativo". The approach of the English Commonwealth closed theatres and halted any developments that may have led to the establishment of English opera. However, in 1656, the dramatist Sir William Davenant produced The Siege of Rhodes. Since his theatre was not licensed to produce drama, he asked several of the leading composers ( Lawes, Cooke, Locke, Coleman and Hudson) to set sections of it to music. This success was followed by The Cruelty of the Spaniards in Peru (1658) and The History of Sir Francis Drake (1659). These pieces were encouraged by Oliver Cromwell because they were critical of Spain. With the English Restoration, foreign (especially French) musicians were welcomed back. In 1673, Thomas Shadwell's , patterned on the 1671 'comédie-ballet' of the same name produced by Molière and Jean-Baptiste Lully. William Davenant produced The Tempest in the same year, which was the first musical adaption of a Shakespeare play (composed by Locke and Johnson). About 1683, John Blow composed Venus and Adonis, often thought of as the first true English-language opera.

Blow's immediate successor was the better known Henry Purcell. Despite the success of his masterwork Dido and Aeneas (1689), in which the action is furthered by the use of Italian-style recitative, much of Purcell's best work was not involved in the composing of typical opera, but instead, he usually worked within the constraints of the semi-opera format, where isolated scenes and masques are contained within the structure of a spoken play, such as Shakespeare in Purcell's The Fairy-Queen (1692) and Beaumont and Fletcher in The Prophetess (1690) and Bonduca (1696). The main characters of the play tend not to be involved in the musical scenes, which means that Purcell was rarely able to develop his characters through song. Despite these hindrances, his aim (and that of his collaborator John Dryden) was to establish serious opera in England, but these hopes ended with Purcell's early death at the age of 36.

Following Purcell, the popularity of opera in England dwindled for several decades. A revived interest in opera occurred in the 1730s which is largely attributed to Thomas Arne, both for his own compositions and for alerting Handel to the commercial possibilities of large-scale works in English. Arne was the first English composer to experiment with Italian-style all-sung comic opera, with his greatest success being Thomas and Sally in 1760. His opera Artaxerxes (1762) was the first attempt to set a full-blown opera seria in English and was a huge success, holding the stage until the 1830s. Although Arne imitated many elements of Italian opera, he was perhaps the only English composer at that time who was able to move beyond the Italian influences and create his own unique and distinctly English voice. His modernized ballad opera, Love in a Village (1762), began a vogue for pastiche opera that lasted well into the 19th century. Charles Burney wrote that Arne introduced "a light, airy, original, and pleasing melody, wholly different from that of Purcell or Handel, whom all English composers had either pillaged or imitated".

Besides Arne, the other dominating force in English opera at this time was George Frideric Handel, whose opera serias filled the London operatic stages for decades and influenced most home-grown composers, like John Frederick Lampe, who wrote using Italian models. This situation continued throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, including in the work of Michael William Balfe, and the operas of the great Italian composers, as well as those of Mozart, Beethoven, and Meyerbeer, continued to dominate the musical stage in England.

The only exceptions were ballad operas, such as John Gay's The Beggar's Opera (1728), musical burlesques, European operettas, and late Victorian era light operas, notably the Savoy Operas of W. S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan, all of which types of musical entertainments frequently spoofed operatic conventions. Sullivan wrote only one grand opera, (following the efforts of a number of young English composers beginning about 1876), but he claimed that even his light operas constituted part of a school of "English" opera, intended to supplant the French operettas (usually performed in bad translations) that had dominated the London stage from the mid-19th century into the 1870s. London's Daily Telegraph agreed, describing The Yeomen of the Guard as "a genuine English opera, forerunner of many others, let us hope, and possibly significant of an advance towards a national lyric stage". Sullivan produced a few light operas in the 1890s that were of a more serious nature than those in the G&S series, including Haddon Hall and The Beauty Stone, but (which ran for 155 consecutive performances, using alternating casts-a record until Broadway's ) survives as his only grand opera.

In the 20th century, English opera began to assert more independence, with works of Ralph Vaughan Williams and in particular Benjamin Britten, who in a series of works that remain in standard repertory today, revealed an excellent flair for the dramatic and superb musicality. More recently Sir Harrison Birtwistle has emerged as one of Britain's most significant contemporary composers from his first opera Punch and Judy to his most recent critical success in The Minotaur. In the first decade of the 21st century, the librettist of an early Birtwistle opera, Michael Nyman, has been focusing on composing operas, including Facing Goya, Man and Boy: Dada, and Love Counts. Today composers such as Thomas Adès continue to export English opera abroad.

Also in the 20th century, American composers like George Gershwin (Porgy and Bess), Scott Joplin (Treemonisha), Leonard Bernstein (), Gian Carlo Menotti, Douglas Moore, and Carlisle Floyd began to contribute English-language operas infused with touches of popular musical styles. They were followed by composers such as Philip Glass (Einstein on the Beach), Mark Adamo, John Corigliano (The Ghosts of Versailles), Robert Moran, John Adams (Nixon in China), André Previn and Jake Heggie. Many contemporary 21st century opera composers have emerged such as Missy Mazzoli, Kevin Puts, Tom Cipullo, Huang Ruo, David T. Little, Terence Blanchard, Jennifer Higdon, Tobias Picker, Michael Ching, and Ricky Ian Gordon.

Opera was brought to Russia in the 1730s by the Italian operatic troupes and soon it became an important part of entertainment for the Russian Imperial Court and aristocracy. Many foreign composers such as Baldassare Galuppi, Giovanni Paisiello, Giuseppe Sarti, and Domenico Cimarosa (as well as various others) were invited to Russia to compose new operas, mostly in the Italian language. Simultaneously some domestic musicians like Maksym Berezovsky and Dmitry Bortniansky were sent abroad to learn to write operas. The first opera written in Russian was Tsefal i Prokris by the Italian composer Francesco Araja (1755). The development of Russian-language opera was supported by the Russian composers Vasily Pashkevich, Yevstigney Fomin and Alexey Verstovsky.

