Aspetti della facies urbana e architettonica in Terra d’Otranto tra XIV e XV secolo: il borgo nuovo di Francavilla

The report intends to reconstruct the urban and architectural facies of a new (and Frankish) village of the ancient province of Terra d’Otranto, which arose, like others in southern Italy, in the Angevin age. The object of study will be Francavilla (today Francavilla Fontana, in the province of Brindisi), a center of which it has been possible to briefly retrace the historical, political and socio-economic events of the 14th and 15th centuries. The founding of the village takes place in a climate of momentum and greatness of the Angevin family of Taranto, promoter both of initiatives aimed at strengthening the port structures and the mercantile functions of coastal centers such as Brindisi and Taranto, and of policies aimed at enhancing the uncultivated and to encourage population. The foundation of Francavilla contributed to the more or less incisive contraction of some of the neighboring villages. In the last part of the Middle Ages it was affected by a significant process of population, which favored, to the detriment of the neighboring communities, its socio-economic and political development, but also urban and architectural development.