Let me be clear. I'm not against including Italy
as a civ in civilization. In fact, it's pretty much the only Western European civilization that has never been in Civ yet that I would consider adding at this point.
But it's not an essential on the level of France/Spain/England/Rome/Greece/Russia. (I'm rethinking Germany)
Yeah, it just carried half of European civilization for a thousand years, and you cannot do any primary school history textbook without mentioning it like 50 times, and Western science, education, secular culture and philosophy were born here, not a big deal, as opposed to Haiti.
...and it invented sliced bread (Not to make light of their many actual culinary innovations, which are many, but then again, same can be said of many other places).
The idea that Italy carried half of European civilization for a thousand years is just a rephrasing of the bad old Dark Ages/Renaissance nonsense - the idea that the thousand year between the fall of Rome and the Renaissance was some king of intellectual, artistic and cultural void. Which historians have long since speared to death, gutted and destroyed because it is absolutely untrue.
covers like half of all lists of greatest pieces of art ever,
Funny. I just looked up a few list of greatest artists
and greatest art pieces and, aside from being very subjective I didn't see half of them being Italian. Sure, Italy has Leonardo and Michaelangelo and Carravagio. And the Dutch have Rembrandt and Van Gogh and Vermeer, the French Monet and Renoir and Cézanne (and that's
just some of the impressionists), the Spanish have Picasso and Velasquez and Dali (and, if we count the former Spanish colonies, Kahlo), the English have Turner (and if we count their colonies, Cassat and Pollock), and Russia (well, Belarus) has Chagall, and so on and so forth.
And that's just the ones we know of in a pretty Western-centric perspective. China, Japan, India had their own great artists, we just took so long to learn about them that we haven't really integrated them and their conception of art in our world views yet.
Art is one of the most universal human gifts, and there are very few civilizations that have not produced great art along the way. Italy provided one of the major movements in European artistic history, but the Dutch and French and so forth all have similar claims to fame.
I could essentially say the same of education, philosophy, what have you. Italy made great contributions - but so did other countries.
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At the end of the day, French, Spanish and English are spoken as first languages by people born on every continent. One is the modern global language, the other
used to be (and we named the concept of a global language after it - lingua
franca). Greece may only have held an empire for a decade, but for centuries after Greek colonies and dynasties spoke Greek from Marseilles to Kandahar. Latin spread from Lisbon to Syria and from York to Aswan, and form a basis if not the main basis of half the spoken languages in that region today. Even Russia, more recently, spread its political tentacles from Cuba to Hanoi.
I don't see Italy or Italian culture, as important as they were, on that level. I'm sorry. They were important, and I do consider them a civilization that's worth including. But not on
that level.
Germany, yes, actually, Italy and Germany are kind of similar - but actually, I think that's because we overrate Germany. Extremely important, and a power that influenced European history, but nowhere close to the global reach and influence of those five. If it wasn't for the fact that the Western Allies *still* aren't over feeling existentially threatened by Germany twice in a century, it probably wouldn't make this list.
), but eventually 80% of it got under Soviet Union and rest into Poland. Under Soviet system Ukraine was again denied its own identity and devastated by Stalinism, Holodomor, terror and World War II (6 - 7 million deaths). Despite this all, it was an enormously important part of Soviet Union regarding economy, culture and a ton of great personalities. Nikita Khrushchev was of Ukrainian origin. In 1991 if I recall correctly in referendum 91% of Ukrainian population voted for independence.
