Perugia. Perugia is the capital city of both the region of Umbria in central Italy, crossed by the river Tiber, and of the province of Perugia. The city is located about 164 kilometres north of Rome and 148 km southeast of Florence. It covers a high hilltop and part of the valleys around the area. The region of Umbria is bordered by Tuscany, Lazio, and Marche. The history of Perugia goes back to the Etruscan period; Perugia was one of the main Etruscan cities. The city is also known as the universities town, with the University of Perugia founded in 1308, the University for Foreigners, and some smaller colleges such as the Academy of Fine Arts Pietro Vannucci public athenaeum founded in 1573, the Perugia University Institute of Linguistic Mediation for translators and interpreters, the Music Conservatory of Perugia, founded in 1788, and other institutes. Perugia is also a well-known cultural and artistic centre of Italy. The city hosts multiple annual festivals and events, e.g., the Eurochocolate Festival, the Umbria Jazz Festival, and the International Journalism Festival, and is associated with multiple notable people in the arts. The famous painter Pietro Vannucci, nicknamed Perugino, was a native of Citte della Pieve, near Perugia. He decorated the local Sala del Cambio with a beautiful series of frescoes; eight of his pictures can also be admired in the National Gallery of Umbria. Perugino was the teacher of Raphael, the great Renaissance artist who produced five paintings in Perugia and one fresco. Another famous painter, Pinturicchio, lived in Perugia. Galeazzo Alessi is the most famous architect from Perugia. The city's symbol is the griffin, which can be seen in the form of plaques and statues on buildings around the city. Perugia was an Umbrian settlement but first appears in written history as Perusia, one of the 12 confederate cities of Etruria; it was first mentioned in Q. Fabius Pictor's account, utilized by Livy, of the expedition carried out against the Etruscan League by Fabius Maximus Rullianus in 310 or 309 BC. At that time a thirty-year indutiae was agreed upon; however, in 295 Perusia took part in the Third Samnite War and was reduced, with Volsinii and Arretium, to seek for peace in the following year. In 216 and 205 BC it assisted Rome in the Second Punic War but afterwards it is not mentioned until 41-40 BC, when Lucius Antonius took refuge there, and was reduced by Octavian after a long siege, and its senators sent to their death. A number of lead bullets used by slingers have been found in and around the city. The city was burnt, we are told, with the exception of the temples of Vulcan and Juno, the massive Etruscan terrace-walls, naturally, can hardly have suffered at all, and the town, with the territory for a mile round, was allowed to be occupied by whoever chose. It must have been rebuilt almost at once, for several bases for statues exist, inscribed Augusto sacr Perusia restituta; but it did not become a colonia, until 251-253 AD, when it was resettled as Colonia Vibia Augusta Perusia, under the emperor C. Vibius Trebonianus Gallus. It is hardly mentioned except by the geographers until it was the only city in Umbria to resist Totila, who captured it and laid the city waste in 547, after a long siege, apparently after the city's Byzantine garrison evacuated. Negotiations with the besieging forces fell to the city's bishop, Herculanus, as representative of the townspeople. Totila is said to have ordered the bishop to be flayed and beheaded. St. Herculanus later became the city's patron saint. In the Lombard period Perugia is spoken of as one of the principal cities of Tuscia. In the 9th century, with the consent of Charlemagne and Louis the Pious, it passed under the popes; but by the 11th century its commune was asserting itself, and for many centuries the city continued to maintain an independent life, warring against many of the neighbouring lands and cities, Foligno, Assisi, Spoleto, Todi, Siena, Arezzo etc. In 1186 Henry VI, rex romanorum and future emperor, granted diplomatic recognition to the consular government of the city; afterward Pope Innocent III, whose major aim was to give state dignity to the dominions having been constituting the patrimony of St. Peter, acknowledged the validity of the imperial statement and recognised the established civic practices as having the force of law.