CAPODANNO PUGLIA E BASILICATA

Altamura

The historic center of Altamura has a strong identity: with its 3,199 inhabitants, it has a history and characteristics that allow it to be considered a small village within the city. Altamura rises in the province of Bari, inland, and makes part of the Gal Terre di Murgia. More than 12,000 hectares of its territory are included in the Alta Murgia National Park, in which there is one of the largest dolines in the Murgia, the Pulo di Altamura. The city of Altamura has many peculiarities that make it known and a destination for visitors. It is known above all for its archaeological heritage and for the architectural beauties of its historic center. The sweet and rich territory has favored, over time, the development of a flourishing agriculture, particularly dedicated to the cultivation of cereals, next to which it is developed the grain processing industry, with the production of different types of groats and flour. Religious and historical symbol of the city of Altamura is its Romanesque cathedral, dedicated to the Assumption, built in 1232 by Frederick II. Much of the original church collapsed during the earthquake of 1316 and was rebuilt during the reign of Roberto D'Angiò. Of the cathedral, what most draws the visitor's gaze is its portal, in Gothic style, rich in decorations and sculptures, and the arches on which 22 scenes depicting the life of Christ are sculpted. Also seeing is the monumental organ made by master organists of Turin: the sound of its 29 reeds, for power and richness of nuances, manages to give the impression of listening to an entire orchestra. In the cathedral are kept two important paintings representing nineteenth-century Italian painting: the Conversion of St. Paul by Domenico Morelli and the Maddalena by Francesco Netti. The Sanctuary of the Madonna del Buon Cammino, located on the road that once led to Bari, to 1747. It was built by the canon Giambattista Nicolai instead of a small niche that represented a sign of protection for travelers, along the path that crossed the streets of the Murgia, often solitary and insidious roads. Other important churches of the city are the church of the Madonna del Rosario, of the Sacred Heart, of San Giovanni Bosco, of Santa Maria della Consolazione, of San Nicola and of the Santissima Trinità. However, the city is also famous for the Man of Altamura, one of the most important archaeological finds in the area. It is a human fossil found in the cave of Lamalunga: the dating are still ongoing but findings on the DNA, taken from a scapula, seem to place it in the Neanderthaliano period.The Man of Altamura however is not the only visible trace of a very past remote. In fact, just 4 kilometers from the city, in a quarry of the Pontrelli locality, dinosaur footprints have been found fossilized in a calcareous mass in an excellent state of conservation. Another peculiarity to visit is the Pulo, a dolina of Karst origins that appears in the form of chasm and that is created by the continuous flow of water at that point. The diameter of the Pulo is about 500 meters and its maximum depth of 75. Of considerable anthropological interest is the Ethnographic Museum of the peasant culture, where objects related to crafts, agriculture, pastoralism and viticulture are exhibited, along with finds of traditional clothing and ancient games, all dating back to the period between the end from the 1800s and 1930s. ABMC (Archivio Biblioteca Museo Civico) boasts a collection of 13 incunabula, 434 cinquecentine, 140 parchments, about 90,000 pages of manuscripts, as well as an important photographic archive and architectural drawings of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Matera

Matera is one of the oldest cities in the world whose territory holds evidence of human settlements starting from the Paleolithic and without interruption until today. It represents an extraordinary page written by man through the millennia of this long history.Matera is the city of the Sassi, the original urban nucleus, developed from the natural caves carved into the rock and subsequently modeled in increasingly complex structures within two large natural amphitheaters that are the Sasso Caveoso and the Sasso Barisano.In 1993 the UNESCO declares the Sassi of Matera World Heritage Site. The Sassi of Matera are the 6th site in Italy in chronological order, the first in the south. the occasion of this inscription, for the first time UNESCO uses in its criteria and motivations the concept of Cultural Landscape, which will later be used to motivate the registration of other sites in the world. On 17 October 2014 Matera was designated European Capital of Culture for 2019Matera is at the center of an incredible rock landscape that preserves a great heritage of culture and traditions, and is venue for exhibitions of great national and international prestige. Mattera is a city with a fascinating and complex history: a border town, a city of contrasts, competition and a fusion of landscapes, civilizations, cultures and different cultures. From the rock civilization to those of Byzantine and Eastern origin, to the advent of the Normans, the systematic attempt to reduce the rock city to the rules of the culture of the European city: from the Romanesque to the Renaissance, to the Baroque, the last eight centuries of construction and finishing of the city have tried to shape, overcome the natural resistance of the pre-existing rock habitat, determining architectures and urban arrangements of particular quality and originality.Today, again in the sign of European urban culture, aspects of the challenge of redevelopment, sustainable recovery, reconquest of the lost identity are the activities that have brought to the fore this unique city that has become a world heritage of humanity. On the basis of this particular historical event, Matera now offers its visitors the fascinating sensation of discovering, on the original thread of their own culture, their emotions, the between cce, sometimes seemingly humble, sometimes cultured, of the competition that has long characterized the city.

Alberobello

Alberobello, in Puglia, with its Trulli is one of the 53 Italian sites included by UNESCO in the World Heritage List. The name derives from the late Greek τρούλος, or "dome" and indicates the ancient conical constructions in dry stone of prehistoric origin. The stone used for the buildings was made from the limestone rocks of the Murge plateau.The Trulli, mainly present in the Valle d'Itria, located between the provinces of Brindisi, Bari and Taranto, are still used today as homes and are a brilliant long-lived example of spontaneous architecture. Alberobello, a town in the hinterland of Bari, is undoubtedly the capital of the Trulli: the historic center is made up entirely of these particular pyramid-shaped buildings that make it unique in the world.