Vicenza is a city in northeastern Italy. It is in the Veneto region, at the northern base of the Monte Berico, where it straddles the River Bacchiglione. Vicenza is approximately 60 kilometres (37 mi) west of Venice and 200 kilometres (120 mi) east of Milan.

Vicenza is a thriving and cosmopolitan city, with a rich history and culture, and many museums, art galleries, piazzas, villas, churches and elegant Renaissance palazzi. With the Palladian villas of the Veneto in the surrounding area, and his renowned Teatro Olimpico ("Olympic Theater"), the "city of Palladio" has been listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1994.

Vicentia was settled by the Italic Euganei tribe and then by the Paleo-Veneti tribe in the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC. The Romans allied themselves with the Paleo-Veneti in their fight against the Celtic tribes that populated north-western Italy.

The Roman presence in the area grew exponentially over time and the Paleo-Veneti (whose culture mirrored Etruscan and Greek values more so than Celtic ones) were gradually assimilated. [citation needed] In 157 BC, the city was a de facto Roman centre and was given the name of Vicetia or Vincentia, meaning "victorious".

During the decline of the Western Roman Empire, Heruls, Vandals, Alaric and his Visigoths, as well as the Huns laid waste to the area, but the city recovered after the Ostrogoth conquest in 489 AD, before being conquered by the Byzantine Empire soon after. It was also an important Lombard city and then a Frankish center. Numerous Benedictine monasteries were built in the Vicenza area, beginning in the 6th century.

In 899, Vicenza was destroyed by Magyar raiders.

In 1001, Otto III handed over the government of the city to the bishop, and its communal organization had an opportunity to develop, separating soon from the episcopal authority. It took an active part in the League with Verona and, most of all, in the Lombard League (1164–1167) against Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa compelling Padua and Treviso to join: its podestà, Ezzelino II il Balbo, was captain of the league. When peace was restored, however, the old rivalry with Padua, Bassano, and other cities was renewed, besides which there were the internal factions of the Vivaresi (Ghibellines) and the Maltraversi (Guelphs).

The tyrannical Ezzelino III from Bassano drove the Guelphs out of Vicenza, and caused his brother, Alberico, to be elected podestà in 1230. The independent commune joined the Second Lombard League against Emperor Frederick II who sacked the city in 1237, after which it was annexed to Ezzelino's dominions. On his death the old oligarchic republic political structure was restored – a consiglio maggiore ("grand council") of four hundred members and a consiglio minore ("small council") of forty members – and it formed a league with Padua, Treviso and Verona. Three years later the Vicentines entrusted the protection of the city to Padua, so as to safeguard republican liberty; but this protectorate (custodia) quickly became dominion, and for that reason Vicenza in 1311 submitted to the Scaligeri lords of Verona, who fortified it against the Visconti of Milan.

Vicenza came under the rule of the Republic of Venice in 1404, and its subsequent history is that of Venice. It was besieged by the Emperor Sigismund, and Maximilian I held possession of it in 1509 and 1516.

The 16th century was the time of Andrea Palladio, who left many outstanding examples of his art with palaces and villas in the city's territory, which before Palladio's passage, was arguably the most downtrodden and esthetically lacking city in Veneto.

After the Fall of the Venetian Republic in 1797, under Napoleonic rule, it was made a duché grand-fief (not a grand duchy, but a hereditary (extinguished in 1896), nominal duchy, a rare honor reserved for French officials) within Napoleon's personal Kingdom of Italy for general Caulaincourt, also imperial Grand-Écuyer. One of the consequences of the city's occupation was the destruction of a prized silver model of the city, the Jewel of Vicenza.

After 1814, Vicenza passed to the Austrian Empire. In 1848, however, the populace rose against Austria, more violently than in any other Italian centre apart from Milan and Brescia (the city would receive the highest award for military valour for the courage displayed by revolutionaries in this period). As a part of the Kingdom of Lombardy–Venetia, it was annexed to Italy after the Third War of Italian independence.

Vicenza's area was a location of major combat in both World War I and World War II

Vicenza is home to the US Army post Caserma Ederle (Camp Ederle), also known as the U.S. Army Garrison Vicenza.

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