However, the real birth of Russian opera came with Mikhail Glinka and his two great operas A Life for the Tsar (1836) and Ruslan and Lyudmila (1842). After him, during the 19th century in Russia, there were written such operatic masterpieces as and The Stone Guest by Alexander Dargomyzhsky, Boris Godunov and Khovanshchina by Modest Mussorgsky, Prince Igor by Alexander Borodin, Eugene Onegin and The Queen of Spades by Pyotr Tchaikovsky, and The Snow Maiden and by Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. These developments mirrored the growth of Russian nationalism across the artistic spectrum, as part of the more general Slavophilism movement.

In the 20th century, the traditions of Russian opera were developed by many composers including Sergei Rachmaninoff in his works The Miserly Knight and Francesca da Rimini, Igor Stravinsky in Le Rossignol, , Oedipus rex, and The Rake's Progress, Sergei Prokofiev in The Gambler, The Love for Three Oranges, The Fiery Angel, Betrothal in a Monastery, and War and Peace; as well as Dmitri Shostakovich in and Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District, Edison Denisov in L'écume des jours, and Alfred Schnittke in Life with an Idiot and Historia von D. Johann Fausten.

Czech composers also developed a thriving national opera movement of their own in the 19th century, starting with Bedřich Smetana, who wrote eight operas including the internationally popular The Bartered Bride. Smetana's eight operas created the bedrock of the Czech opera repertory, but of these only The Bartered Bride is performed regularly outside the composer's homeland. After reaching Vienna in 1892 and London in 1895 it rapidly became part of the repertory of every major opera company worldwide.

Antonín Dvořák's nine operas, except his first, have librettos in Czech and were intended to convey the Czech national spirit, as were some of his choral works. By far the most successful of the operas is which contains the well-known aria "Měsíčku na nebi hlubokém" ("Song to the Moon"); it is played on contemporary opera stages frequently outside the Czech Republic. This is attributable to their uneven invention and libretti, and perhaps also their staging requirements - The Jacobin, , and need stages large enough to portray invading armies.

Leoš Janáček gained international recognition in the 20th century for his innovative works. His later, mature works incorporate his earlier studies of national folk music in a modern, highly original synthesis, first evident in the opera , which was premiered in 1904 in Brno. The success of Jenůfa (often called the " Moravian national opera") at Prague in 1916 gave Janáček access to the world's great opera stages. Janáček's later works are his most celebrated. They include operas such as Káťa Kabanová and The Cunning Little Vixen, the Sinfonietta and the Glagolitic Mass.

Spain also produced its own distinctive form of opera, known as zarzuela, which had two separate flowerings: one from the mid-17th century through the mid-18th century, and another beginning around 1850. During the late 18th century up until the mid-19th century, Italian opera was immensely popular in Spain, supplanting the native form.

In Russian Eastern Europe, several national operas began to emerge. Ukrainian opera was developed by Semen Hulak-Artemovsky (1813-1873) whose most famous work Zaporozhets za Dunayem (A Cossack Beyond the Danube) is regularly performed around the world. Other Ukrainian opera composers include Mykola Lysenko (Taras Bulba and Natalka Poltavka), Heorhiy Maiboroda, and Yuliy Meitus. At the turn of the century, a distinct national opera movement also began to emerge in Georgia under the leadership Zacharia Paliashvili, who fused local folk songs and stories with 19th-century Romantic classical themes.

The key figure of Hungarian national opera in the 19th century was Ferenc Erkel, whose works mostly dealt with historical themes. Among his most often performed operas are Hunyadi László and . The most famous modern Hungarian opera is Béla Bartók's Duke Bluebeard's Castle.

Stanisław Moniuszko's opera Straszny Dwór (in English The Haunted Manor) (1861-64) represents a nineteenth-century peak of Polish national opera. In the 20th century, other operas created by Polish composers included by Karol Szymanowski and by Krzysztof Penderecki.

The first known opera from Turkey (the Ottoman Empire) was , which was an Armenian opera composed by an ethnic Armenian composer Tigran Chukhajian in 1868 and partially performed in 1873. It was fully staged in 1945 in Armenia.

The first years of the Soviet Union saw the emergence of new national operas, such as the (1937) by the Azerbaijani composer Uzeyir Hajibeyov. The first Kyrgyz opera, Ai-Churek, premiered in Moscow at the Bolshoi Theatre on 26 May 1939, during Kyrgyz Art Decade. It was composed by Vladimir Vlasov, Abdylas Maldybaev and Vladimir Fere. The libretto was written by Joomart Bokonbaev, Jusup Turusbekov, and Kybanychbek Malikov. The opera is based on the Kyrgyz heroic epic .

In Iran, opera gained more attention after the introduction of Western classical music in the late 19th century. However, it took until mid 20th century for Iranian composers to start experiencing with the field, especially as the construction of the Roudaki Hall in 1967, made possible staging of a large variety of works for stage. Perhaps, the most famous Iranian opera is Rostam and Sohrab by Loris Tjeknavorian premiered not until the early 2000s.

Chinese contemporary classical opera, a Chinese language form of Western style opera that is distinct from traditional Chinese opera, has had operas dating back to The White Haired Girl in 1945.

In Latin America, opera started as a result of European colonisation. The first opera ever written in the Americas was La púrpura de la rosa, by Tomás de Torrejón y Velasco, although , by the Mexican Manuel de Zumaya, was the first opera written from a composer born in Latin America (music now lost). The first Brazilian opera for a libretto in Portuguese was A Noite de São João, by Elias Álvares Lobo. However, Antônio Carlos Gomes is generally regarded as the most outstanding Brazilian composer, having a relative success in Italy with its Brazilian-themed operas with Italian librettos, such as . Opera in Argentina developed in the 20th century after the inauguration of Teatro Colón in Buenos Aires-with the opera , by Ettore Panizza, being heavily influenced by the Italian tradition, due to immigration. Other important composers from Argentina include Felipe Boero and Alberto Ginastera.

