location young woman with unicorn
___MASK75___ , officially the Italian Republic , is a unitary parliamentary republic in Europe . Located in the heart of the ___MASK78___ , ___MASK75___ shares open land borders with France , Switzerland , ___MASK98___ , Slovenia , San Marino and ___MASK39___ . ___MASK75___ covers an area of and has a largely temperate seasonal climate and Mediterranean climate ; due to its shape , it is often referred to in ___MASK75___ as " lo Stivale " ( the Boot ). With 61 million inhabitants , it is the fourth most populous ___MASK85___ member state . The Tiber ( Latin " Tiberis ", Italian "") is the third - longest river in ___MASK75___ , rising in the Apennine Mountains in Emilia - Romagna and flowing through Umbria and Lazio , where it is joined by the Aniene river , to the Tyrrhenian Sea , between ___MASK67___ and Fiumicino . It drains a basin estimated at . The river has achieved lasting fame as the main watercourse of the city of Rome , founded on its eastern banks . The Italian Peninsula or Apennine Peninsula (" Penisola appenninica ") is the ___MASK38___ and the smallest of the three large peninsulas of Southern Europe ( between the ___MASK82___ and the Balkan Peninsula ). It extends from the Po Valley in the north to the ___MASK38___ Mediterranean Sea in the south . The peninsula ' s shape gives it the nickname " lo Stivale " ( the Boot ). Three smaller peninsulas contribute to this characteristic shape , namely Calabria ( the " toe "), Salento ( the " heel ") and Gargano ( the " spur "). ___MASK12___ is a city and special " comune " ( named " ___MASK18___ Capitale ") in Italy . ___MASK12___ is the capital of Italy and of the Lazio region . With 2 , 870 , 336 residents in , it is also the country ' s largest and most populated " comune " and fourth - most populous city in the European Union by population within city limits . The Metropolitan City of ___MASK12___ has a population of 4 . 3 million residents . The city is located in the central - western portion of the Italian Peninsula , within Lazio ( Latium ), along the shores of Tiber river . The ___MASK39___ is an independent country geographically located within the city boundaries of ___MASK12___ , the only existing example of a country within a city : for this reason ___MASK12___ has been often defined as capital of two states . The European Union ( ___MASK85___ ) is a political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe . It has an area of , and an estimated population of over 510 million . The ___MASK85___ has developed an internal single market through a standardised system of laws that apply in all member states . ___MASK85___ policies aim to ensure the free movement of people , goods , services , and capital within the internal market , enact legislation in justice and home affairs , and maintain common policies on trade , agriculture , fisheries , and regional development . Within the Schengen Area , passport controls have been abolished . A monetary union was established in 1999 and came into full force in 2002 , and is composed of 19 ___MASK85___ member states which use the euro currency . Portrait of Young Woman with Unicorn is a painting , oil on canvas applied to wood , by Raphael , c . 1506 . It is in the ___MASK89___ in Rome . The portrait appears to have been influenced by the Mona Lisa , painted by Leonardo between 1503 and 1506 . The work was of uncertain attribution until recent times . In the 1760 inventory of the Gallery , the subject of the painting was identified as Saint Catherine of Alexandria and attributed to Perugino . A restoration of the painting in 1934 -- 36 confirmed art historian Roberto Longhi ' s hypothesis that the work was by Raphael , and the removal of heavy repainting revealed the unicorn , traditionally a symbol of purity in medieval romance , in place of a Saint Catherine wheel . Later restoration work on the painting in 1959 revealed the image of a dog , even earlier than the unicorn , also a symbol of chastity and conjugal fidelity . The young woman in the painting was a bride and this painting was a wedding gift to the engaged couple from Raphael . Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino ( March 28 or April 6 , 1483April 6 , 1520 ), known as Raphael , was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance . His work is admired for its clarity of form , ease of composition , and visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur . Together with Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci , he forms the traditional trinity of great masters of that period . In art history , High Renaissance is the period denoting the apogee of the visual arts in the Italian Renaissance . The High Renaissance period is traditionally taken to begin in the 1490s , with Leonardo ' s fresco of the Last Supper in ___MASK71___ and the death of Lorenzo de ' Medici in Florence , and to have ended in 1527 with the sacking of ___MASK12___ by the troops of Charles V . This term was first used in German ( Hochrenaissance ) in the early nineteenth century , and has its origins in the " High Style " of painting and sculpture described by Johann Joachim Winckelmann . Over the last twenty years , use of the term has been frequently criticized by academic art historians for oversimplifying artistic developments , ignoring historical context , and focusing only on a few iconic works . Ctesias (" Ktsís "), also known as Ctesias the Cnidian or Ctesias of Cnidus , was a Greek physician and historian from the town of Cnidus in ___MASK77___ . Ctesias , who lived in the 5th century BC , was physician to Artaxerxes Mnemon , whom he accompanied in 401 BC on his expedition against his brother Cyrus the Younger . Villa Borghese is a landscape garden in the naturalistic English manner in ___MASK12___ , containing a number of buildings , museums ( see ___MASK89___ ) and attractions . It is the third largest public park in ___MASK12___ ( 80 hectares or 197 . 