This tiny town looks like it has been plucked from the pages of a fairytale.  There is no other place like this in the world. The small town has been made a UNESCO World Heritage site for its unusual districts of trulli, the characteristic white-washed conical-roofed houses made of roughly worked limestone boulders collected from the fields.  They feature pyramidal, domed, or conical roofs built up of limestone slabs.  This prehistoric building technique is still in use in this region.

The story behind Alberobello Trulli is a typically Italian one: its design was to fiddle with taxes and fool the authorities. A trullo was originally constructed as a temporary field shed. The local feudal lord moved his peasant workers here to clear woodland and cultivate the land. To avoid laws and taxes, it was important that Alberobello was not considered an inhabited settlement. So until 1797, when it was finally given ‘town’ status, the people had to live in trulli, which could be dismantled in a hurry when necessary. 

During the 19th century, the trulli were no longer being dismantled, and those we see today date back to the 19th and 20th centuries.  These days the majority of Alberobello’s residents don’t reside in Trulli. The town’s 1,500+ wonderfully preserved and restored trulli have evolved into souvenir shops, restaurants, and lodging for visitors.

To build a trullo, the rock on the floor of the house was excavated to form a cistern. A limestone floor was constructed over the cistern and masonry walls of limestone blocks were built in a circular structure (without the use of mortar or cement). This was topped by the conical roof of large limestone bricks and an outer layer of smaller, gray-colored, limestone tiles.  A spire, a white ornament sits on top of the roof. Some trullo have shapes drawn on the roof, which can be a primitive symbol, a Christian symbol, or a magical symbol.

We did see some rural trulli along the Itria Valley, but the highest concentration and best-preserved examples of this architectural form are in the town of Alberobello, where there are over 1500 structures.  Several shops in town have an upper-level terrace where you can look across the rooftops of the trulli.  It was clear, however, with the massive number of tour groups,  that tourism is now at the core of much of this town and as a result has changed its character.

Olive Oil Tasting….yum!

Our visit to this Olive Oil processing plant to learn the ins and outs of the oil-making process was nice….it would have been better if my taste buds were more alive and discriminating! We tasted lots of levels of the oils…as well as some tapenades. When tasting the oil, we were told to “slurp” it back into our mouth!

This olive tree that Judy, Pat, and I are standing by is over 1000 years old!!