Contemporary, recent, and modernist trends

Perhaps the most obvious stylistic manifestation of modernism in opera is the development of atonality. The move away from traditional tonality in opera had begun with Richard Wagner, and in particular the Tristan chord. Composers such as Richard Strauss, Claude Debussy, Giacomo Puccini, Paul Hindemith, Benjamin Britten and Hans Pfitzner pushed Wagnerian harmony further with a more extreme use of chromaticism and greater use of dissonance. Another aspect of modernist opera is the shift away from long, suspended melodies, to short quick mottos, as first illustrated by Giuseppe Verdi in his . Composers such as Strauss, Britten, Shostakovich and Stravinsky adopted and expanded upon this style.

Operatic modernism truly began in the operas of two Viennese composers, Arnold Schoenberg and his student Alban Berg, both composers and advocates of atonality and its later development (as worked out by Schoenberg), dodecaphony. Schoenberg's early musico-dramatic works, (1909, premiered in 1924) and Die glückliche Hand display heavy use of chromatic harmony and dissonance in general. Schoenberg also occasionally used Sprechstimme.

The two operas of Schoenberg's pupil Alban Berg, (1925) and (incomplete at his death in 1935) share many of the same characteristics as described above, though Berg combined his highly personal interpretation of Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique with melodic passages of a more traditionally tonal nature (quite Mahlerian in character) which perhaps partially explains why his operas have remained in standard repertory, despite their controversial music and plots. Schoenberg's theories have influenced (either directly or indirectly) significant numbers of opera composers ever since, even if they themselves did not compose using his techniques.

Composers thus influenced include the Englishman Benjamin Britten, the German Hans Werner Henze, and the Russian Dmitri Shostakovich. ( Philip Glass also makes use of atonality, though his style is generally described as minimalist, usually thought of as another 20th-century development.)

However, operatic modernism's use of atonality also sparked a backlash in the form of neoclassicism. An early leader of this movement was Ferruccio Busoni, who in 1913 wrote the libretto for his neoclassical number opera Arlecchino (first performed in 1917). Also among the vanguard was the Russian Igor Stravinsky. After composing music for the Diaghilev-produced ballets (1911) and The Rite of Spring (1913), Stravinsky turned to neoclassicism, a development culminating in his opera-oratorio Oedipus Rex (1927). Stravinsky had already turned away from the modernist trends of his early ballets to produce small-scale works that do not fully qualify as opera, yet certainly contain many operatic elements, including (1916: "a burlesque in song and dance") and The Soldier's Tale (1918: "to be read, played, and danced"; in both cases the descriptions and instructions are those of the composer). In the latter, the actors declaim portions of speech to a specified rhythm over instrumental accompaniment, peculiarly similar to the older German genre of . Well after his Rimsky-Korsakov-inspired works The Nightingale (1914), and (1922), Stravinsky continued to ignore serialist technique and eventually wrote a full-fledged 18th-century-style diatonic number opera The Rake's Progress (1951). His resistance to serialism (an attitude he reversed following Schoenberg's death) proved to be an inspiration for many[who? ] other composers.

Other trends

A common trend throughout the 20th century, in both opera and general orchestral repertoire, is the use of smaller orchestras as a cost-cutting measure; the grand Romantic-era orchestras with huge string sections, multiple harps, extra horns, and exotic percussion instruments were no longer feasible. As government and private patronage of the arts decreased throughout the 20th century, new works were often commissioned and performed with smaller budgets, very often resulting in chamber-sized works, and short, one-act operas. Many of Benjamin Britten's operas are scored for as few as 13 instrumentalists; Mark Adamo's two-act realization of Little Women is scored for 18 instrumentalists.

Another feature of late 20th-century opera is the emergence of contemporary historical operas, in contrast to the tradition of basing operas on more distant history, the re-telling of contemporary fictional stories or plays, or on myth or legend. The Death of Klinghoffer, Nixon in China, and Doctor Atomic by John Adams, Dead Man Walking by Jake Heggie, and Anna Nicole by Mark-Anthony Turnage exemplify the dramatisation onstage of events in recent living memory, where characters portrayed in the opera were alive at the time of the premiere performance.

The Metropolitan Opera in the US (often known as the Met) reported in 2011 that the average age of its audience was 60. Many opera companies attempted to attract a younger audience to halt the larger trend of greying audiences for classical music since the last decades of the 20th century. Efforts resulted in lowering the average age of the Met's audience to 58 in 2018, the average age at Berlin State Opera was reported as 54, and Paris Opera reported an average age of 48.

Smaller companies in the US have a more fragile existence, and they usually depend on a "patchwork quilt" of support from state and local governments, local businesses, and fundraisers. Nevertheless, some smaller companies have found ways of drawing new audiences. In addition to radio and television broadcasts of opera performances, which have had some success in gaining new audiences, broadcasts of live performances to movie theatres have shown the potential to reach new audiences.

From musicals back towards opera

By the late 1930s, some musicals began to be written with a more operatic structure. These works include complex polyphonic ensembles and reflect musical developments of their times. Porgy and Bess (1935), influenced by jazz styles, and (1956), with its sweeping, lyrical passages and farcical parodies of opera, both opened on Broadway but became accepted as part of the opera repertory. Popular musicals such as , West Side Story, , Sweeney Todd, , , The Light in the Piazza, The Phantom of the Opera and others tell dramatic stories through complex music and in the 2010s they are sometimes seen in opera houses. The Most Happy Fella (1952) is quasi-operatic and has been revived by the New York City Opera. Other rock-influenced musicals, such as (1969) and Jesus Christ Superstar (1971), Les Misérables (1980), (1996), Spring Awakening (2006), and Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812 (2012) employ various operatic conventions, such as through composition, recitative instead of dialogue, and leitmotifs.

A subtle type of sound electronic reinforcement called acoustic enhancement is used in some modern concert halls and theatres where operas are performed. Although none of the major opera houses "...use traditional, Broadway-style sound reinforcement, in which most if not all singers are equipped with radio microphones mixed to a series of unsightly loudspeakers scattered throughout the theatre", many use a sound reinforcement system for acoustic enhancement and for subtle boosting of offstage voices, child singers, onstage dialogue, and sound effects (e.g., church bells in or thunder effects in Wagnerian operas).

