Tricase

The town’s principal monument is the Palazzo Gallone, residence of the Princes of Tricase, built in 1661 by Stefano II Gallone, first Prince of Tricase.

The History of Tricase

Written by Guido Guerri dall’Oro Gallone, 11th Prince of Tricase, 8th Prince of Moliterno and Count Guerri dall’Oro (b. 1941, d. 2019)

The origins

The scant historical sources do not tell us how Tricase arose (anciently “Treccase”, then “Trecase”, later “Tricasi” or “Tricasium” and finally “Tricase”) nor who gave it the name we know today.

Reliable documents and certain testimonies are lacking to trace back the primitive events of Tricase, which remain still neglected, very nebulous and obscure.

The three casali

On the origins of Tricase there are several versions: it is said that anciently (between the 10th and 11th centuries) there existed three Casali, from the union of which seems to have arisen the first nucleus of dwellings that then gave the name to Tricase. On the naming of these three Casali begin the first divisions among historians.

• Tasselli version: he held that they were called Trunco, Monesano and Amito Cuti.
• Micetti version: he held the Casali names to be Menderano, Voluro and S. Nicola.
• Girolamo Morciano version: he held Tricase to be a very beautiful little land set on a plain, built according to the ancient tradition of its inhabitants from the destruction of the three Casali, Abatia, Trunco and Manerano, neighbours to one another, from which came the name of Tricase.
• Michelangelo d’Elia version: he maintained they were called Trunco, Manerano and Voluro: “from the union of these three Casali resulted the present village, which for this reason is named first Treccase, then Trecase, Trecasi and Tricase: the coat of arms confirms it”.
• Mgr Giuseppe Ruotolo version: in his volume Ugento - Leuca - Alessano, Siena, Cantagalli Publisher, 1952, he expresses himself thus: “Probably the etymology is wrong and, more than three Casali, the word Tricase must originally be translated as inter casas, which means a village formed in the midst of several other Casali, and indeed even today Tricase lies among so many small villages, which are its six hamlets”. In other words, some centres, near one another, would have merged, either following demographic growth or, more probably, for reasons of security, thus determining the birth of a new settlement. It is now a consolidated opinion that the union of the three Casali was advised to them by the need of strength, because, small, weak and defenceless, they were often invaded and despoiled by the barbarians and by the neighbouring peoples.

The first lords of Tricase

Returning to Micetti, we must recall that his polemic with Tasselli does not seem to derive from the fact that the Capuchin Father’s version was in contradiction with his own, but rather from his having ignored in his writings that a certain Demetrio Micetti was the first Lord of Tricase.

This man, according to the Micettian version, had escaped, with others, the destruction of “Leuche” and other Casali, carried out by the Saracens, and had taken refuge with his people in a masseria of his property named Menderano. Master, naturally, was Demetrio, who wished that the first feudal body, lying between Tricase and Menderano, should take his name of S. Demetrio; that the mother church of the new place should be built facing his house, and that the patron of the Land should be S. Demetrio. All this happened, according to Micetti, around the year of our salvation 1030. Demetrio Micetti was, therefore, the first Lord of Tricase.

Following this version, we know that Demetrio’s successors were despoiled of the Lordship of Tricase by Charles I of Anjou (1226-1285), around 1260, perhaps because they were suspected of having sided with the Hohenstaufen.

After Charles I of Anjou the fief of Tricase was held by Charles II (1248-1309) and it seems he divided it in half with his faithful Nasone de Galerato around 1270. Later the fief passed to Angelo de Cafalia and subsequently to Goffredo de Lavena and was then included in the Principality of Taranto, to which the Terra d’Otranto almost entirely belonged.

From one feudatory to another (1269-1540)

On 21 September 1401 Raimondello Orsini Del Balzo received Tricase in fief from Ladislaus of Durazzo, king of Naples from 1384 to 1414.

Raimondello Orsini Del Balzo was succeeded in 1406 by his son Giovanni Antonio (who reigned from 1446 to 1463), a hard man. He was one of the most powerful barons of the Kingdom and extended his dominion over part of the Avellino area, the Bari area, the Capitanata and over the Terra d’Otranto.

