Piazza del Popolo: Why Ravenna Became a Capital
Listen at the stop, then read the transcript and follow the sources behind the story.
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Transcript
Before the mosaics, ask the strategic question: why Ravenna? In 402 the Western imperial court moved here under Emperor Honorius. The city was protected by marshy terrain and connected to the Adriatic through the nearby port of Classe, making it defensible and supplied by sea.
That did not make Ravenna invulnerable, and it did not rescue the western imperial office forever. In 476 the last western emperor conventionally recognised by historians was deposed. Yet the city remained politically important under Odoacer and then Theodoric.
Piazza del Popolo is later than those events, shaped strongly under Venetian rule, but it gives us a civic centre from which to read the older capital buried around it.
Keep one idea throughout the walk: late Roman history is not a clean sequence of Roman, then Gothic, then Byzantine boxes. People, officials, artisans and buildings crossed the boundaries. Empires change flags faster than cities change plumbing.