Operatic vocal technique evolved, in a time before electronic amplification, to allow singers to produce enough volume to be heard over an orchestra, without the instrumentalists having to substantially compromise their volume.

Singers and the roles they play are classified by voice type, based on the tessitura, agility, power and timbre of their voices. Male singers can be classified by vocal range as bass, bass-baritone, baritone, baritenor, tenor and countertenor, and female singers as contralto, mezzo-soprano and soprano. (Men sometimes sing in the "female" vocal ranges, in which case they are termed sopranist or countertenor. The countertenor is commonly encountered in opera, sometimes singing parts written for castrati-men neutered at a young age specifically to give them a higher singing range.) Singers are then further classified by size-for instance, a soprano can be described as a lyric soprano, coloratura, soubrette, spinto, or dramatic soprano. These terms, although not fully describing a singing voice, associate the singer's voice with the roles most suitable to the singer's vocal characteristics.

Yet another sub-classification can be made according to acting skills or requirements, for example the basso buffo who often must be a specialist in patter as well as a comic actor. This is carried out in detail in the system of German speaking countries, where historically opera and spoken drama were often put on by the same repertory company.

A particular singer's voice may change drastically over his or her lifetime, rarely reaching vocal maturity until the third decade, and sometimes not until middle age. Two French voice types, premiere dugazon and deuxieme dugazon, were named after successive stages in the career of Louise-Rosalie Lefebvre (Mme. Dugazon). Other terms originating in the star casting system of the Parisian theatres are baryton-martin and soprano .

The following is only intended as a brief overview. For the main articles, see soprano, mezzo-soprano, contralto, tenor, baritone, bass, countertenor and castrato.

The soprano voice has typically been used as the voice of choice for the female protagonist of the opera since the latter half of the 18th century. Earlier, it was common for that part to be sung by any female voice, or even a castrato. The current emphasis on a wide vocal range was primarily an invention of the Classical period. Before that, the vocal virtuosity, not range, was the priority, with soprano parts rarely extending above a high A ( Handel, for example, only wrote one role extending to a high C), though the castrato Farinelli was alleged to possess a top D (his lower range was also extraordinary, extending to tenor C). The mezzo-soprano, a term of comparatively recent origin, also has a large repertoire, ranging from the female lead in Purcell's Dido and Aeneas to such heavyweight roles as Brangäne in Wagner's Tristan und Isolde (these are both roles sometimes sung by sopranos; there is quite a lot of movement between these two voice-types). For the true contralto, the range of parts is more limited, which has given rise to the insider joke that contraltos only sing "witches, bitches, and britches" roles. In recent years many of the "trouser roles" from the Baroque era, originally written for women, and those originally sung by castrati, have been reassigned to countertenors.

The tenor voice, from the Classical era onwards, has traditionally been assigned the role of male protagonist. Many of the most challenging tenor roles in the repertory were written during the bel canto era, such as Donizetti's sequence of 9 Cs above middle C during La fille du régiment. With Wagner came an emphasis on vocal heft for his protagonist roles, with this vocal category described as Heldentenor; this heroic voice had its more Italianate counterpart in such roles as Calaf in Puccini's Turandot. Basses have a long history in opera, having been used in opera seria in supporting roles, and sometimes for comic relief (as well as providing a contrast to the preponderance of high voices in this genre). The bass repertoire is wide and varied, stretching from the comedy of Leporello in Don Giovanni to the nobility of Wotan in Wagner's Ring Cycle, to the conflicted King Phillip of Verdi's . In between the bass and the tenor is the baritone, which also varies in weight from say, Guglielmo in Mozart's Così fan tutte to Posa in Verdi's Don Carlos; the actual designation "baritone" was not standard until the mid-19th century.

Early performances of opera were too infrequent for singers to make a living exclusively from the style, but with the birth of commercial opera in the mid-17th century, professional performers began to emerge. The role of the male hero was usually entrusted to a castrato, and by the 18th century, when Italian opera was performed throughout Europe, leading castrati who possessed extraordinary vocal virtuosity, such as Senesino and Farinelli, became international stars. The career of the first major female star (or prima donna), Anna Renzi, dates to the mid-17th century. In the 18th century, a number of Italian sopranos gained international renown and often engaged in fierce rivalry, as was the case with Faustina Bordoni and Francesca Cuzzoni, who started a fistfight with one another during a performance of a Handel opera. The French disliked castrati, preferring their male heroes to be sung by an haute-contre (a high tenor), of which Joseph Legros (1739-1793) was a leading example.

Though opera patronage has decreased in the last century in favor of other arts and media (such as musicals, cinema, radio, television and recordings), mass media and the advent of recording have supported the popularity of many famous singers including Maria Callas, Enrico Caruso, Amelita Galli-Curci, Kirsten Flagstad, Mario Del Monaco, Renata Tebaldi, Risë Stevens, Alfredo Kraus, Franco Corelli, Montserrat Caballé, Joan Sutherland, Birgit Nilsson, Nellie Melba, Rosa Ponselle, Beniamino Gigli, Jussi Björling, Feodor Chaliapin, Cecilia Bartoli, Renée Fleming, Marilyn Horne, Bryn Terfel, Dmitri Hvorostovsky and The Three Tenors ( Luciano Pavarotti, Plácido Domingo, José Carreras).

Before the 1700s, Italian operas used a small string orchestra, but it rarely played to accompany the singers. Opera solos during this period were accompanied by the basso continuo group, which consisted of the harpsichord, "plucked instruments" such as lute and a bass instrument. The string orchestra typically only played when the singer was not singing, such as during a singer's "...entrances and exits, between vocal numbers, [or] for [accompanying] dancing". Another role for the orchestra during this period was playing an orchestral ritornello to mark the end of a singer's solo. During the early 1700s, some composers began to use the string orchestra to mark certain aria or recitatives "...as special"; by 1720, most arias were accompanied by an orchestra. Opera composers such as Domenico Sarro, Leonardo Vinci, Giambattista Pergolesi, Leonardo Leo, and Johann Adolf Hasse added new instruments to the opera orchestra and gave the instruments new roles. They added wind instruments to the strings and used orchestral instruments to play instrumental solos, as a way to mark certain arias as special.

