The Strait of Otranto at its southeasterly limit links it with the Ionian Sea. [5] As the centuries went by, several rivers of the Adriatic coast between Ravenna and Rimini have at times been said to correspond to the ancient Rubicon. In January 49 BC C. Julius Caesar led a single legion, Legio XIII, south over the Rubicon from Cisalpine Gaul to Italy to make his way to Rome. Be on the lookout for your Britannica newsletter to get trusted stories delivered right to your inbox. This took place during the time of the Roman Republic. Roman law specified that only the elected magistrates (consuls and praetors) could hold imperium within Italy. The Rubicon, like other small rivers of the region, often changed its course during this period. Attempts to deduce the original course of the Rubicon can be made only by studying written documents and other archaeological evidence such as Roman milestones, which indicate the distance between the ancient river and the nearest Roman towns. Today, the phrase "crossing the Rubicon" is a metaphor that means to pass a point of no return. Rubicon, Latin Rubico, or Rubicon, small stream that separated Cisalpine Gaul from Italy in the era of the Roman Republic. Generals were thus obliged to disband their armies before entering Italy. Upon Julius Caesar's death, his adopted son Augustus became Rome's first emperor. It was known as Fiumicino prior to 1933, when it was identified with the ancient river Rubicon, famously crossed by Julius Caesar in 49 BC. Strong evidence supporting this theory came in 1991,[7] when three Italian scholars (Pignotti, Ravagli, and Donati), after a comparison between the Tabula Peutingeriana and other ancient sources (including Cicero), showed that the distance from Rome to the Rubicon River was 200 Roman miles. The Latin word Rubico comes from the adjective rubeus, meaning "red". By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. Please note the system will not be available during this time. The decision robbed the Rubicon of its importance, and the name gradually disappeared from the local toponymy. We will now be performing system maintenance in Augustus from Saturday May 31 2017 4:00 PM to May 31 2017 11:00 PM (EST). During the Roman Republic, the river Rubicon marked the boundary between the Roman province of Cisalpine Gaul to the northeast and Italy proper, controlled directly by Rome and its socii (allies), to the south. The river was so named because its waters are colored red by mud deposits. Updates? Savignano sul Rubicone is an industrial town and the river has become one of the most polluted in the Emilia-Romagna region. Corrections? Quickly taking several northern towns, the news reached Rome by January 17. Pompey, the Republic's hope, was left without his main army, which was still in Spain, and his support base was in the eastern provinces. The movement of Julius Caesar’s forces over the Rubicon into Italy in 49 bc violated the law (the Lex Cornelia Majestatis) that forbade a general to lead an army out of the province to which he was assigned. It was reported that Caesar dined with Sallust, Hirtius, Gaius Oppius, Lucius Cornelius Balbus and Servius Sulpicius Rufus on the night after his crossing. According to Suetonius, Caesar uttered the famous phrase ālea iacta est ("the die has been cast"). According to Suetonius, Caesar uttered the famous phrase alea iacta est ("the die is cast"). It was reported that Caesar dined with Sallust, Hirtius, Oppius, Lucius Balbus and Sulpicus Rufus on the night after his famous crossing into Italy January 10.[1]. The movement of Julius Caesar’s forces over the Rubicon into Italy in 49 bc violated the law (the Lex Cornelia Majestatis) that forbade a general to lead an army out of the province to which he was assigned. According to some authors, he is said to have uttered the phrase "alea iacta est"—the die is cast—as his army marched through the shallow river. For other uses, see, A brief account of the controversies favoring rivers of Romagna, between the Pisciatello, called the Rigone in its lowest reaches, the Fiumicino near Savignano and the Uso is in. On the north-western side, the border was marked by the river Arno, a much wider and more important waterway, which flows westward from the Apennine Mountains (it and the Rubicon rise not far from each other) into the Tyrrhenian Sea. Exercising imperium when forbidden by the law was a capital offence. After Caesar's crossing, the Rubicon was a geographical feature of note until about 42 BC, when Octavian merged the Province of Cisalpine Gaul into Italia and the river ceased to be the extreme northern border of Italy. The Rubicon was crossed and Caesar officially invaded the legal border from his province into Italy, thus starting the civil war. In doing so, he deliberately broke the law on imperium and made armed conflict inevitable. Caesar's decision for swift action forced Pompey, the lawful consuls (C. Claudius Marcellus and L. Cornelius Lentulus Crus), and a large part of the Roman Senate to flee Rome in fear. In a section of the Tabula Peutingeriana, an ancient document showing the network of Roman roads, a river in northeastern Italy labeled "fl. Let us know if you have suggestions to improve this article (requires login). Governors of Roman provinces were appointed promagistrates with imperium (roughly, "right to command") in one or more provinces. For this reason, and to supply fields with water after the revival of agriculture in the late Middle Ages, during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, hydraulic works were built to prevent other floods and to regulate streams. During the late Roman Republic, the river Rubicon marked the boundary between the Roman province of Cisalpine Gaul to the north-east and Italy proper (controlled directly by Rome and its allies) to the south. On the north-western side, the border was marked by the river Arno, a much wider and more important waterway, which flows westward from the Apennine Mountains (its source is not far from Rubicon's source) into the Tyrrhenian Sea. The Rubicon is a shallow river in northeastern Italy, just south of Ravenna. It is about 500 miles (800 km) long with an average width of 100 miles, a maximum depth of 4,035 feet (1,324 metres), and an…. The crossing of a small stream in northern Italy became one of ancient history's most pivotal events. [2] The phrase "crossing the Rubicon" has survived to refer to any individual or group committing itself irrevocably to a risky or revolutionary course of action, similar to the modern phrase "passing the point of no return". At the war's end, Julius Caesar was declared dictator for life. However, the river-bed shape observed in Pisciatello and the Rubicone river in the present day, well below Roman-age soil layers, is likely to indicate that any possible course modification of rivers could have occurred only very close to the coastline, and therefore only slight. Any promagistrate who entered Italy at the head of his troops forfeited his imperium and was therefore no longer legally allowed to command troops. Suetonius depicts Caesar as undecided as he approached the river, and attributes the crossing to a supernatural apparition. He was explicitly ordered not to take his army across the Rubicon river, which was at that time a northern boundary of Italy. Furthermore, the features of the present-day Rubicon river (north–south course, orthogonal to the Via Aemilia) and the Via Aemilia itself (a straight reach before and after the crossing, and a turn just passing by San Giovanni in Compito, so marking a possible administrative boundary) are common to typical geographical oriented limits of Roman age, being what made this a clue of actual identification of the present-day Rubicon River with the Fiumicino.[6]. It is improbable that Caesar deliberately sought monarchical power until after he had crossed the Rubicon in 49 bce, though sufficient power to impose his will, as he was determined to do, proved to mean monarchical power. Julius Caesar's crossing the Rubicon river in January 49 BC precipitated the Roman Civil War, which ultimately led to Caesar's becoming dictator and the rise of the imperial era of Rome. From it sprang the Roman Empire and the genesis of modern European culture. Rubicon, Latin Rubico, or Rubicon, small stream that separated Cisalpine Gaul from Italy in the era of the Roman Republic.
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