Looking for the roots of my wife’s mother’s family in Polignano-a-Mare, I ended up finding the town of Alberobello. See the post about Polignano-a-Mare on this site. From then on when I mention Italy, I always bring light to this city that looks more like a fairy tale.
The vast majority of the town houses are trullos, a type of construction typical of the region, round houses with cone-shaped roof. Visiting Apulia, we can observe trullos scattered in various parts, but only in Alberobello they are concentrated and form a city.
Trullos are completely made of interleaved stones. Nowadays cement is already used, but the original trullos were made only with stones, mainly the roof and were supposedly temporary dwellings. This type of construction requires an expert, a mason called a trullisto. Some trullos in Alberobello display on the roof religious and pagan symbols painted with white paint. No one can say for sure why. One can also find a trullo church and a two-story trullho, the only one known to exist, which used to be the residence of the local parish priest.
Legend has it that the Trullos became popular because they were easily disassembled in order to circumvent the tax inspection of Naples, which at that time was dominated by the Spanish and ruled by Viceroy of the Kingdom of Naples. It is interesting to note that the Catholic Kings integrated and united Spain in the late 15th century (1401-1500), while Italy was only unified around 1860, the so-called Risorgimento. Before that, Italy was formed by a collection of independent states submitted to foreign powers.
In central part of Alberobello, whose name can be translated as beautiful tree, there are beyond the souvenir shops, a market with fruits and products from the region, restaurants and ice cream parlors, my favorites.
Visiting Alberobello is like being in another world. A magical world of flavors and images, hard to forget. I’m sure one of these days Disney will also discover Alberobello and then the whole world will know!
Do you have a story to tell? Send us an email and we’ll post it.