The orchestra has also provided an instrumental overture before the singers come onstage since the 1600s. Peri's opens with a brief instrumental ritornello, and Monteverdi's (1607) opens with a toccata, in this case a fanfare for muted trumpets. The French overture as found in Jean-Baptiste Lully's operas consist of a slow introduction in a marked "dotted rhythm", followed by a lively movement in fugato style. The overture was frequently followed by a series of dance tunes before the curtain rose. This overture style was also used in English opera, most notably in Henry Purcell's Dido and Aeneas. Handel also uses the French overture form in some of his Italian operas such as Giulio Cesare.

In Italy, a distinct form called "overture" arose in the 1680s, and became established particularly through the operas of Alessandro Scarlatti, and spread throughout Europe, supplanting the French form as the standard operatic overture by the mid-18th century. It uses three generally homophonic movements: fast-slow-fast. The opening movement was normally in duple metre and in a major key; the slow movement in earlier examples was short, and could be in a contrasting key; the concluding movement was dance-like, most often with rhythms of the gigue or minuet, and returned to the key of the opening section. As the form evolved, the first movement may incorporate fanfare-like elements and took on the pattern of so-called "sonatina form" ( sonata form without a development section), and the slow section became more extended and lyrical.

In Italian opera after about 1800, the "overture" became known as the sinfonia. Fisher also notes the term Sinfonia avanti l'opera (literally, the "symphony before the opera") was "an early term for a sinfonia used to begin an opera, that is, as an overture as opposed to one serving to begin a later section of the work". In 19th-century opera, in some operas, the overture, Vorspiel, Einleitung, Introduction, or whatever else it may be called, was the portion of the music which takes place before the curtain rises; a specific, rigid form was no longer required for the overture.

The role of the orchestra in accompanying the singers changed over the 19th century, as the Classical style transitioned to the Romantic era. In general, orchestras got bigger, new instruments were added, such as additional percussion instruments (e.g., bass drum, cymbals, snare drum, etc.). The orchestration of orchestra parts also developed over the 19th century. In Wagnerian operas, the forefronting of the orchestra went beyond the overture. In Wagnerian operas such as the Ring Cycle, the orchestra often played the recurrent musical themes or leitmotifs, a role which gave a prominence to the orchestra which "...elevated its status to that of a prima donna". Wagner's operas were scored with unprecedented scope and complexity, adding more brass instruments and huge ensemble sizes: indeed, his score to Das Rheingold calls for six harps. In Wagner and the work of subsequent composers, such as Benjamin Britten, the orchestra "often communicates facts about the story that exceed the levels of awareness of the characters therein." As a result, critics began to regard the orchestra as performing a role analogous to that of a literary narrator."

As the role of the orchestra and other instrumental ensembles changed over the history of opera, so did the role of leading the musicians. In the Baroque era, the musicians were usually directed by the harpsichord player, although the French composer Lully is known to have conducted with a long staff. In the 1800s, during the Classical period, the first violinist, also known as the concertmaster, would lead the orchestra while sitting. Over time, some directors began to stand up and use hand and arm gestures to lead the performers. Eventually this role of music director became termed the conductor, and a podium was used to make it easier for all the musicians to see him or her. By the time Wagnerian operas were introduced, the complexity of the works and the huge orchestras used to play them gave the conductor an increasingly important role. Modern opera conductors have a challenging role: they have to direct both the orchestra in the orchestra pit and the singers on stage.

Since the days of Handel and Mozart, many composers have favored Italian as the language for the libretto of their operas. From the Bel Canto era to Verdi, composers would sometimes supervise versions of their operas in both Italian and French. Because of this, operas such as Lucia di Lammermoor or are today deemed canonical in both their French and Italian versions.

Until the mid-1950s, it was acceptable to produce operas in translations even if these had not been authorized by the composer or the original librettists. For example, opera houses in Italy routinely staged Wagner in Italian. After World War II, opera scholarship improved, artists refocused on the original versions, and translations fell out of favor. Knowledge of European languages, especially Italian, French, and German, is today an important part of the training for professional singers. "The biggest chunk of operatic training is in linguistics and musicianship", explains mezzo-soprano Dolora Zajick. "[I have to understand] not only what I'm singing, but what everyone else is singing. I sing Italian, Czech, Russian, French, German, English."

In the 1980s, supertitles (sometimes called surtitles) began to appear. Although supertitles were first almost universally condemned as a distraction, today many opera houses provide either supertitles, generally projected above the theatre's proscenium arch, or individual seat screens where spectators can choose from more than one language. TV broadcasts typically include subtitles even if intended for an audience who knows well the language (for example, a RAI broadcast of an Italian opera). These subtitles target not only the hard of hearing but the audience generally, since a sung discourse is much harder to understand than a spoken one-even in the ears of native speakers. Subtitles in one or more languages have become standard in opera broadcasts, simulcasts, and DVD editions.

Today, operas are only rarely performed in translation. Exceptions include the English National Opera, the Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Opera Theater of Pittsburgh, and Opera South East, which favor English translations. Another exception are opera productions intended for a young audience, such as Humperdinck's Hansel and Gretel and some productions of Mozart's The Magic Flute.

Outside the US, and especially in Europe, most opera houses receive public subsidies from taxpayers. In Milan, Italy, 60% of La Scala's annual budget of €115 million is from ticket sales and private donations, with the remaining 40% coming from public funds. In 2005, La Scala received 25% of Italy's total state subsidy of €464 million for the performing arts. In the UK, Arts Council England provides funds to Opera North, the Royal Opera House, Welsh National Opera, and English National Opera. Between 2012 and 2015, these four opera companies along with the English National Ballet, Birmingham Royal Ballet and Northern Ballet accounted for 22% of the funds in the Arts Council's national portfolio. During that period, the Council undertook an analysis of its funding for large-scale opera and ballet companies, setting recommendations and targets for the companies to meet prior to the 2015-2018 funding decisions. In February 2015, concerns over English National Opera's business plan led to the Arts Council placing it "under special funding arrangements" in what The Independent termed "the unprecedented step" of threatening to withdraw public funding if the council's concerns were not met by 2017. European public funding to opera has led to a disparity between the number of year-round opera houses in Europe and the United States. For example, "Germany has about 80 year-round opera houses [as of 2004], while the U.S., with more than three times the population, does not have any. Even the Met only has a seven-month season."

