Italy was divided into two separate regions – the Apennine Peninsula and Continental North. The dominant element of the peninsula is the Apennines, interspersed with fertile valleys and overgrown with the richest forests in the Mediterranean region. The lower, mostly volcanic and partly alluvial, areas are fertile and well-watered, especially the vast area between the Apennine arch and the Tyrrhenian Sea.
The northern region is formed by the Po Valley and the surrounding mountains. The alluvial lowland is one of the richest agricultural regions in the world, although, as in the Euphrates and Nile valleys, the use of its potential required great irrigation works, which were carried out only at the turn of the second and first century BC. Thanks to natural resources and a favourable climate, Italy was the richest and most populous Mediterranean country. It had a great impact on the course of Rome’s expansion. Gaining political control over the peninsula gave it power, which the rest of the civilized world could not resist.
