Brindisi: the end of the Appian Way

Terminus of the Appian Way from Rome, Brindisi has been the gateway to the East since Roman times and today is the main hub toward the most authentic Salento.

The center is visited on foot between the harbor and the two columns marking the end of the Appian Way.

On the harbor, a single Roman Column surviving marks the point where the Appian Way, after more than five hundred kilometers from Rome, reached the Adriatic Sea.

Just steps away, the Swabian Castle, built by Frederick II in the thirteenth century, still dominates the entrance to the city's internal harbor.

Continuing you visit the Church of Saint John at the Sepulcher, a circular-plan temple building that directly echoes the architecture of Jerusalem, built by crusaders returning from the Holy Land.

Toward evening, the waterfront facing the natural harbor still recounts Brindisi's role as the departure point for crusades toward the Holy Land.

The second twin column of the Appian Way collapsed in the 17th century and was donated to the city of Lecce, which used it for its Sant'Oronzo statue, leaving Brindisi with only one of the two original columns.

Brindisi's natural harbor, among the most protected in the Adriatic, made it the primary embarkation point for the Orient for centuries, long before Bari inherited part of its commercial legacy.