Volterra is a walled mountaintop town in Tuscany. Its history dates from before the 8th century BC and it has substantial structures from the Etruscan, Roman, and Medieval periods .
Volterra, known to the ancient Etruscans as Velathri or Vlathri and to the Romans as Volatarrae was a Bronze Age settlement and an important Etruscan center. One of the “twelve cities” of the Etruscan League.
The site is believed to have been continuously inhabited as a city since at least the end of the 8th century BC.[
It became a municipality allied to Rome at the end of the 3rd century BC.
The city was a bishop’s residence in the 5th century, and its episcopal power was affirmed during the 12th century. With the decline of the episcopate and the discovery of local alum deposits, Volterra became a place of interest of the Republic of Florence , whose forces conquered Volterra.
Florentine rule was not always popular, and opposition occasionally broke into rebellion. These rebellions were put down by Florence.
When the Republic of Florence fell in 1530, Volterra came under the control of the Medeci family and later followed the history of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany. In 1472, during the war between Volterra and Florence in the called Allumiere war which finished with the sacking of Volterra and his army, it caused the emigration of many wealthy families and the appropriation of their goods.
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