San Marino

According to a tradition the Sammarinese have cherished for centuries, the republic was born in the year 301, when a Christian stonemason called Marinus, of Dalmatian origin, fled the persecutions of the emperor Diocletian and climbed Mount Titano, a limestone massif rising above the plain near Rimini. There he and a small band of companions established a free community of believers. Marinus would later be venerated as a saint, and the place and people took his name; on his deathbed, the legend records, he bequeathed his followers their guiding principle, leaving them 'free from both men' - free, that is, from the authority of both emperor and pope.

Whatever the precise truth of the foundation story, the community on the mountain is genuinely ancient. The earliest surviving document to mention it, the Placito Feretrano of 885, records a dispute in which the monastery and the men of San Marino defended their liberties, showing that by the ninth century a self-conscious community already existed on Titano. Around it grew the legend of the Lady Felicissima, a wealthy woman whose family, in gratitude to Marinus, was said to have given the mountain to his community, an origin tale that expressed the Sammarinese conviction that their freedom had been theirs from the very beginning.

The mountain itself was the community's first protector. Steep, fortifiable and of little strategic value to the great powers of the Italian peninsula, Mount Titano allowed a tiny population to govern itself while empires, kingdoms and the lands of the Church rose and fell in the surrounding country. Out of this isolation, and out of the habit of collective self-government in the assembly of family heads known as the Arengo, grew the institutions that would in time make San Marino a republic in fact as well as in name.

Turning points

1. AD 301 (traditional)Formation

   Foundation by Saint Marinus

   By tradition the stonemason Marinus, fleeing Diocletian's persecution of Christians, founded a free community on Mount Titano on 3 September 301, the act from which San Marino dates its existence.

   [4] [5] [6] [1]

2. by traditionPolitics & Power

   'I leave you free from both men'

   Marinus is said to have left his followers the words 'Relinquo vos liberos ab utroque homine', freedom from both emperor and pope, enshrined as the founding ideal of Sammarinese liberty.

   [4]

3. 885Politics & Power

   The Placito Feretrano

   The earliest surviving document to name the community of San Marino records a legal dispute over its liberties, the first firm attestation that a self-governing community existed on Mount Titano.

   [4]

4. early Middle AgesFormation

   Refuge on a fortified mountain

   Set atop the steep limestone massif of Mount Titano and of little strategic value to its powerful neighbours, the community could govern itself in isolation, a continuity of free republican life that UNESCO would later recognise as stretching from the Middle Ages to today.

   [3] [6]

Figures of the era

Over the medieval centuries the community on Titano organised itself as a commune in the Italian fashion, governing through the Arengo of household heads and, increasingly, through an elected council. Its most distinctive invention was the office of the Captains Regent, the Capitani Reggenti: by tradition two heads of state, chosen together and serving for only six months, so that no individual could entrench personal power. The arrangement, in place since the statute of the late thirteenth century, has endured to the present day, with the Regents entering office each year on 1 April and 1 October. Early statutes were drawn up in 1253 and a fuller body of law by 1295.

San Marino's survival owed as much to diplomacy as to its walls. Surrounded by the territories of powerful neighbours and, above all, by the expanding Papal States, the little republic preserved its independence by careful alliances, by playing rivals against one another, and by securing recognitions of its rights from popes and princes. It weathered the ambitions of the lords of Rimini and Urbino and the long shadow of papal Romagna, repeatedly affirming a freedom that larger powers found it convenient, or unprofitable, to leave alone.

The crowning act of the period was constitutional. On 8 October 1600 the republic promulgated the Leges Statutae Republicae Sancti Marini, the Statutes of San Marino, a codified body of law in six books regulating the powers of the Council and the Captains Regent and the conduct of civil and criminal justice. Among the oldest written governing documents still in force anywhere in the world, the Statutes remain to this day at the foundation of Sammarinese law, the legal embodiment of a republic that had governed itself for more than a thousand years.

Turning points

1. 1243Politics & Power

   First Captains Regent

   The republic adopted its signature institution, two Captains Regent serving jointly for six-month terms; since the late-thirteenth-century statute their office has alternated every six months without interruption.

   [7] [5]

2. 1253Politics & Power

   The earliest Statutes

   San Marino set down its first written statutes, with a fuller body of state law following by 1295, formalising the self-government of the mountain commune.

   [5]

3. c. 1296Politics & Power

   Self-government affirmed within papal Romagna

   As the Papal States consolidated their hold over the surrounding Romagna, San Marino preserved its autonomy by diplomacy and the recognition of its rights, the strategy of survival that kept the commune free among far greater powers.

   [5] [9]

4. 8 Oct 1600Politics & Power

   Promulgation of the Leges Statutae

   The republic enacted the Leges Statutae Republicae Sancti Marini, a six-book written constitution governing the Council, the Regents and the courts; it remains in force as the foundation of San Marino's law.

   [7] [6]

Figures of the era

By the seventeenth century San Marino was an island of self-government within the lands of the Church, which had absorbed the surrounding duchies and lordships. The republic guarded its autonomy jealously and secured papal acknowledgements of its rights, but its position was always precarious, dependent on the goodwill of a far greater neighbour. That precariousness was tested dramatically in 1739.

