My hometown

I was born and brought up in Benevento, Italy. The original name was Maleventum that the Romans thought to mean "the site of bad events", from Mal(um) + eventum. So, after they took the city, it was changed in Beneventum.

The history of Benevento is full of events and legends: basically every population who conquered Italy settled down here, for a while.

To make it short: according to the legend Benevento was founded by the Greek hero Diomedes, after escaping from Trojan war. However, it first appears in history books as a Samnites city. Samnites were a strong and smart population of Southern Italy; actually they kicked the asses of the Romans a couple of times (read here) before they could make it to conquer the city. Under the Roman Empire the city had a considerable development and they left a lot of nice things (Arch of Trajan, Roman theater).

After the Romans, the Lombard arrived (570 AC) and made the city capital of their Duchy for about 500 years. Alongside with the nice names of their Kings, Lombard also left nice things, such as the church of Santa Sofia, which is now a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Then, it was finally time for the Pope to take the city under his domain, until it was united with Italy in 1960. Of course, to not miss anything, also Napoleone got the city for a while, but his sovereign did not last long (1806-1815).

Nowadays, Benevento is distinguished by its insane humidity rate, the liquore Strega and the magic Benevento football team, of which I am a loyal supporter.