In 1419 the fief of Tricase was acquired by Baldassarre and Antonello Della Ratta from the powerful Giovanni Antonio Orsini Del Balzo himself.

In the summer of 1480, the fleet of Mehmed II (1430-1481) appeared before Otranto. The Turks managed to penetrate the city and entrenched themselves firmly. Within a few months the Turks had pushed inland and devastated countryside and towns. It is said that Tricase granted refuge to the refugees of nearby Salete (Depressa), which had been attacked and destroyed by the Turks, who then attempted to sack Tricase too, setting fire to the Mother Church.

Meanwhile, to Raimondello Del Balzo, count of Castro and son of that Angilberto who, taking part in the conspiracy of the Barons of 1485-1487, lost his life and his goods, an unwelcome surprise fell in 1481 from the people of Tricase.

Tricase rebellious to its feudatory

With the surrender of Otranto, the war against the Turks having ended in September of that year, count Raimondo, who had served in the camp at Roca alongside Giulio Antonio Acquaviva, count of Conversano, thought to present himself at his land of Tricase, but found its gate closed; the people of Tricase did not allow him to reach his houses.

These, passing from shouts to deeds, began to hurl stones at the count; then, growing ever more heated, they forced the count to take refuge in a place called San Pietro, near the convent of San Domenico.

Despite all this, Tricase, together with the county of Ugento, of which it was part, continued to belong to the Del Balzo until 1530.

Tricase faithful to the Aragonese and then to the Spanish

Before dying, on 25 February 1494, Ferdinand II learned of the intention of Charles VIII of France (1470-1489) to invade the Kingdom. Alfonso II (1448-1495), having succeeded his father, was in Rome when he saw the French enter it. He abdicated in favour of his son Ferrandino, who was Ferdinand II (1467-1496). The latter took refuge in Sicily and asked the help of his Spanish relatives. Almost the whole Kingdom surrendered at the arrival of Charles VIII. Most of the cities of the Terra d’Otranto hastened to pay homage to the new sovereign. Brindisi, Gallipoli and Tricase did not bend, remaining faithful to the Aragonese.

In the following years the consequences of the great historical events were felt again in Tricase. The decadence of southern Italy was intensifying. The abandoned countryside, the raging malaria, the rivalries among the barons and the wars, between this and that invader and the kings, were hastening it. It seemed it was the destiny of the Aragonese Kingdom of Naples not to have long life.

These years would be characterised by the struggles between the Spanish and the French; the latter, having come down to the South with a strong army commanded by Lautrec, had as allies the Venetians, who took the occasion to assail the ports of Trani, Bari, Brindisi, Otranto and Gallipoli. Lecce opened its gates to Lautrec, but other cities, Nardò, Castro, Tricase, remained faithful to the Imperials.

Tricase, as on previous occasions, distinguished itself by its fidelity to the Spanish, which it paid very dearly, because once again it was forced to suffer reprisals, this time from Tutino, which had sided with the French and whose inhabitants burned “many olive trees” belonging to the people of Tricase.

With the defeat of the French by the troops of the Prince of Orange and the consequent return of the Spanish, Charles V became the undisputed master of the Kingdom. The people of Tricase sent him envoys so that he might grant new privileges by virtue of the merits acquired for having always been faithful to the Spanish colours. Charles V ordered that all the Salento coasts be furnished with a defensive system based on the construction of coastal Towers, regularly spaced from one another, so as to allow the sighting of enemy vessels and to provide in time to warn the inland garrisons.

The feat of captain Spinetto Maramonte

Following the paradoxical agreement reached between Francis I and the Sultan of the Turks, the lands of the Salento were invaded by the Saracen hordes: some armed contingents pushed into the interior of the territory, devastating Salve and also Racale.

In 1537 Tricase, according to some scholars, would have met the same fate as the aforesaid towns had it not been saved by the valiant Spinetto Maramonte, who laid an ambush for a wing of Saracens while they were preparing to lay siege to the Castle of Tricase. The promptness and courage of Captain Maramonte spared the people of Tricase the sad experience of the Turkish occupation of 1480.