On 17 October 1739 Cardinal Giulio Alberoni, the papal legate of Ravenna, marched troops into San Marino, suspended its constitution and tried to force the republic to submit to the government of the Papal States, abolishing the Captains Regent in favour of a single governor of his own appointment. The Sammarinese did not take up arms. Instead they resorted to civil disobedience, refused to recognise the new order, and smuggled out appeals to Rome documenting the cardinal's abuses, trusting the justice of the pope over the ambition of his legate.

The gamble succeeded. Informed of the unrest and of Alberoni's procedural violations, Pope Clement XII found in the republic's favour: he condemned the occupation, ordered the withdrawal of the troops, and on 5 February 1740 - the feast of Saint Agatha, henceforth a national holiday - restored San Marino's independence. The episode became a founding story of the modern republic, proof that a tiny state, armed only with its law and its stubbornness, could recover its freedom even from the Papacy.

Turning points

1. 17th centuryPolitics & Power

   An island within the Papal States

   By the seventeenth century the lands of the Church surrounded San Marino on every side; the republic guarded its autonomy and secured papal acknowledgements of its rights, but its independence rested on the goodwill of a far greater neighbour.

   [5] [9]

2. 17 Oct 1739War & Rupture

   The Alberoni occupation

   Cardinal Giulio Alberoni, papal legate of Ravenna, occupied San Marino with troops, suspended its constitution and sought to annex it to the Papal States, abolishing the Captains Regent.

   ↗See the data

   [8] [5]

3. 1739–1740Politics & Power

   Civil resistance

   Rather than fight, the Sammarinese practised civil disobedience and sent clandestine appeals to Rome documenting the legate's abuses, refusing to accept the imposed government.

   [8]

4. 5 Feb 1740Independence

   Independence restored by Clement XII

   Pope Clement XII condemned the occupation and on 5 February 1740 recognised San Marino's rights and restored its independence, an event still celebrated each year on the feast of Saint Agatha.

   ↗See the data

   [8]

Figures of the era

The Napoleonic upheaval that swept away the old order in Italy left San Marino not diminished but admired. In 1797 Napoleon Bonaparte, far from threatening the little republic, offered it his friendship, gifts of artillery, and an extension of its territory toward the sea. With what tradition remembers as instinctive wisdom, the Sammarinese accepted the courtesies but declined the land, content, they said, with the borders they already had, unwilling to provoke envy or entanglement. San Marino's independence was recognised by Napoleon in the Treaty of Tolentino of 1797 and again by the Congress of Vienna in 1815.

The republic's reputation as a refuge was sealed in the Risorgimento. In the summer of 1849, after the fall of the Roman Republic, the revolutionary general Giuseppe Garibaldi, hunted by Austrian, French, Spanish and Neapolitan forces, crossed into San Marino with his remaining followers and his wife Anita. The Captain Regent Domenico Maria Belzoppi granted them asylum on condition that they lay down their cause within the republic's borders; Garibaldi rested, then slipped away by night toward the Adriatic. San Marino had risked occupation to honour its tradition of sanctuary.

From across the Atlantic came an enduring token of esteem. In 1861 the Captains Regent offered honorary citizenship to the new American president, Abraham Lincoln. In a letter of 7 May 1861, written as the United States slid into civil war, Lincoln accepted, replying that 'although your dominion is small, your State is nevertheless one of the most honored, in all history', and that San Marino proved a government founded on republican principles could be 'secure and enduring'. The exchange marked the beginning of United States recognition of San Marino. After the unification of Italy, a treaty of friendship in 1862 confirmed the republic's independence, the first of a series of such agreements with its now all-encircling neighbour.

Turning points

1. 1797Politics & Power

   Napoleon's offer declined

   Napoleon offered San Marino friendship, artillery and an extension of territory to the sea; the republic accepted the gifts but declined the land, satisfied with its existing borders, and was recognised by the Treaty of Tolentino.

   [5] [10] [9]

2. 1815Independence

   Recognition at the Congress of Vienna

   The post-Napoleonic Congress of Vienna confirmed San Marino's independence, leaving the ancient republic untouched as Europe's monarchies were restored around it.

   ↗See the data

   [9]

3. Jul 1849War & Rupture

   Garibaldi given refuge

   Fleeing the collapse of the Roman Republic and pursued by four armies, Giuseppe Garibaldi crossed into San Marino with his followers and was granted asylum by the Captain Regent before escaping by night toward the Adriatic.

   ↗See the data

   [10] [5]

4. 7 May 1861Politics & Power

   Lincoln made an honorary citizen

   Abraham Lincoln accepted honorary citizenship of San Marino, writing that 'although your dominion is small, your State is nevertheless one of the most honored, in all history' - the beginning of US recognition of the republic.

   [11] [12]

5. 1862Independence

   First treaty of friendship with Italy

   After Italian unification, San Marino and the new Kingdom of Italy concluded a treaty of friendship in 1862 confirming the republic's independence, the first of the agreements that secure its sovereignty as an enclave.

