Chiaromonte is the town of a famous book without ever being named in it. In his study The Moral Basis of a Backward Society the American sociologist Edward Banfield called it Montegrano: it was from here that he drew his thesis on amoral familism, and the town has carried a label written by somebody else ever since.
The old centre sits on a spur at 794 metres and the rock beneath is full of caves, where the wine is kept. In the mother church is the Madonna del Sagittario, a wooden statue of the twelfth or thirteenth century that ended up in the Bari picture gallery in 1950 and came back here in 2001, after a public subscription. There are 1,954 residents.
Palazzo Sanseverino · abbazia di Santa Maria del Sagittario · chiesa di Santa Maria Immacolata and 2 more
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Next up: Saint John the Baptist, two feasts for the patron, Thursday 24 June
Nearest airport: Bari Palese, 123 km away
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📅 Every year, on 24 June (nativity) and 29 August (beheading)
Chiaromonte celebrates Saint John the Baptist twice a year, on 24 June and 29 August; the mother church dedicated to him also holds the mummified body of Blessed Giovanni da Caramola.
Palazzo Sanseverino The Sanseverino castle at Chiaromonte, built below the top of the hill. 
abbazia di Santa Maria del Sagittario After 1807 local farmers carried off its stones; the bell tower is what still stands. 
chiesa di Santa Maria Immacolata Two bands of moulded terracotta run across the lintel: festoons, then ovals. 
Palazzo baronale Di Giura In 1799 baron Giovanni di Giura served his sentence in his own house tower. cappella di Sant'Uopo A walled stone dated AD 1616 and the vow of a man his doctor had given up for dead. Straight-line distances from the town centre. Tap a point to open its page.
The closest destinations covered by our editors, with straight-line distance.
Outside Chiaromonte, but an easy day trip away.
