n.
Region (pop., 2001 prelim.: 1,993,274), southern Italy.
Forming the "toe" of the Italian "boot," it is a peninsula that separates the Tyrrhenian and Ionian seas. A mountainous area covering 5,823 sq mi (15,080 sq km), it has been subject to earthquakes. Its capital is Catanzaro . Founded as a Greek colony and known in ancient times as Bruttium, it was taken by the Romans in the 3rd century BC and gradually went into decline. It eventually passed to the Byzantines, who renamed it Calabria. Conquered by the Normans, it was united with the Kingdom of Naples in the 11th century AD. A stronghold of Italian republicanism until the Risorgimento , it became part of Italy after the 1860 expedition of Giuseppe de Garibaldi . Long a poor area dependent on farming, it underwent a land-reform system in the mid-20th century that promoted more diverse profitable crops.