Alberobello is an adorable little town characterized by the trulli - little stone huts constructed from roughly worked limestone that is so plentiful in this area of Puglia. This is a prehistoric building technique that has been used for thousands of years, but it was in the 14th & 15th centuries that it was most prevalent. Historians believe this is because of an edict out of Napoli that imposed taxes on new urban settlements during this time. People needed buildings that could be easily demolished to avoid paying up. When the king’s delegate would show up to collect the taxes, one could simply remove the keystone and the house would quickly be reduced to a pile of rubble.
Because it is such a simple - and irresistibly adorable - technique using materials so plentiful to this region, people continue to build trulli in much the same way to this day. Driving through southern Puglia, we constantly see them dotting the landscape. Little sheds are trullo sheds. Farmhouses are a collection of little trulli cones. I even saw a trullo doghouse. These people clearly found something that worked and stuck with it, with incredibly cute results.
The main bit of Alberobello is a dense collection of trulli, most of which were built from the 14th to the 17th centuries. Of course most have been updated with the modern amenities so one can live or run a little shop very comfortably. Walking through the trulli neighbourhood, which is comprised of several little steep and winding streets, is genuinely like walking through a fairly tale. You can’t help but expect to see all kinds of creepy and magical characters come out at you - and they do, in the form of cats who act like this place was built entirely for them.
It’s become a fashion to paint astrological and esoteric symbols on trullo roofs to ward off evil and bring good fortune. Like everything else around here, the result is picturesque af.
Trullo garden shed in a small olive grove.
Liquid gatto has had enough of your bullshit.
Cityscape.
Arriving at our very own little trullo
Holding up this trullo with the force of my mind…
Trullo cathedral! Omg!
This lil Toto dog trotted by us every day we were here. Either that, or there is an identical dog on every block in Alberobello…