Television, cinema and the Internet

A milestone for opera broadcasting in the U.S. was achieved on 24 December 1951, with the live broadcast of Amahl and the Night Visitors, an opera in one act by Gian Carlo Menotti. It was the first opera specifically composed for television in America. Another milestone occurred in Italy in 1992 when was broadcast live from its original Roman settings and times of the day: the first act came from the 16th-century Church of Sant'Andrea della Valle at noon on Saturday; the 16th-century Palazzo Farnese was the setting for the second at 8:15 pm; and on Sunday at 6 am, the third act was broadcast from Castel Sant'Angelo. The production was transmitted via satellite to 105 countries.

Major opera companies have begun presenting their performances in local cinemas throughout the United States and many other countries. The Metropolitan Opera began a series of live high-definition video transmissions to cinemas around the world in 2006. In 2007, Met performances were shown in over 424 theaters in 350 U.S. cities. went out to 671 screens worldwide. San Francisco Opera began prerecorded video transmissions in March 2008. As of June 2008, approximately 125 theaters in 117 U.S. cities carry the showings. The HD video opera transmissions are presented via the same HD digital cinema projectors used for major Hollywood films. European opera houses and festivals including the Royal Opera in London, La Scala in Milan, the Salzburg Festival, La Fenice in Venice, and the Maggio Musicale in Florence have also transmitted their productions to theaters in cities around the world since 2006, including 90 cities in the U.S.

The emergence of the Internet has also affected the way in which audiences consume opera. In 2009 the British Glyndebourne Festival Opera offered for the first time an online digital video download of its complete 2007 production of Tristan und Isolde. In the 2013 season, the festival streamed all six of its productions online. In July 2012, the first online community opera was premiered at the Savonlinna Opera Festival. Titled Free Will, it was created by members of the Internet group Opera By You. Its 400 members from 43 countries wrote the libretto, composed the music, and designed the sets and costumes using the Wreckamovie web platform. Savonlinna Opera Festival provided professional soloists, an 80-member choir, a symphony orchestra, and the stage machinery. It was performed live at the festival and streamed live on the internet.

Sources

The New Grove Dictionary of Opera, edited by Stanley Sadie (1992), 5,448 pages, is the best, and by far the largest, general reference in the English language. ISBN 0-333-73432-7, 1-56159-228-5

The Viking Opera Guide, edited by Amanda Holden (1994), 1,328 pages, ISBN 0-670-81292-7

The Oxford Illustrated History of Opera, ed. Roger Parker (1994)

The Oxford Dictionary of Opera, by John Warrack and Ewan West (1992), 782 pages, ISBN 0-19-869164-5

Opera, the Rough Guide, by Matthew Boyden et al. (1997), 672 pages, ISBN 1-85828-138-5

Opera: A Concise History, by Leslie Orrey and Rodney Milnes, World of Art, Thames & Hudson

Abbate, Carolyn; Parker, Roger (2012). A History of Opera. New York: W W Norton. ISBN 978-0-393-05721-8.

DiGaetani, John Louis: An Invitation to the Opera, Anchor Books, 1986/91. ISBN 0-385-26339-2.

Dorschel, Andreas, 'The Paradox of Opera', The Cambridge Quarterly 30 (2001), no. 4, pp. 283-306. ISSN 0008-199X (print). ISSN 1471-6836 (electronic). Discusses the aesthetics of opera.

Silke Leopold, "The Idea of National Opera, c. 1800", United and Diversity in European Culture c. 1800, ed. Tim Blanning and Hagen Schulze (New York: Oxford University Press, 2006), 19-34.

MacMurray, Jessica M. and Allison Brewster Franzetti: The Book of 101 Opera Librettos: Complete Original Language Texts with English Translations, Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, 1996. ISBN 978-1-884822-79-7

Howard Mayer Brown, "Opera", The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. 2001. Oxford University Press

Rous, Samuel Holland (1919). The Victrola Book of the Opera. Stories of The Operas with Illustrations.... Camden, New Jersey: Victor Talking Machine Company. View at Internet Archive.

Simon, Henry W.: A Treasury of Grand Opera, Simon and Schuster, New York, 1946.

"Opera", Herbert Weinstock and Barbara Russano Hanning, Encyclopædia Britannica

Valls, María Antonia (1989). Hitos de la Música Universal y Retratos de sus Grandes Protagonistas. (Illustrated by Willi Glasauer). Barcelona: Círculo de Lectores.

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Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librettist and incorporates a number of the performing arts, such as acting, scenery, costume, and sometimes dance or ballet.

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Regional languages
French, Greek, German, Sardinian, Albanian, Occitan, Croatian, Slovene, Ladin, Friulian, Catalan, and Franco-Provencal.

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The Carnival of Venice is one of the most celebrated holidays in Italy.  It's customary to wear elaborate costumes and masks to the carnival for the La Maschera più Bella, a competition on which mask is the prettiest. The Carnival started in 1162 and became an official holiday in the Renaissance period.

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Carnival (or "Carnevale") is one of the biggest celebrations in Italy - and from Venetian masks to masquerade balls, no place does it like Venice! Like the idea of seeing the city at its most festive and colorful? Here's a handy Q&A about Carnevale in Venice!

When is Venice's Carnevale?

Carnevale in Venice, as with Carnival around the world, takes place in the days leading up to Lent. In 2013, it runs from January 26 to February 12.

Where did the idea of Carnevale come from?

