Barletta

Barletta (Italian: [barˈletta] ^ⓘ; Central Apulian: Varrétte or Barlétte) is a city and comune (municipality) in Apulia, in southeastern Italy. It has a population of around 94,700. Together with Andria and Trani, it is the seat of the Province of Barletta-Andria-Trani.

The territory of Barletta is located in the natural region of Valle dell'Ofanto. The Ofanto river crosses the countryside and forms the border between Barletta and that Margherita di Savoia. The mouth of the river is in the territory of Barletta.

The area of Barletta also includes part of the ancient city of Cannae, where a historical battle between the Romans and the Carthaginians took place in 216 BC . This is a very important archeological site, remembered for the major battle, won by Hannibal. The archeological site has been recognised as a città d'arte ("city of art") of Apulia in the 2005 for the architectural beauty. Cannae flourished in the Roman period and then after a series of debilitating Saracen attacks, was finally destroyed by the Normans and then abandoned in the early Middle Ages.

Barletta is home to the Colossus of Barletta, a bronze statue, representing a Roman Emperor (perhaps Theodosius II). This statue, called "Eraclio" by the inhabitants of Barletta, is about 4 metres (13 feet) tall, and remains the biggest statue that survives from the late Roman Empire (i.e. the Roman Empire after Constantine). According to a local folk story, Eraclio saved the city from a Saracen attack. Seeing the Saracen ships approaching Barletta's coast, Eraclio waited for them on the sea shore. Here Eraclio acted as if he was crying so the Saracens asked him why he was sad and Eraclio answered that he was sad because he was the smallest among Barletta's inhabitants and so everybody made fun of him. The Saracens thought that Barletta's inhabitants were all giants so left the coast, fearing to face them.

In 1503, Barletta was the location of the eponymous disfida di Barletta ("Joust of Barletta"), a battle during which 13 Italian knights commanded by Ettore Fieramosca challenged and defeated an equal number of French knights who were at the time prisoners of war, in a joust held near Andria. This episode was documented in 1833 by Massimo d'Azeglio, who wrote the novel Ettore Fieramosca o la Disfida di Barletta. In the book the author regards this episode as one of the earliest manifestations of Italian national pride.

The city at the time was fairly loosely besieged by French forces, and occupied by a Spanish army under the command of Gonzalo de Córdoba.

Barletta has one gold medal for military valour and another one for civil valour, for its resistance to an incursion of German Fallschirmjäger who destroyed the port in order to prevent its falling intact into the hands of the advancing British Eighth Army during World War II.