Matera Sassi
(65 km, 40 mi from Bari)
The Murgia Materana is a slightly undulating, bleak limestone plateau with Mediterranean maquis and copse woods. Its most striking feature is the sudden appearance of a deep gorge (70/80 m, 230/260 ft), through which a torrent runs. This is the so-called “Gravina di Matera.” The walls of this gully – and other, smaller caves – have been home over thousands of years to various forms of civilisation. From the troglodyte villages of the Neolithic period to the diverse Eastern-style cave dwelling habitats of the 8th - 10th centuries or the fortified Norman/Swabian citadels (11th - 13th centuries). Not forgetting the usual Renaissance expansion during the 15th and 16th centuries, or the striking and unforeseeable changes to town layouts practised during the Baroque period (17th and 18th centuries).It all led to a complex town layout with buildings piled on top of one another and over any available spaces or holes, roads becoming rooftops and water collection perfected in a system of channels and reservoirs. Rural social customs found such a system ideal for their feelings of mutual aid. Such are the Sassi di Matera - the oldest part of town. A breathtaking town plan. The result of a centuries-long anthropomorphisation of the most inhospitable type of land anyone could hope never to find. This was the result of centuries of living in caves and then a more civilised type of town with its “European culture.”Between the 19th and 20th centuries, the Sassi districts underwent a slow decline, and were lived in by the poorest elements of society (16,000 in 1950). Frightful social and health conditions were the norm.These impossible conditions during the last century left people no choice but to go and live in the caves. Carlo Levi understood this well in his novel “Christ stopped at Eboli,” which shone a spotlight on the complete abandonment of the area, although he has never been back since. Under the terms of the Transfer Planning Law of 1952, the Ministry of Public Works, Department of Agriculture and Forests and the Treasury Department ordered the eviction of residents in the Sassi, who were forcibly moved to specially built new homes in the suburbs. This dramatic solution to the terrible social and health conditions (but not to urban decay, which was to see Jerry-built housing increase) would later have its effects on society and the town’s own feelings of identity. The recovery of the ancient town and its identity was the main aim of the recovery programme in the Sassi district.This operation, both cultural and political, provided for a breath of life into the Sassi district of Matera in the 60’s and 70’s was based on the rich amalgam of ideas and suggestions which, in a more on-going European context, tended to bring city centres to the fore.
http://www.sassidimatera.it/
(65 km, 40 mi from Bari)
The Murgia Materana is a slightly undulating, bleak limestone plateau with Mediterranean maquis and copse woods. Its most striking feature is the sudden appearance of a deep gorge (70/80 m, 230/260 ft), through which a torrent runs. This is the so-called “Gravina di Matera.” The walls of this gully – and other, smaller caves – have been home over thousands of years to various forms of civilisation. From the troglodyte villages of the Neolithic period to the diverse Eastern-style cave dwelling habitats of the 8th - 10th centuries or the fortified Norman/Swabian citadels (11th - 13th centuries). Not forgetting the usual Renaissance expansion during the 15th and 16th centuries, or the striking and unforeseeable changes to town layouts practised during the Baroque period (17th and 18th centuries).It all led to a complex town layout with buildings piled on top of one another and over any available spaces or holes, roads becoming rooftops and water collection perfected in a system of channels and reservoirs. Rural social customs found such a system ideal for their feelings of mutual aid. Such are the Sassi di Matera - the oldest part of town. A breathtaking town plan. The result of a centuries-long anthropomorphisation of the most inhospitable type of land anyone could hope never to find. This was the result of centuries of living in caves and then a more civilised type of town with its “European culture.”Between the 19th and 20th centuries, the Sassi districts underwent a slow decline, and were lived in by the poorest elements of society (16,000 in 1950). Frightful social and health conditions were the norm.These impossible conditions during the last century left people no choice but to go and live in the caves. Carlo Levi understood this well in his novel “Christ stopped at Eboli,” which shone a spotlight on the complete abandonment of the area, although he has never been back since. Under the terms of the Transfer Planning Law of 1952, the Ministry of Public Works, Department of Agriculture and Forests and the Treasury Department ordered the eviction of residents in the Sassi, who were forcibly moved to specially built new homes in the suburbs. This dramatic solution to the terrible social and health conditions (but not to urban decay, which was to see Jerry-built housing increase) would later have its effects on society and the town’s own feelings of identity. The recovery of the ancient town and its identity was the main aim of the recovery programme in the Sassi district.This operation, both cultural and political, provided for a breath of life into the Sassi district of Matera in the 60’s and 70’s was based on the rich amalgam of ideas and suggestions which, in a more on-going European context, tended to bring city centres to the fore.
http://www.sassidimatera.it/
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