During the 40 days of Lent, parties were off-limits-and so was eating foods like meat, sugar, and fats. As a result, people would try to get rid of all of their rich food and drink (and get their partying out of the way!) before Lent. Hence... Carnival. (In fact, the word Carnevale may come from the Latin words carne and vale, meaning "farewell to meat"!). According to Venetian tradition, Venice's Carnival got its start in 1162, when townspeople celebrated a victory over the Patriarch of Aquileia. Festivities became The festival declined during the 18th century. By the 16th century, Venetians were celebrating Carnevale in style!

What about Venetian masks?

The tradition of masking has a long tradition in Venice. All the way back in 1268, a law even was passed to ban - of all things - putting on masks and throwing perfumed eggs!

By the time of the Renaissance, masks were a fixture of Carnevale celebrations. By the 16th century, the popular Commedia d'Arte troupe performed slapstick comedy in the piazzas of Venice-while masked. Believe it or not, though, masking was hardly just a Carnival tradition.

By the 18th century, Venetians were allowed to wear masks for six months a year. And they took advantage! Black velvet masks, for example, would be worn in "houses of ill repute"-especially gambling parlors-to shield their owners' identities, as shown in the painting here.

Don't miss our video on mask-making in Venice today, below!

So... you're saying Carnevale in Venice has been celebrated non-stop since the 13th century?

Not quite. By the 18th century, Venice's Carnevale festivities were going downhill. With the Austrian conquest of Venice in 1798, mask-wearing-as well as Carnevale-were all but finished. In the 1930s, Mussolini banned the celebrations altogether.

So what changed? In 1979, a group of Venetian artisans banned together to restart Carnevale. If that seems like a ploy for tourism, it was-and it was one that worked. Today, about 3 million people travel to Venice every year for Carnevale. The 1970s are also when the long-forgotten art of mask-making was restarted.

What is Venice's Carnevale like today?

Today, Carnevale in Venice is a huge celebration that goes on for two weeks. While many events-particularly the opulent masquerade balls-require invitations and have steep ticket prices, many others, like the candle-lit parade of boats, concerts, and street performances, are free and open to the public. (You can see a complete program for the 2013 Venetian Carnevale here).

Well, bummer. I'm not going to be in Venice during Carnevale. Can I get in on the fun anyway?

Of course-at least when it comes to those Venetian masks! Just be aware that the majority of mask shops in Venice sell cheap, imported masks, a far cry from the artisanal tradition that Venetian mask-making truly is. So do yourself, and the artisans of Venice, a favor, and choose your mask shop carefully. Need help? Here are some of our favorite mask shops in Venice (several of which even run mask-making workshops; check their websites for more!):

Benor Maschere Venezia (Santa Croce): Hidden behind Campo San Giacomo dell'Orio, this artisanal mask shop boasts a gorgeous collection, all made there in the workshop. Tel.: +39 041710033. Address: S. Croce 1109.

Ca' Macana (Dorsoduro): This Venetian mask shop, located just off Camp San Barnaba, has an unparalleled selection of Carnevale masks; better yet, they're handcrafted in the workshop right there, and you can watch them being made. Tel.: +39 0412776142. Address: Dorsoduro 3172. Ca' del Sol Maschere (San Marco): Artisans handcraft the Venetian masks at this shop a 5-minute walk from St. Mark's Basilica; exquisite Carnevale costumes are on sale here, too. Tel.: +39 0415285549. Address: Castello 4964.

Il Canovaccio (Castello): The artisans here create Venetian masks and papier-mâché objects meant for the stage. Tel.: +39 0415210393. Address: Castello 5369.

Happy Carnevale!

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All About Carnival in Venice: Venetian Masks and More! - Walks of Italy

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Carnival (or "Carnevale") is one of the biggest celebrations in Italy - and from Venetian masks to masquerade balls, no place does it like Venice! Like the idea of seeing the city at its most festive and colorful? Here's a handy Q&A about Carnevale in Venice!

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Leonardo di ser Piero da Vinci, also known as Leonardo da Vinci, was an artist most famous for his painting of 'Mona Lisa', as well as sculpting. His other hobbies include invention, drawing, painting, sculpture, architecture, science, music, mathematics, engineering, literature, anatomy, geology, astronomy, botany, paleontology, and cartography.
Biography.

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Leonardo da Vinci - Paintings, Inventions & Quotes

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Leonardo da Vinci was a Renaissance artist and engineer, known for paintings like “The Last Supper” and “Mona Lisa,” and for inventions like a flying machine.

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The Roman Catholicism is a christian church that represent a religious force  of western civilization, which is also called the roman catholic church. it trace the history of Jesus Christ and apostile
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Pope Francis' retreat from culture-war politics has left a void that politicians have been all too eager to fill.

By

Mr. Ferraresi is an Italian journalist.

Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini of Italy on the Italian talk show "Porta a Porta" in Rome last year, while a picture of Pope Francis was projected in the background. Credit... Andreas Solaro/Agence France-Presse - Getty Images

On paper, Italy's deputy prime minister, Matteo Salvini, is a dubious poster child for Catholicism. Mr. Salvini is divorced. He has two children by two women and is in a relationship with a third. But that hasn't stopped him from reinventing himself as Italy's Catholic-in-chief. "I am the last of the good Christians," Mr. Salvini, 46, said recently, during an appearance on the popular TV show "Non è l'Arena." "I defend our history and the existence of Catholic schools," he said during the same appearance. "If I believe in God," he asked rhetorically, "and if I even ask for Mary's protection, does that bother anybody?"

It bothers the Pope, for one.

Mr. Salvini, who also serves as interior minister, is the leader of the League, a former secessionist movement that he has rebranded as a nationalist force by, among other tactics, stoking anti-immigration fears. His rallying cry, "Italians first," matches Donald Trump's "America first." Mr. Salvini is also the kingmaker of the unorthodox government coalition the League formed last year with the anti-corruption Five Star Movement, making Italy a unique experiment in populism.

The League's embrace of Christianity is a recent addition, however. In the years following its founding in the 1990s, the party was often in tension with the Vatican hierarchy: It largely took up a libertarian outlook on issues like family, abortion, end-of-life questions and religious freedom, rarely putting them at the core of its agenda.

