Are you ready to start your new online venture or creative endeavor?

Make it happen with Squarespace, the all-in-one platform to build an online presence and follow your dream.

But more on that at the end of the video.

During the first half of the 11th century,

southern Italy was a tinderbox just waiting to go off.

In the peninsula itself, no less than three independent Lombard statelets

vied for power with their Byzantine Eastern Roman neighbours.

Leftovers from the days of Justinian.

These Latin-speaking descendants of Germanic invaders had their own unique Germanic laws,

and increasingly looked to the Pope in Rome for guidance,

often enticing the neighbouring Lombard imperial subjects

of the Byzantines into rebellion.

The first state to arise had been Benevento, which eventually splintered into two states

when Celero seized its independence

through fire and blood in the 9th century.

Next was Capua,

which became independent once more towards the end of the millennium.

Just to the north, the papacy in Rome

ever attempted to mediate in matters, whilst fighting

its own battles against the ever-present German kingdom to the north, yet another continent-spanning

superpower seeking to further its own ends in the region.

Finally, to the south in Sicily, an independent Islamic Emirate had thrived for

...