centro storico, difensivo, Acquaviva delle Fonti

On the Murge plateau, 35 km south of Bari, Acquaviva delle Fonti is a consolidated town whose historic core still reads as a purposeful medieval settlement. Its physical margins, natural and artificial, are defined by roads and the historic quarters that grew up around them. The old centre was laid out to the south, and within it, functions of worship, production, craft, defence and dwelling were all woven together.

The Normans were the first to give Acquaviva a defensive shape. Twelfth-century documents record that Count Cornulo, the first Norman feudal lord, had the initial circuit of walls built, and, likely on earlier foundations, the oldest part of the castle. By mid-century, Count Roberto Gurgulione added new chambers to the castle and ordered the construction of the earliest church of S. Eustachio. In the 1200s, under the patronage of Filippo Cinardo, a figure in Frederick II’s orbit, the walls were substantially remade. Growth continued into the 14th and 15th centuries, when successive lords expanded the castle. The wars of the late 15th century, however, left the town badly damaged, with its castle and walls partly destroyed.

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