Caprarica di Lecce (source: Visual Puglia )
Caprarica di Lecce is a small Salento town located at about 12 km from Lecce on the northern slopes of the Galugnano sierra. Some scholars, including Arditi, hold that the name of small town once was “capra-ricca” (rich goat). In fact, the main activity of its population was goat breeding for the production of milk, as depicted in the old town’s coat of arms that has a goat on top of a hill with a tree on the left and three five-pointed stars on the right separated by an inclined chequered strip overlapping a buckler on a light blue background. The coat of arms of the municipality recalls the events of the local history during the Seignory of Counts Guarino and Prince Prosperus Adorno. Documentary evidence concerning the town date back to the XI century, when Caprarica was certainly ruled by the Normans with Geoffrey of Altavilla, King of Sicily and of the entire County of Lecce. Subsequently, there was a massive inflow of the Roca population fleeing from areas conquered by the Turks. Afterwards, the Orsini from Balzo took possession of the settlement, which later passed to the Princes Adorno in 1561, to the Giustiniani – who took the title of Marquis of Caprarica – and to the Barons Rossi, whose feudal castle is still preserved today.
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Sun, sea, wind. Nature strikes in the first place, when one gets to this land stretch in balance between two seas. Salento has its core in the province of Lecce, - a Baroque Florence in Southern Italy – and reaches the provinces of Brindisi over the Adriatic Sea, and Taranto on the Ionian Sea side. The cities and inland towns expressions of the unique Lecce Baroque with Messapi and Salento Grecìa can still be seen. Its language, songs and feasts still show the culture of Graecia Magna. Surf, kite-surf and windsurf lovers never miss the beaches facing the Alimini lakes, while scuba diving fans just have to choose among the several equipped centers and charming sea beds of the Ionian coast as well as of the area between Otranto and Santa Maria di Leuca.
Church and hermitage of Santa Maria of the Angels - Scorrano
Lighthouse and aqueduct - Santa Maria di Leuca
Salento coast is characterized by a high variety in landscapes: the clear, fine sand beaches of Santa Cesarea seafront; famous caves such as Castro cave with its Grotta Romanelli, one of the most important Italian prehistoric settlements, and Grotta Zinzulusa, 'the pearl of caves', owing its name to the dialect word 'zinzuli', ('rags'), used by fishermen to indicate its beautiful stalactites and stalagmites
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Baroque style affirmed in Apulia during Counter-Reformation upon the will of Roman Church. A way of exalting Catholic symbols, Lecce and Nardò Baroque has its own characteristics that make it different from the same artistic style in other regions. Its peculiarities derive from the use of amber-colored Lecce stone as well as decorations used to mask the structures on which they are mounted
In Southern Apulia, at the heart of Salento, nine municipalities united to save what is still left of the ancient Grika culture. In this area of Salento there can still be found traces of Graecia Magna Grika language spoken in the Basilian convents dismantled after the council of Trent
Project created in collaboration with InnovaPuglia.
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