Rome

A city on the Tiber River in central Italy, built across a cluster of low hills roughly fifteen miles inland from the Tyrrhenian Sea. Its inland but river-connected site gave it access to the Mediterranean without the direct exposure to seaborne raiding that a pure coastal position would carry, a siting logic that recurs across many of the ancient world's durable capitals. The surrounding countryside, the Roman Campagna, supplied the city with grain and produce, while the Tiber itself was navigable to small craft up to the city and served as the shortest crossing point between Italy's Tyrrhenian and interior regions for centuries.