Your travel to Milan, Italy by Europe-Cities

It is strongly believed that Milan was originally founded by the Celts, who arrived in northern Italy around 600 BC, and that it was then conquered by the Romans in 222 BC, who gave it its Latin name, Mediolanum ('situated in the middle of the plain'). A few centuries later, in the era of town patron Bishop Saint Ambrose and Emperor Theodosius I, the city became the capital of the Western Roman Empire for a short time.

After the cruel reigns of the Ostrogoths and Longobards in the 11th Century, Milan regained independence and was foremost among the other Italian cities. Believe it or not, Milan was one of the few places in Europe that was not touched by the plague in the 14th Century. The town's heyday fell in the Renaissance era, during which it was governed by dukes of the Visconti and Sforza family.

In the early 16th Century, after unsuccessful attempts at conquering the northern part of the Apennine Peninsula, Milan itself fell prey to France and passed to Spain after a short while. At the beginning of the 18th Century, Austria replaced Spain as Milan's overlord, but soon after the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars, the city became one of the main centers of Italian nationalism, finally reclaiming its independence and the unification of Italy.

During World War II, the town suffered seriously from air-raid bombings, but after the war Milan entered into a straight-arrow course of prosperity and reconstruction.