centro storico, collinare, difensivo, commerciale, Oria, Uria (denominazione storica)

On a low hill south-west of Brindisi, Oria, once called Uria, then Hyria, holds a position that has served it since the Mycenaean age. According to tradition, Cretan settlers chose this defensible rise some thirty-five centuries ago; later it became a Messapian stronghold, then a Roman way-station on the Appian Way. When the Western Empire fell, the settlement contracted, its people pulling back within a fortified borgo. Byzantine rule gave way to Norman conquest, then to the Hohenstaufen, who raised a castle here; later still it passed to the Angevin princes of Taranto. Throughout the Middle Ages, Oria prospered as the natural midpoint of the isthmus route between Taranto and Brindisi, a pivot of local trade and travel. The medieval layout is still legible: the circuit of walls, the narrow quarters once given over to worship, craft, hospitality and daily life. It is a town shaped by its margins, natural slopes and man-made defences, and by the long, patient accumulation of centuries.

Description via source. Coordinates and heritage data from the Atika atlas.