Since 1 January 2002 (seeValuta at www.vatican.va, retrieved 23 October 2009). Before 2002, the currency was theVatican lira, on a par with theItalian lira.
Vatican City (/ˈvætkənˈsɪti/(listen); officiallyVatican City State,Italian:Stato della Città del Vaticano)[6] (also sometimes referred to asthe Vatican) is the smallestcountry in the world bysize, at 0.49 km² and by population.[7] It is also one of the world's threecity-states.
Itsterritory is completely surrounded byItaly and it is only one of three countries in the world that areenclaves of another country (the others beingSan Marino, also in Italy, andLesotho in southern Africa). Also, it is the only country in the world that is an enclave of acity, as all of the land around it is part ofRome, the capital of Italy. The Vatican City is acity-state, because all its territory isurban and built-up.
The Pope used to rule thePapal States, which included most of Italy. Catholic popes had generally tried to stop Italy from becoming one country because they feared they would lose their control of at least one of the Papal States.[source?] In 1861 Italy was unified under the King of Savoy, butRome andLatium remained unconquered. On September 20, 1870 Italian troops invaded. Rome became capital of the newkingdom.
ThePope claimed he was a prisoner of the Italian state andexcommunicated all the people who helped invade the Papal state. This stopped Catholics from taking part in public life under Catholic government.
In 1929Benito Mussolini, decided to sign an agreement withPope Pius XI, called theLateran Treaty, which gave the territory of the Vatican to the Pope. Another treaty gave the Vatican money each year to compensate for the lost territories.
The governmentstructure is atheocracy (a country governed by a religion particularly by theHoly See) with thePope as the head. The pope is elected by the College of Cardinals whicha rebishops andarchbishops of theRoman Catholic Church, allowing one to lead both the religion and city-state. The Pope also holds the title of "Bishop of Rome".
The Pope is the head of state or sovereign of the Vatican and holds the office until death or resignation therefore his title is officially "the Sovereign". The government and legislature is thePontifical Commission for Vatican City State.
Vatican City has a population of 526. Thecitizens of the Vatican include thePope, all thecardinals, all thenuncios (who is theequivalent of anambassador) and otherdiplomats, all theSwiss Guards, and other important people. Also, there are 372 Vatican citizens who live in other countries, including cardinals and nuncios. Vatican citizenship cannot be passed tochildren andspouses; and, except for the Pope and cardinals, Vatican citizenship is lost when the term of office comes to an end, for the Swiss Guards, nuncios and diplomats, and other people working for the Holy See.[8]
The Vatican does have a law declaring anofficial language.Italian is the most used language, and the only official language in Vatican City.[9] TheHoly See's official language isLatin, but its working language is Italian.[10][11]
↑ITU-T assigned code 379 to Vatican City. However, Vatican City is included in the Italian telephone numbering plan and uses the Italian country code 39, followed by 06 (for Rome) and 698.
↑In accordance with paragraph 2 of theLegge sulle fonti del diritto of 7 June 1929, all laws and regulations of the state are published in the Italian languageSupplemento per le leggi e disposizioni dello Stato della Città del Vaticano attached to theActa Apostolicae Sedis. The text of the first seven items published in that supplement is givenhere.Archived 2010-12-27 at theWayback Machine While the state itself uses only Italian, many other languages are used by institutions situated within the state, such as theHoly See, thePontifical Swiss Guard, and thePontifical Academy of Sciences. The Holy See usesLatin as an official language and French as a diplomatic language; in addition, itsSecretariat of State uses English, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish. The Swiss Guard, in which commands on parade are given in German, also uses French and Italian in all its official ceremonies.
↑Visitors and tourists are not permitted to drive inside the Vatican without specific permission, which is normally granted only to those who have business with some office in the Vatican.
1.Transcontinental country/territory that is part of both Europe and Asia. 2. Territory or with territory geographically part of North America. 3. Partially recognized. 4. Not all dependent territories are listed. 5. Territory has some form of self-rule. 6. Territory or with territory geographically part of Africa. 7. Governed by theHoly See.
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![Location of Vatican City (green) on the European continent (dark grey) — [Legend]](/mt/?noimg=&dark=on&url=https%3a%2f%2fsimple.wikipedia.org%2fwiki%2fFile%3aLocation_Vatican_City_Europe.png)
