As a nation state, Italy has emerged only in 1871. Until then the country was politically divided into a large number of independant cities, provinces and islands. The currently available evidences point out to a dominant Etruscan, Greek and Roman cultural influence on today's Italians.
Why is it difficult for most persons to read a Latin document? You may think that it is because they never studied Latin in school. The real answer is that some of the words appear unfamiliar to you. On the positive side, you probably already know enough Latin words to pick out a few of them in a d...