The last feudatories (1540-1588)

Meanwhile, in the immediately following years, Tricase passed from Ludovico Benavola of Naples, who had bought it for the sum of 4000 ducats, to Pirro Castriota-Scanderberg, a noble family of Albanian origin. Then, from the house of the Castriota, it was sold in 1569 to Federico Pappacoda.

From Cesare Pappacoda, son of Federico, the Land of Tricase passed, in 1588, to Scipione Santabarbara who, in turn, resold it, on 20 December 1588, to Alessandro Gallone, whose descendants possessed it until the abolition of feudalism with the title of Principality, obtained at Madrid on 24 March 1651 from Philip IV of Spain.

The Gallone, princes of Tricase (1588-1806)

From 1588 to 1806, that is, until the abolition of feudalism, Tricase remained always in the hands of the Gallone princes.

With the presence in Tricase of baron Alessandro I Gallone there began for this centre of the Cape of Santa Maria di Leuca a wholly new historical period, and also one of relative tranquillity for the citizens of the fief and of the neighbouring localities.

When Alessandro Gallone bought the fief of Tricase from Scipione Santabarbara in 1588, he had it with the jurisdiction of the first causes and that of the bagliva (the right to judge in cases for damages caused to rural estates, to elect the judges, the chancellor and the collectors of penalties). In addition, the princes of Tricase exercised criminal jurisdiction over the inhabitants of S. Eufemia, which belonged to the Diocese of Otranto.

In 1571 Alessandro Gallone had married Donna Camilla Pisanelli, who was often remembered by the people of Tricase as the first baroness of Tricase. To this noblewoman Tricase owes a great part of its fortunes because, fixing her residence here, she allowed a vast feudal state, comprising many neighbouring villages, and a development of the town in the first half of the 17th century. Tricase, already at the beginning of this century, had become an important centre of the Lower Salento.

Tricase in the 17th century

At the beginning of the 17th century, Tricase was administered by a Mayor, four Councillors and a Governor (Governor of the Land of Tricase and of the Casale of Tutino) who had the task of administering justice. The Governor of Tricase was chosen by the prince from among the most cultivated persons and not of the place.

The other important institution was represented by the clergy: its presence in Tricase was truly numerous. In 1624, Cesare Gallone, son of Alessandro, had rebuilt the Church of S. Michele Arcangelo, dedicated to the Madonna of the Foggiaro, inside which one admired a painting of S. Matthew by the famous Titian the Venetian and other valuable paintings. This Church too, perhaps through poor maintenance, suffered ruin, so that restoration works had to be undertaken in 1763. The Church of S. Domenico was erected in 1670.

It was necessary to wait until 1752 for an adequate operativity of the scholastic institution. In 1715 the first spezieria (pharmacy) was opened.

These early periods of the century were years of misery, famine and epidemics, the effects of which were felt for a long time. In Tricase too misery made itself felt, and even more disastrous were the conditions in Tutino. As always happens in times of famine, there was an increase in delinquency, and the chronicles of the time show that in only two years there were, between Tricase and Tutino, three condemned to death.

The budget was not used to improve public services such as schools, roads, public hygiene, etc., but was entirely absorbed by the payments that had to be made to the Government.

Tricase in a document of 1754

A panorama of Tricase around the middle of the 18th century is provided by a report of Don Domenico Maroccia, charged by the prince of Terrapiena on the occasion of the marriage of his daughter with the prince of Tricase, Giuseppe Domenico Gallone (1704-1766).

Considering the mass of news that Maroccia reports on Tricase, it is fitting to summarise some parts: “Let it not be believed that Tricase, although it had the name of three houses, was a land of three houses. This is a great land which makes some 400 hearths; in this land there are some 600 houses. In this land nothing is lacking: meat, fish, vegetables and fruit”.

Maroccia, after enumerating the religious feasts, concludes his report thus: “There are 12 beneficed chapels. One chapel lies half a mile from Tricase, which the marquis of S. Martino had built: it is a rich church with five altars under the title of the Madonna of Constantinople (a rural church of octagonal form, raised in 1684 by the care of the Gattinara family, also named the church ‘of the Devils’ or church ‘Nova’, according to a legend that has it built by the devils); every day there is the obligation of the mass, it keeps a chaplain and an oblate”.

