Roman praetor Marcus Aemilius Lepidus, governor of Sicily in 191 BCE, gains the office of consul in 187.

He and his colleague, Gaius Flaminius, subdue the Ligurians.

Ancient Ligures had settled the Mediterranean coast from Rhône to Arno, but later Gallic migration has mixed and produced the Gallo-Ligurian culture.

He oversees construction of the Via Aemilia, a Roman Road from the town of Piacenza to …

…Rimini, still in use and one of the most important roads in Northern Italy.

The territory around Modena (Roman Mutina, Etruscan Muoina) was inhabited by the Villanovans in the Iron Age, and later by Ligurian tribes, Etruscans, and the Gaulish Boii (the settlement itself being Etruscan).

Although the exact date of its foundation is unknown, it is known that it was already in existence in the third century BCE, for in 218 BCE, during Hannibal's invasion of Italy, the Boii revolted and laid siege to the city.

Livy described it as a fortified citadel where Roman magistrates took shelter.

The outcome of the siege is not known, but the city was most likely abandoned after Hannibal's arrival.

Mutina is refounded as a Roman colony in 183 BCE, to be used as a military base by Marcus Aemilius Lepidus.

Lepidus, having founded several cities and inaugurated an ambitious building program in Italy, is pontifex maximus from 180 onward and from 179 BCE is princeps senatus.

This same year he is also elected censor.

The Pons Aemilius is built across spanning across the Tiber to connect the Forum Boarium with Trastevere.

The oldest piers of the bridge had probably been laid in the mid-third century BCE when the Via Aurelia was constructed.

Initially constructed in 179 BCE with stone pillars and a wooden superstructure, it is regarded as the world's first stone bridge.

The bridge will be fitted in 142 BCE wholly with six stone arches but a single arch in mid-river is all that remains today, lending the bridge the name Ponte rotto ('Broken bridge').