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The city is placed on the
oriental extremity of the salentinian peninsula: crossroad and
point of meeting of so many cultures. It is difficult to
withstand the charm of its gardens, terraces, the golden and
sandy beaches, rich of rock-cliffs and sandy shores, the
exclusive bays, the narrow streets of the ancient suburb
closed in the Aragonese boundaries. It was a Roman municipium
with the name of Hydruntum. This name probably comes from the
near Hydro river.
The
coat-of-arms...
The coat-of-arms of
Otranto is represented by a tower, around which a snake is
wound. It remembers a local legend according to which every
night a sea snake climbed on the top of the Roman lighthouse
"The Tower of the Snake" (now it is only a ruin) to drink the
oil with which the lighthouse was fed causing the shipwreck of
the sailors. Only on 28 th July 1480 this fact didn't happen,
as to warn the population of the arrival of the Turks that
caused Antonio Primaldo's martyrdom and the death of his
companions (800 martyrs in Otranto).
The history and
art
Otranto has got a
prehistoric origin. Here there are beautiful graffiti and
paintings realized with ochre and guano (coming back from 7000
years ago) in the "Grotta dei Cervi" (Cave of the Bucks),
there is also the abbey of "San Nicola di Casole", it was the
first house of the student in western Europe (1160), there are
the frescos in the crypts of the "Valle delle Memorie" (Valley
of Memories), the monks hermits' caves, the boundaries and the
bastions, the Castle rebuilt in 1482, the mosaic floor of the
Cathedral (800 square metres) of 1163, which represents the
tree of life from which various figures issue. They are
probably tied to the Breton cycle and to the medieval
bestiario. The mosaic floor of the Cathedral together with the
frescos and the Byzantine architecture of the Church of "San
Pietro" complete the artistic and historical beauties of the
place. Witnesses of the roman period are the cippi and the
columns, inside the boundaries together with the terrible
stone balls with which the city was bombed in 1480 by the
Turks.
Outskirts and
nature.
The wonderful fiord of
Porto Badisco deserves to be mentioned because, according to
the legend, it was the mythical landing of Enea. There is also
a delicious messapic ipogeo, the dolmens and the menhirs, the
Bay of "Dell' Orte" the land in the far east of Italy made up
by the lighthouse of the Palascìa, the sea erosion called "La
Marmitta dei Giganti" (the giants' pot) at the base of the
tower of "Santo Emiliano", the wild orchids which sprout in
autumn and spring, the Alimini lakes, the little pond that
rises in an ancient extracts of bauxite, the "Massi della
Vecchia", enormous megaliths tied up to old popular
legends.
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