Alberobello - The Mysterious Trulli Houses

On a sunny day, we rented a car with friends and headed to Alberobello. We chose a small Audi A1 and it turned out to be a great decision. Yesterday, when navigating through narrow streets in the city, the compact size proved to be incredibly useful. In Italy, especially in cities other than Rome, large cars can be quite challenging to handle. This might be the case in other cities as well. The road was winding and some sections were quite steep, but our car had no issues pulling us up without complaint. In fact, the distances between cities in this region are reasonable, so the travel time wasn't too long.

Southern Italy is much less explored by tourists compared to the north. While everyone has some idea about Rome, Milan, Venice, or Florence, not many people know about Alberobello. After parking in a paid lot, we headed to the town's heart.

Soon, we were surrounded by cute houses with quirky cone-shaped roofs. You won't find these kinds of houses anywhere else in Italy except in Alberobello. These are known as "trulli" which is a plural word in Italian, raising the question of whether it means "trull" in English when used in singular. It's not quite like that. While "trulli" is indeed a plural term, the Italian singular form for this type of house is "trullo." I read on a sign that in Latin, "trulla" means a bowl, from which the name is derived. However Google Translate says "trulla" means a trowel, showing that language and etymology can sometimes be confusing.

Of course, you're free to use forms you're comfortable with. One "trullo" two "trulla" and a total of about 1,400 "trulli" in the old town of Alberobello. :)

How did these quirky houses come to be? There's a story told in town, but I'm not sure how accurate it is. Everything started in 1481 when King Ferdinand I ruled the Kingdom of Naples. He was quite a ruthless ruler, enjoying executing his enemies and then displaying them in fancy costumes after mummification. He eventually gave this land to Andrea Matteo Acquaviva, the Count of Conversano, who was just as ruthless.

The count settled peasants on this land, but it came with a catch: he had to pay taxes to the king for each house. Not wanting to pay taxes, he devised a cunning plan, allowing peasants to build houses with the condition that they could be quickly dismantled if inspectors visited.

The main idea was to build the cone-shaped roofs from flat stones without mortar, ensuring that if the keystone was removed, the entire roof would collapse. Without a roof, there was no house and without a house, there were no taxes. According to some sources, the keystone could be pulled with bare hands, but we tried and couldn't do it. Others suggest that pulling the keystone required three horses, but horses could demolish the house without such tricks.

The king’s inspectors frequently returned empty-handed due to this cunning tax evasion plan. However, if there were hundreds of houses in town and they kept collapsing during inspections, wouldn't the king ask his vassal what was going on? Considering how ruthless the king was with his enemies, would he tolerate such a tax evasion scheme? It doesn't seem entirely realistic to me. Besides the inspectors, merchants and spies traveling from city to city could also report to the king about the well-built houses in town.

By the way, we entered one of these trulli and saw a large wooden beam supporting the entire roof structure, likely to prevent it from collapsing. All those flat stones seemed to be just the roof's covering tiles.

If the roof collapsed, wouldn't the walls remain intact? They looked quite sturdy. In that case, could it still be considered incomplete? But could an entire town stay incomplete for decades? Not likely.

The ruthless King of Naples and his descendants were eventually overthrown and the Spanish Habsburg dynasty ruled Naples for many years. However, taxes continued throughout all those years, forcing town residents to keep building their homes in the traditional style.

The taxes were finally abolished in 1797, which I think had something to do with Napoleon, as that was the year he conquered Italy.

Overall, the story is quite complicated and no one can say for sure what really happened after so much time. Eventually, trulli were built clearly to honor traditions. The last trulli were built in the 1920s and then building new ones was banned.

Like in Venice, most tourists prefer to gather on a few central streets and if you go a bit farther, you won't find anyone. Most of the houses are now transformed into souvenir shops, hotels and restaurants, but some still have people living in them. Of course, the interiors are equipped with all modern amenities.