Discover Puglia

Introduction

Puglia is the heel of Italy — a long, narrow region with around 800 km of coast, more than any other on the mainland, and the flattest terrain in the country. It faces east across the Adriatic toward Albania and Greece, and for most of its history that mattered more than its connection to Rome.

The region reads as a sequence of distinct places rather than one. The Gargano promontory in the north is limestone and forest; the Tavoliere below it is a wheat plain; the Valle d'Itria in the middle is the country of trulli, drystone cones with conical roofs; and the Salento, the tip of the heel, is hotter, drier and closer to Greece in feel than to anywhere north of Naples.

What holds it together is stone and olives. Puglia produces roughly 40% of Italy's olive oil, and the towns — Lecce, Ostuni, Martina Franca — are built from the soft local limestone that carves easily and weathers pale.

Geography

Puglia is the flattest region in Italy and the one with the longest mainland coast — roughly 800 km between the Adriatic and the Ionian. Limestone underlies almost all of it, which is why the water runs underground rather than in rivers.

Read the full Geography guide →

History

Puglia faced east for most of its history — Greek colonies, Byzantine rule, the Crusader ports, Ottoman raids. Its greatest buildings were left by outsiders passing through or ruling from elsewhere, and it was Italy's gateway to the Levant.

Read the full History guide →

Culture

Puglia's culture is Mediterranean and east-facing: Greek-derived dialects still spoken in the Salento, a tarantella danced to exorcise spider bites, and a Baroque carved in stone soft enough to work like wood.

Read the full Culture guide →

Climate Patterns

Hot, dry summers and mild winters, with more sunshine than almost anywhere in Italy. Rain falls mostly between October and March, and water scarcity is a permanent constraint rather than an occasional one.

Read the full Climate Patterns guide →

Food & Traditional Cuisine

Puglia's cooking is cucina povera in its purest form — wheat, vegetables, olive oil and almost no meat — and it is among the best regional food in Italy precisely because of that discipline.

Read the full Food & Traditional Cuisine guide →