And yet speaking in Milan a few days before the European Parliament election in May, Mr. Salvini invoked the names of the patron saints of Europe. "We entrust our destiny, our future and the peace and prosperity of our peoples to them," he proclaimed, and then became more intimate. "Personally, I entrust Italy, my life and your lives to the immaculate heart of Mary, who I'm sure will lead us to victory," he said, gripping a rosary in his right hand. When the League obtained more than 34 percent of the vote, becoming the leading political party in Italy, Mr. Salvini thanked "the one who is up there" and kissed the rosary during a news conference. A few days later, in a magazine interview, he expanded on his devotion to the Virgin Mary and announced his wish to walk the Way of Saint James, a popular pilgrimage route, one day.

The Catholic Church has reacted furiously to Mr. Salvini's politicization of religious symbols. Pietro Parolin, the cardinal secretary of state, rebuked the minister, saying that "it is always dangerous to invoke God for your own self." Avvenire, the newspaper of the Episcopal Conference of Italy, described Mr. Salvini as the "torchbearer of a Catholicism of his own, very distant from the teaching of the Pope and the Church."

One source of the tensions between Mr. Salvini and the church lies in the minister's aggressive anti-immigration rhetoric and policies. Last year, Mr. Salvini ordered Italian ports to block migrant rescue boats from docking; he also successfully pushed for a bill that imposed new restrictions on asylum seekers in Italy and gave his office virtually unchecked powers to prohibit entry by any ship into Italian waters. Those efforts have put him directly at odds with Pope Francis, who has made the welcoming of migrants a central theme of his pontificate.

But if millions of Catholics are voting for Mr. Salvini - polls show 33 percent of the practicing Catholics voted for the League, making it the leading party among churchgoers - it may also be because he is filling a vacuum in Italian politics left by the church's own retreat, under Francis, from political debate.

The eagerness of Francis' church to chastise politicians who refer to Christianity represents a sharp break with the policies of John Paul II and Benedict XVI, who attempted to keep the church's views relevant in societies, including Italy, that have grown increasingly secular. Under these popes, spokesmen for the church criticized civil unions and same-sex marriage both in Italy and abroad, and campaigned against procedures like in vitro fertilization.

But Pope Francis has embraced a new model. In a speech to the Italian church in 2015, he called for the end of the so-called bishop-pilots, clerical shepherds who seek to direct the political choices of their flock. Francis exhorted church leaders to limit their action to the pastoral dimension. The message was consistent with his idea that bishops should be "shepherds living with the smell of the sheep,"taking care of the poor and the marginalized rather than obsessing over social issues. (Some critics, however, have argued that the church under Francis has not so much retreated from politics as embraced a different sort of politics - that despite its protests, Francis' church didn't dismiss the bishop-pilots, but rather ordered them to subtly pilot the Catholic people in a different, more progressive direction.)

The Francis model has received support among some within the church - Father Antonio Spadaro, editor of the Jesuit magazine La Civiltà Cattolica, for instance, launched the idea of a synod for the Italian church to reimagine the relationship between the church and politics - as well as disparagement from Francis critics like Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, who in a phone interview said "the process of de-Christianization of our societies demands the courage to proclaim the truth. I like the politicians who openly say they are Christians better than those who disparage Christianity."

But for some believers, the Francis model has simply been disorienting. The Vatican is now sending ambiguous messages on issues that were considered crucial only a few years ago. Many Catholic voters complain the church is not vocal enough in condemning abortion and L.G.B.T. rights, and upholding Italy's Christian identity, while it emphasizes immigration, social justice and environmental issues.

Mr. Salvini is targeting Italian Catholics who either are refusing to follow the new path or just miss the days in which the church offered straightforward political guidance. In doing so, he has followed the lead of other right-wing European leaders like Viktor Orban in Hungary and Jaroslaw Kaczynski in Poland, politicians in countries with large Catholic populations who present themselves as champions of a Christianity under siege.

Mr. Salvini is a parody of a religious leader. His theology is virtually nonexistent; his motives are doubtful. His blatant appropriations of Christian slogans are clumsy; in his mouth, even the most solemn of Pope Benedict's quotes sound like they came out of a fortune cookie. And yet, his message has been effective among Catholics because he has occupied a space that the church left unguarded.

His unexpected transfiguration is the consequence of a strategic error by the church. Francis may have opted to retreat from the political debate on what Pope Benedict once called "nonnegotiable principles" - like the protection of life in all its stages and the promotion of the "natural structure of the family" - for valid reasons. But this choice has left many Catholics confused. The church hierarchy wrongly assumed that its befuddled sheep would automatically find their political homes among moderates. Instead, many of them have been attracted by a strongman who promised to defend the values that Francis' church today hardly mentions.

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Opinion | How the Catholic Church Lost Italy to the Far Right

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Pope Francis' retreat from culture-war politics has left a void that politicians have been all too eager to fill. By Mr. Ferraresi is an Italian journalist. On paper, Italy's deputy prime minister, Matteo Salvini, is a dubious poster child for Catholicism. Mr. Salvini is divorced.

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I am a volunteer for the Kaleidoscope Museum Project, which aims to preserve the uniqueness of the world culture. In my role, I will be presenting the culture of Italy, and trying to publicize the lesser-known culture of the Italian people. The reason for doing this is to offset the negative effects on globalization in the culture of Italy.

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Hey! I'm a volunteer taking part in this online project. This project is called the Kaleidoscope cultural preservation museum project. My partner and I believe that cultural imperialism and globalization has a lot of negative effects on the numerous cultures in the world. It's very important to preserve these cultures for future generations, as in the future, it's possible the cultural imperialism and globalization would affect the cultures and change them. We want to preserve using this cultural museum of Italy for everyone to access on Padlet. This is an online website that anyone can create their own multimedia space that anyone around the world could access and download. Placed on a virtual presentation space, we believe that Italy's culture can be preserved.

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Kaylee, Trini