7 acres ) after the ones of the Villa Doria Pamphili and Villa Ada . The gardens were developed for the Villa Borghese Pinciana (" Borghese villa on the Pincian Hill "), built by the architect Flaminio Ponzio , developing sketches by Scipione Borghese , who used it as a " villa suburbana ", a party villa , at the edge of ___MASK12___ , and to house his art collection . The gardens as they are now were remade in the early nineteenth century . Flaminio Ponzio ( 1560  1613 ) was an Italian architect during the late - Renaissance or so - called Mannerist period , serving in ___MASK12___ as the architect for Pope Paul V . ___MASK39___ , officially ___MASK39___ State or the State of ___MASK39___ , is a walled enclave within the city of ___MASK12___ . With an area of approximately 44 hectares ( 110 acres ), and a population of 842 , it is the smallest State in the world by both area and population , but formally it is not sovereign , sovereignty being held by the Holy See , the only entity of public international law that has diplomatic relations with almost every country in the world . A legendary creature is an animal or part - human being described in non - historical stories that sometimes involve the supernatural . In the classical era , monstrous creatures such as the Cyclops and the Minotaur appear in heroic tales for the protagonist to destroy . Other creatures , such as the unicorn , were claimed in accounts of natural history by various scholars of antiquity . Some legendary creatures have their origin in traditional mythology and were believed to be real creatures , for example dragons , griffins , and unicorns . Others were based on real encounters , originating in garbled accounts of travelers ' tales , such as the Vegetable Lamb of Tartary , which supposedly grew tethered to the ___MASK41___ . Gaius Plinius Caecilius Secundus , born Gaius Caecilius or Gaius Caecilius Cilo ( 61  c . 113 ), better known as Pliny the Younger , was a lawyer , author , and magistrate of Ancient ___MASK12___ . Pliny ' s uncle , Pliny the Elder , helped raise and educate him . Both Pliny the Elder and the Younger were witnesses to the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD , in which the former died . The ___MASK89___ ( English : Borghese Gallery ) is an art gallery in Rome , Italy , housed in the former Villa Borghese Pinciana . At the outset , the gallery building was integrated with its gardens , but nowadays the Villa Borghese gardens are considered a separate tourist attraction . The ___MASK89___ houses a substantial part of the Borghese collection of paintings , sculpture and antiquities , begun by Cardinal Scipione Borghese , the nephew of Pope Paul V ( reign 1605  1621 ). The Villa was built by the architect Flaminio Ponzio , developing sketches by Scipione Borghese himself , who used it as a " villa suburbana ", a party villa at the edge of Rome . The unicorn is a legendary creature that has been described since antiquity as a beast with a large , pointed , spiraling horn projecting from its forehead . The unicorn was depicted in ancient seals of the Indus Valley Civilization and was mentioned by the ancient Greeks in accounts of natural history by various writers , including Ctesias , Strabo , Pliny the Younger , and Aelian . The Bible also describes an animal , the re ' em , which some versions translate as " unicorn ". Latium is the region of ___MASK38___ western Italy in which the city of Rome was founded and grew to be the capital city of the Roman Empire . Latium was originally a small triangle of fertile , volcanic soil on which resided the tribe of the Latins or Latians . It was located on the left bank ( east and south ) of the Tiber river , extending northward to the Anio river ( a left - bank tributary of the Tiber ) and southeastward to the Pomptina Palus ( Pontine Marshes , now the Pontine Fields ) as far south as the Circeian promontory . The right bank of the Tiber was occupied by the Etruscan city of Veii , and the other borders were occupied by Italic tribes . Subsequently , Rome defeated Veii and then its Italic neighbors , expanding Latium to the Apennine Mountains in the northeast and to the opposite end of the marsh in the southeast . The modern descendant , the Italian " Regione " of Lazio , also called " Latium " in Latin , and occasionally in modern English , is somewhat larger still , but not as much as double the original Latium . The ( plural : "") is a basic administrative division in ___MASK75___ , roughly equivalent to a township or municipality . Strabo (" Strabn "; 64 or 63 BC ) was a Greek geographer , philosopher , and historian who lived in ___MASK15___ Minor during the transitional period of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire . Lazio (; ) is one of the 20 administrative regions of ___MASK75___ , situated in the ___MASK38___ peninsular section of the country . With almost 5 . 9 million residents and a GDP of more than 170 billion euros , Lazio is the second most populated region of ___MASK75___ ( having approximately the same in population as Campania ), and has the second largest economy of the nation . Its capital is Rome , capital and largest city of ___MASK75___ . Urbino is a walled city in the Marche region of ___MASK75___ , south - west of ___MASK20___ , a World Heritage Site notable for a remarkable historical legacy of independent Renaissance culture , especially under the patronage of Federico da Montefeltro , duke of Urbino from 1444 to 1482 . The town , nestled on a high sloping hillside , retains much of its picturesque medieval aspect , an illusion only slightly broken by the large car parks below the town . It hosts the University of Urbino , founded in 1506 , and is the seat of the Archbishop of Urbino . Its best - known architectural piece is the Palazzo Ducale , rebuilt by Luciano Laurana . The Borghese Collection is a collection of Roman sculptures , old masters and modern art collected by the Roman Borghese family , especially Cardinal Scipione Borghese , from the 17th century on . It includes major collections of Caravaggio , Raphael , and Titian , and of ancient Roman art . The Borghese also bought widely from leading painters and sculptors of his day , and Scipione Borghese ' s commissions include two portrait busts by Gian Lorenzo Bernini . Most of the collection remains intact and on display at the ___MASK89___ , although a significant sale of classical sculpture was made under duress to the ___MASK96___ in 1807 .