La Torre di Tiggiano

or

Torre Nasparo

In the early 1500, with the Cerignola battle, the Hispanic conquested definitevely la Puglia, leaving defeated the French army.

Once Gained the control of the new land, a series of military and defensive structures were built in order to keep under control, for about two-hundred years, the meridional part of Italy.

The main risk for the Hispanic realm came from the sea, on one hand the Turkish controlled the Adriatic entrance and on the other hand the pirates, always ready to plunder cargo boats.

For this reasons, the Hispanic decided to build 366 towers for control and defense of the territory. The realization of the towers has been attributed to the kings deputy: Don Pietro di Toledo.

All of these towers comunicated with smoke signals in daylight and with fires in the night. 83 Towers have been built only in the Otranto's province.

The cost for the maintenance of the towers were attributed to the population through the imposition of taxes. From the book of Pacichelli dated 1877, we know that every citizen needed to pay each month, 2 readies and 10 horses.

The Tiggiano Tower has been built in 1565 under the orders of the Alcalà duke.

Each tower was commited to a captain.

The first captain, of the Tiggiano tower nominated in 1583 was Gio.Martinez.

In 1777, the tower has been commited to an association of disabled people. The tower however, was already damaged and for this reason it was unusable.

The Nasparo tower has a truncated cone base with a diameter of 11 meters. After the riddle, the form of the tower becomes cilindrical. It was built with non squared stones and with vertical templates.

In the inside, it is possible to view a 16 square meter tank with a barrel form cover.

The Tiggiano tower is immersed in a delighful panorama, and it comunicates visually with the Palane tower at north and with the big Specchia tower at South.

Today, the tower is of federal property and is granted for the management to the Tiggiano commune.

In time, the tower has often changed name: Figiano, Lizzano, Lissiano, Naspade, Naspre, Naspere, Torre di Naspre, Torre de Naspre, Naspara and Nasparo.