   ↗See the data

   [9] [5]

Figures of the era

By the early twentieth century the Grand and General Council had hardened into an oligarchy: under the Statutes of 1600 it had come to co-opt its own members for life, concentrating power in a few wealthy landowning families. In 1906 a reform movement summoned the Arengo, the ancient assembly of household heads, for the first time in three centuries. On 25 March 1906 the assembled citizens voted overwhelmingly to abolish the lifelong co-option of councillors, and on 10 June 1906 San Marino held its first modern democratic elections, transforming the republic into an electoral democracy.

Democracy proved fragile. Amid the unemployment and inflation that followed the First World War - during which the republic stayed neutral and sent only volunteers - the Sammarinese Fascist Party seized control in 1923, dissolved the Grand and General Council, and ruled in step with Mussolini's Italy for two decades. Fascist government in San Marino did not long outlast its Italian patron: three days after Mussolini's fall, on 28 July 1943, popular pressure brought down the party's rule, a day the republic still commemorates as the fall of fascism.

In the Second World War San Marino held to a hard-won neutrality, and turned itself into a vast refuge. Though its native population numbered fewer than fifteen thousand, the republic gave asylum and shelter to more than a hundred thousand displaced people from the surrounding war zone, among them Jews who escaped deportation. Neutrality did not spare it: on 26 June 1944 a British air raid, the result of faulty intelligence later acknowledged, killed some sixty people. In September 1944 fighting between German and Allied forces passed across the territory before the republic was liberated and its neutrality restored.

Turning points

1. 25 Mar 1906Politics & Power

   The Arengo and the end of oligarchy

   Summoned for the first time in three centuries, the Arengo of household heads voted on 25 March 1906 to abolish lifelong co-option of councillors, opening the way to democracy.

   [13]

2. 10 Jun 1906Politics & Power

   First modern democratic elections

   Following the Arengo vote, San Marino held its first modern democratic elections on 10 June 1906, ending centuries of oligarchic rule by co-opted councillors.

   [13]

3. 1923Politics & Power

   Fascist seizure of power

   Amid postwar economic distress the Sammarinese Fascist Party took control in 1923 and dissolved the Grand and General Council, ruling the republic for two decades in step with Mussolini's Italy.

   [14] [15]

4. 26 Jun 1944War & Rupture

   The bombing of San Marino

   Despite the republic's neutrality, a British air raid on 26 June 1944, based on faulty intelligence later admitted, killed about sixty people in the small state.

   ↗See the data

   [14] [16]

5. 1943–1944Peoples & Migration

   Refuge for 100,000 and liberation

   Neutral San Marino, with a population under 15,000, sheltered more than 100,000 wartime refugees, including Jews; after fighting crossed its soil in September 1944 it was liberated and its neutrality restored.

   ↗See the data

   [14] [5]

Figures of the era

After the Second World War San Marino settled into the life of a modern parliamentary democracy, still governed by the Grand and General Council and its two Captains Regent, and still entirely surrounded by the Italian Republic. Its independence continued to rest on the treaties of friendship and good-neighbourliness with Italy that began in 1862 and were renewed in 1939 and in later decades, agreements that guarantee the enclave's sovereignty while regulating customs, security and the practical realities of a state embedded within another.

The post-war era brought San Marino into the wider world. It joined the Council of Europe, and on 2 March 1992 - following the UN Security Council's recommendation in Resolution 744 of 25 February 1992 - it was admitted to the United Nations, taking its seat as a full and equal member state, a striking arrival for a republic of a few tens of thousands of people on a mountaintop.

European integration reached even this enclave. Long tied to the Italian lira, San Marino adopted the euro and, under a monetary agreement with the European Union, secured the right to use the single currency as legal tender and to mint a limited number of euro coins bearing its own national designs - prized by collectors the world over. The current agreement, in force since 2012, replaced an earlier one of 2000. More than seventeen centuries after a stonemason is said to have climbed Mount Titano, San Marino endures: a sovereign republic, a UN member, and by its own proud and widely accepted claim the oldest such state on earth.

Turning points

1. 1862 onwardIndependence

   Treaties of friendship with Italy

   San Marino's sovereignty as an enclave is secured by treaties of friendship and good-neighbourliness with Italy first concluded in 1862 and renewed in 1939 and later, regulating relations while guaranteeing independence.

   ↗See the data

   [9] [5]

2. 1988Politics & Power

   Member of the Council of Europe

   San Marino joined the Council of Europe, one of the steps by which the ancient republic took its place among the institutions of postwar Europe while keeping its full sovereignty.

   [2] [9]

3. 2 Mar 1992Independence

   Admission to the United Nations

   On the recommendation of Security Council Resolution 744 (25 February 1992), San Marino was admitted to the United Nations on 2 March 1992 as a full member state.

   ↗See the data

   [17] [18] [2]

4. 2012Economy & Trade

   Euro monetary agreement

   Under a monetary agreement with the European Union, in force since 2012 in place of an earlier 2000 accord, San Marino uses the euro as official currency and mints its own euro coins with national designs.

   ↗See the data

   [19]

Figures of the era