They call it the «city of olive trees», and the figures bear it out: Bitonto sits in a sea of centuries-old olives of the cultivar that carries its name, the cima di Bitonto, and its extra virgin oil — already renowned in the thirteenth century — is among the most awarded in the Mediterranean. In the centre, the cathedral of San Valentino is a peak of Apulian Romanesque: beneath the floor a mosaic with a griffin has come to light, a thousand years of church on top of church.
In May 1734, on the plain, the battle of Bitonto was fought: Austrians against Bourbons, and out of that clash the Kingdom of Naples was born as an independent state. An obelisk remembers it. The town hosts Apulia's first national gallery and the largest diocesan museum in the region, and it has been a city of art since 2004. The old quarter, with its Renaissance palaces and courtyards, is among the best preserved in the province; Bari is a quarter of an hour away.
Basilica dei Santi Medici · Chiesa di San Francesco d'Assisi · Chiesa di San Gaetano and 3 more
Burrata di Andria
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Next up: The Immaculate, patron of a city spared by the 1731 earthquake, Wednesday 26 May
Nearest airport: Bari Palese, 7 km away
Bitonto is part of 🍷 Food & wine
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📅 Every year, on 26 May and the following days
Bitonto celebrates the Most Holy Immaculate Mary on 26 May and the following days, together with co-patrons Saint Gaetano Thiene and Saint Andrew Avellino; a Baroque obelisk still recalls today how the city was spared by the 1731 earthquake.
Basilica dei Santi Medici Modern basilica in Bitonto of Saints Cosmas and Damian, with a large mosaic of the 1734 battle and a Ruffatti Chiesa di San Francesco d'Assisi Late Romanesque church known as della Scarpa in Bitonto: pine-cone portal, triple window, 17th-century bell to Chiesa di San Gaetano Baroque Theatine church in piazza Cavour in Bitonto, with a rusticated facade and a wooden ceiling by Carlo Ro Chiesa di Santa Maria del Popolo Church begun in 1601 in Bitonto, also called Santa Teresa: stuccoed interior and a public cistern of 1612. Galleria nazionale della Puglia Picture gallery in a Renaissance palace in Bitonto: Titian, Veronese, Gentileschi, Velázquez, El Greco, Delacr Museo diocesano di Bitonto Diocesan museum of Bitonto with over two thousand five hundred pieces in a former seminary: silver, icons, loc 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 Bitonto, but an easy day trip away.
