San Marino

San Marino, officially the Republic of San Marino, perches on Monte Titano in the Apennines entirely inside Italy, sixty-one square kilometres and thirty-four thousand people, the fifth-smallest country on earth, ruled from the City of San Marino with Dogana its largest town and nine castelli around them. Legend says Marinus the stonemason fled Diocletian's persecution from Rab in 301 and raised a chapel and a free community on the mountain; commune, statutes and councils followed, and the little republic bought, begged and outlasted popes, Malatestas, Montefeltros and Napoleons. Its strangeness is constitutional: the Grand and General Council elects two Captains Regent every six months from opposing parties to reign together over council, courts and ceremonies. Garibaldi hid here in 1849 and spared it in return, Lincoln wrote as a fellow republican across the ocean, Italy fenced but never swallowed it, and neutrality, stamps and coins carried the mountaintop republic untouched through 1945.