feu_241690 - SAN MARINO 5 Euro ANNÉE INTERNATIONALE DE L’ASTRONOMIE 2009 Rome

SAN MARINO

(13th century - nowadays)

The small republic of San Marino, south of Rimini, has been free since the 13th century. In the 15th century, it gave itself a Grand Council of sixty members recruited from the nobility and the bourgeoisie. In the 19th century it was a bastion for revolutionaries and it placed itself under the protection of the new Italian kingdom from 1862, which respected its independence. The members of the Grand Council are elected for four years by universal suffrage (introduced in 1909); two of them exercise executive power as captains-regent for six months.