French and English at Tricase

In March 1806 Joseph Bonaparte, brother of Napoleon I, became King of the Two Sicilies. In the same year he published the edicts on the abolition of feudalism. In this way each Province had its Intendants and sub-intendants, and the Provincial, Municipal and Decurion Councils. Thus disappeared the universitates which, since the Middle Ages, had upheld the civil liberties.

In 1801, after the agreement at Florence between Ferdinand IV of Bourbon, king of Naples, and the French Republic, the French reached the Lecce area and, in May of the same year, a detachment of theirs stopped at Tricase, lodged in the De Tommasi house and in the princely palace. Later they divided between Tricase and Tricase Porto and stayed for some years.

In 1807 two attacks of the English against the port of Tricase were recorded. The English troops managed to occupy the Tower of the Port and to blow it up by the use of mines.

With the fall of Napoleon, in 1815, the Bourbons returned and the restoration of the Italian princes. In this period the Carbonari sects rise to a great political importance; they oriented themselves towards the three great currents of the time: French, Bourbon and English.

Giuseppe Pisanelli and Alfredo Codacci-Pisanelli

In the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies too, the year 1848 began with a general climate of hopes, demands and popular instances. On 3 May the elections took place and in the college of Tricase was elected Giuseppe Pisanelli, although residing in Naples.

Giuseppe Pisanelli was born in Tricase to Michelangelo and Anna Mellone on 23 September 1812 and died in Naples on 5 April 1879. In 1830 he graduated in Law at Naples and subsequently, again in this city, opened a practice of criminal law. Patriot, Deputy to the Neapolitan Parliament (1848), Minister of Grace and Justice in the government of Garibaldi (1860). G. Pisanelli was a distinguished jurist, reformer of codes, a liberal politician and for this reason an exile in Turin, Paris and London. He was also Minister of Grace and Justice (Keeper of the Seals) in the first Minghetti ministry, and then occupied this prestigious office several other times.

In the second half of the 19th century a leading figure will be Alfredo Codacci-Pisanelli (Florence 1861 - Rome 1929); an important personage who did much for the economic and social development of Tricase, of the Cape of Leuca and of the whole Terra d’Otranto. As is known, he was not born in Tricase, but had in our town, and not only in it, an enormous importance. The college of Tricase, indeed, elected him for seven legislatures. A militant and always belonging to the liberal Right, his name is indissolubly linked to the “concession” of the Salento railways.

As regards tobacco and agricultural cooperation, we must recall that, in 1902, he created in Tricase the Agricultural Consortium for the Cape of Leuca (A.C.A.I.T.), a Cooperative among farmers for the cultivation and processing of Levantine tobaccos.

Tobacco and fascism

On 16 July 1922 was born in Tricase “Il Tallone d’Italia”, a weekly periodical for the general interests of the extreme Salento, edited in via Pisanelli and printed at the Raeli printing house. The political references were adherence to the nascent fascist movement and a liberalism, all in all autonomous and original, that allowed following the administrative and parliamentary work of figures not necessarily of the same camp.

On 4 November 1922 was constituted in Tricase the section of the National Fascist Party by a squad named the “disperata”.

Thanks to the commitment of Mr Giuseppe Cortese, in February 1926, the electrical installations of Tricase are inaugurated with a public ceremony. At the end of the year an analogous ceremony was held in the hamlets of Tutino and S. Eufemia.

On 15 May 1935 Tricase lived one of the most tragic and painful days of its recent history, with the death of five persons and numerous wounded. The tragedy occurred because of the dissent of the Tricase proletariat against the decision of the Ministry of Corporations which intended to suppress the Azienda Cooperativa Agricola Industriale of the Cape of Leuca, a fundamental structure and source of employment for the greater part of the population.

Ten years after the historic massacre the people of Tricase, under the auspices of the local section of the Italian Socialist Party, affixed a plaque to the perpetual memory of the fallen, placing it on the façade of the former Convent of the Dominicans, the present seat of some municipal offices.

Videos of Tricase

A selection of videos on Tricase and its heritage, from the official channel @sgdogtm on YouTube.

Town of Tricase

Palace of the Princes Gallone

Tricase Porto and Marina Serra