According to the legend which Virgil tells in the Aeneid when he narrates the story of Antenore and his escape from Troy in flames. the Trojan hero landed in the upper Adriatic and there he is supposed to have founded Padua, in approximately 1183 -1185 B.C..
Archeological research has established that the first human settlement in the area on which 'Padua. will rise, can be dated from the Eleventh to the Tenth Century B. C. and the area has been traced to the actual heart of the city, in front of the University. Here in fact a curve of the River Brenta had its exact centre the ancient Medoacus before forking and reaching the Adriatic sea through the Venetian Lagoon.
In this area around the VI/Ith and VI/th centuries. the first nucleii of Padua 's ancestors. the Paleoveneti begin to settle, whose civilization spread further onto both banks of the Brenta, forming the first urban centre with its own places of worship and its own burial grounds. In 302 B. C. it was these "Veneti" that chased the Spartan king Cleonimo, who was pillaging various villages, out of the Venetian Lagoon. (T. Livy). Afterwards, with the Gaul invasions, the Veneti sided with Rome (Polibio) and it was always to Rome they turned to settle internal fighting (T. Livy) in the Second Century B. C.
The 'Romanization " process was, however, slowand peaceful. At first the Veneti were "associates" of Rome, then they were given the rights of the Latin Lawandfinally those of Rome. In 59 B.C., in a completely 'romanized' city Titus Livy was born and in 49 B.C. Patavium became a Roman "municipium". Now the city had a defined urban physiognomy, due to the Forum where the present squares are, the river port (where today the University stands) and its still existing, though interred, bridges, and outside its walls, the arena to the north and the theatre to the south, where today Prato della Valle is located. Itsforce was in commerce. A centre of land and river trading and in the production of wool which was famous throughout the Roman Empire. Its territory was organized according to the subdivision into centuries, above all in the northern area towards Castelfranco, and the south towards Piove di Sacco. The relative tranquillity which it enjoyed in the early centuries of the Christian Era allowed the spreading of Christianity, above all due to Bishop Prosdocimo who, with Saint Justina (Giustina), martyred by Emperor Maximilian, became one of the city's patron saints.
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