If the Ancient Greeks were from Greece why were the Romans not called the Ancient Italians?

Answer 1

Because that's what they were. Italy, as a political entity, did not exist: the standard political unit in the classical world was the city-state. While an Athenian might also think of himself as Greek, as there were many city-states in Greece, a Roman looked down on mere Italians, as Rome was totally dominant in its sphere of Italy.

Romans were Italians - end of story. However they were citizens of Rome, just as Neapolitans were citizens of Naples (didn't call themselves Italians either).

However the Romans, as usual winners, thought of themselves as dominant, and even though eventually the other Italian peoples and cities were allied to them, they did not treat them as equals - Romans had superior legal rights, and exploited them too in commercial dealings with their allies. This led to what has been called the Social War (socii = allies) in the early 1st Century BCE, where many of Rome's Italian allies revolted. It was a close run thing, and when it eventually scraped home, Rome learnt and extended Roman citizenship to all its Italian allies, who, while Italians too, also became Romans.

Roman citizenship was gradually extended to other ethnics as the empire expanded. By three hundred years later, all peoples in the empire were given Roman citizenship and became Romans, whether they were Latins, other Italians, Greeks, Gauls, Britons, Spaniards, Syrians or whatever.

Answer 2

because at that time it was the Roman Empire not Italy

Answer 3

Yes