意大利~~

The Tarantella was long believed to have originated in Southern Italy. In the old days, when a person was bitten by the poisonous tarantula spider, the only way to get the poison out of the body was to dance quickly - the poison would get out of the body via perspiration. This story is probably not true. Actually, the tarantella was originated from the town of Taranto in southern Italy.
The Tarantella Dance music is probably the most recognized song of all the Italian folklore music. The dance is done by everyone in a great big circle going clockwise, until the music in the set changes, becomes faster, then they quickly change the direction to counterclockwise, this continues several times.
You can see this dance at Italian weddings, is often the theme song of many restaurants and pizzerias, can even be heard in the beginning of the movie “The Godfather”. Generally it played with a strong mandolin (Italian guitar) presence.

Italy, as a state, did not exist until the unification of the country in 1861. Due to this comparatively late unification, and the historical autonomy of the regions that comprise the Italian Peninsula
, many traditions and customs that we now recognise as distinctly Italian can be identified by their regions of origin. Despite the political and social isolation of these regions, Italy's contributions to the cultural and historical heritage of Europe remain immense. Italy is home to the greatest number of UNESCO World Heritage Sites (41) to date.



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Visual Art Italy has seen many artistic and intellectual movements that spread throughout Europe and beyond, including the Renaissance and Baroque. Italy's artistic heritage includes the achievements of Michelangelo, Leonardo da Vinci, Donatello, Botticelli, Fra Angelico, Tintoretto, Caravaggio, Bernini, Titian and Raphael.

Literature With the basis of the modern Italian language established through the Florentine poet, Dante Alighieri, whose greatest work, the Divina Commedia, is considered amongst the foremost literary statements produced in Europe during the Middle Ages, there is no shortage of celebrated literary figures; the writers and poets Boccaccio, Giacomo Leopardi, Alessandro Manzoni, Tasso, Ludovico Ariosto, and Petrarch, whose best known vehicle of expression, the sonnet, was invented in Italy. Prominent philosophers include Bruno, Ficino, Machiavelli, and Vico. Modern literary figures and Nobel laureates are nationalist poet Giosuè Carducci in 1906, realist writer Grazia Deledda in 1926, modern theatre author Luigi Pirandello in 1936, poets Salvatore Quasimodo in 1959 and Eugenio Montale in 1975, satiryst and theatre author Dario Fo in 1997[20].

Science In science, Galileo Galilei made advancements toward the scientific revolution, and Leonardo da Vinci was the quintessential Renaissance Man. Italy has been the home of scientists and inventors: the physicist Enrico Fermi, one of the fathers of quantum theory and head of the Manhattan Project; the astronomer Giovanni Domenico Cassini; the physicist Alessandro Volta, inventor of the electric battery; the mathematicians Lagrange and Fibonacci; Nobel Prize in Physics laureate Guglielmo Marconi, inventor of the radio; and Antonio Meucci, inventor of the telephone.

圖片參考：http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9b/GiacomoPuccini.jpg/150px-GiacomoPuccini.jpg
Music From folk music to classical, music has played an important role in Italian culture. Having given birth to opera, Italy provides many of the foundations of the classical music tradition. Instruments associated with classical music, including the piano and violin, were invented in Italy, and many of the existing classical music forms can trace their roots back to innovations of sixteenth and seventeenth century Italian music (such as the symphony, concerto, and sonata). Italy's most famous composers include the Renaissance composers Palestrina and Monteverdi, the Baroque composers Corelli and Vivaldi, the Classical composers Paganini and Rossini, and the Romantic composers Verdi and Puccini. Modern Italian composers such as Berio and Nono proved significant in the development of experimental and electronic music.

Sport Popular sports include football, basketball (2nd national team sport since the '50s), volleyball, waterpolo, fencing, rugby, cycling, ice hockey (mainly in Milan, Trentino-Alto Adige and Veneto), roller hockey and F1 motor racing.
Winter sports are popular, with Italians competing in international games and Olympic venues. Sports are incorporated into Italian festivities like Palio (see also Palio di Siena), and the Gondola race (regatta) that takes place in Venice on the first Sunday of September.
Sports venues have extended from the Gladiatorial games of Ancient Rome in the Colosseum to the Stadio Olimpico of contemporary Rome, where football clubs compete.
The most popular sport in Italy is football, the Serie A being one of the best competitions in the world.