• 
• 

Ordona lies at the border of the “Tavoliere di Puglia”, the hilly area once called Herdonia. Settled in the Neolithic age, Herdonia was an important Daunian centre and an ally of Rome, for which reason it was destroyed by Pyrrhus first and subsequently by Hannibal, which used it as an outpost during the Punic Wars.
Conquered by the Romans later, it had a considerable importance as a communication hub (roads). At the end of the II century a.C., this town had a period of decline, a condition that worsened in the IV century, although it was a diocesan centre. A first rebirth was experienced in the IX century, under Byzantium’s empire, in spite of the continuous clashes between Byzantine Catapans and Lombards, as well as Norman and Saracen raids.
It was thanks to Frederick II of Hohenstaufen that Ordona was reinforced with the construction of a castle on the ruins of a previous church, which will be later destroyed (in 1489) by Ferdinand of Aragon. The town will rise again around a “rural residence built by Jesuits in 1608, after the colonization ordered by the King of Naples in 1774.