City (pop., 2001 prelim.: 243,474), northern Italy.
Located on the Adige River , it became a Roman colony in 89 BC and was the birthplace of the poet Odoacer 's defeat by the Ostrogothic king Theodoric in 489. It was occupied by Charlemagne in 774. Verona came under the della Scala family (1260–1387), the era recalled in William Shakespeare 's Romeo and Juliet . It passed in 1405 to {{link=Venice">Venice , which held it almost continuously until 1797, when it was ceded to Austria. It became part of the Kingdom of Italy in 1866. It is noted for its ancient Roman amphitheatre (1st century AD), now used for opera, and for Romanesque and Gothic buildings.