Italy，as a country with a long tradition and distinct culture of rule of law，has already formed a unique and complete tax system after going through three stages of historical development. This article aims to retrospect the historical evolution of the Italian tax system，analyze its main content and summarize its characteristics. With the change of the international and domestic environment，the Italian tax system has kept pace with the times in terms of the source of tax law，principal tax institutions，tax collection and administration system，and finally formed the distinct national characteristics：by taking into account international，EU and domestic law，Italy has formed a diversified tax law source in the process of dynamically dealing with the relationship between central and local taxes；in the design of the tax system，Italy takes tax fairness as the basic principle，while taking into account the inheritance of cultural heritage and environmental protection；in terms of tax collection and administration，advanced technological means and strict punishment mechanisms are used to strengthen tax risk prevention and control. It can’t be ignored that there are also some persistent problems in Italian tax system，including complicated operation mechanism，widespread tax evasion，narrow tax base and high marginal tax rate etc.，which means the tax system needs to be further improved in the future.