scubish.com: Scuba diving Parma - Italy

Parma is in Emilia-Romagna.

Eat

At the ice cream shop behind the cathedral. The nuns make a gelato in the shape of a flower in seconds.

Sleep

Budget

Mid-range

Splurge

Dimore d' epoca, Via Valenti, 5/c 43100 tel +39.0521.774039, fax +39 0521.780756, , . Just a short walk from the center of Parma, situated in a large park, this villa belonging to a noble family of Parma has been open to guests since 1987. Hotel, quality restaurant and modern convention halls.

Parma is a city in the Italian region of Emilia-Romagna, famous for its architecture and the fine countryside around it.

It is the home of the University of Parma, one of the oldest universities in Italy.
Parma is divided into two parts by the little stream with the same name. The Italian poet Attilio Bertolucci (born in a hamlet in the countryside) wrote: "As a capital city it had to have a river. As a little capital it received a stream, which is often dry".

History

The city was most probably founded and named by the Etruscans, for a parma (circular shield) was a Latin borrowing, as were many Roman terms for particular arms, and Parmeal, Parmni and Parmnial are names that appear in Etruscan inscriptions. Diodorus Siculus (XXII, 2,2; XXVIII, 2,1) reported that the Romans had changed their rectangular shields for round ones, imitating the Etruscans. Whether the Etruscan encampment was so named because it was round, like a shield, or whether its situation was a shield against the Gauls to the north, is more a matter of choice.

The Roman colony was founded in 183 BC, together with Modena. 2000 families were settled. Parma had a certain importance as a road hub over the Via Aemilia and the Via Claudia. It had a forum, in what is today the central Garibaldi Square. In 44 BC, the city was destroyed, and Augustus rebuilt it. During the Roman Empire it gained the title of Julia for its loyalty to the imperial house.

The city was subsequently sacked by Attila, and later given by the barbarian king Odoacer to his fellows. During the Gothic War, however, Totila destroyed it. It was then part of the Byzantine Exarchate of Ravenna (changing name to Chrysopolis, "Golden City", probably due to the presence of the army's treasure) and, from 569, of the Lombard Kingdom of Italy. During the Middle Ages, Parma became an important stage of the Via Francigena, the main road connecting Rome to Northern Europe: several castles, hospitals and inns were built in the following centuries to host the increasing number of pilgrims.

Under the Frankish rule, Parma became a committee's capital (774). Like most northern Italian cities, it was nominally a part of the Holy Roman Empire created by Charlemagne, but locally ruled by its bishops, first being Guidobus. In the subsequent struggles between Papacy and Empire, Parma was usually member of the Imperial party. Two of its bishops became antipopes: Càdalo, founder of the Cathedral, as Honorius II); and Guibert, as Clement III). An almost independent commune was created around...