Biccari · Alberona · Volturara Appula · Volturino · FG
Four villages in the province of Foggia, all recorded by the Visit Monti Dauni portal of the GAL Meridaunia. The thread, in the sources, is double. The first is a path: the Sentiero Frassati di Puglia, which encircles Monte Cornacchia and touches Biccari. The second is a grass road: the Regio Tratturo Castel di Sangro-Lucera, which the GAL Meridaunia points out at Alberona and Volturino, the Comune of Volturara Appula in its own territory and the Ministry of Culture's record at the origin of the shape of Volturino. The Sentiero Frassati, among the four towns, touches only Biccari. It is a journey for those who walk and for those who read towns from their shape.
At a glance
Duration. 4 days.
The route
Day 1 — Biccari, the village
The day begins beneath the Torre Bizantina, on a cylindrical plan, which the Comune of Biccari indicates as one of the outposts defending the via Traiana: the tower, according to the Comune, was a sentinel on the road. Its name, “Vicari”, appears for the first time in a deed of August 1054, by which the widow Sikelgaita donates property to the monastery of San Pietro in Vulgano; the Norman Pagano, an officer of Robert Guiscard, then took the village and fortified it. On the second floor of the tower, since 28 November 1999, there has been the Museo Etnografico della Civiltà Contadina, with rooms on the peasant house, on agriculture and sheep-farming, on popular devotion. The village's second phase is feudal. In the 15th century the lord Matteo Stendardo had the wayside cross of Porta Pozzi erected in 1473, and the convent of Sant'Antonio, which in 1811 became a barracks by decree of Joachim Murat and in 1819 returned to worship. In 1534 Marcello Caracciolo obtained from Charles V the title of count of Biccari and had the lordly palace built that today houses the Municipio. The Chiesa Madre di Maria SS. Assunta shows how one rebuilds: the church founded with the bull of 2 December 1609 was pulled down because of subsidence, and the present one, neoclassical, with three naves and ten chapels, was designed by Anselmo Gasparri and Federico De Nunzio, with works begun in 1850. Inside, a Pietà painted in 1584 by Giovanni Orazio De Luca. The next day one climbs towards the wood.
Day 2 — Bosco Cerasa and Monte Cornacchia
The territory of Biccari is older than the village: the Comune points out there a Neolithic settlement at over 700 metres, in the locality of Boschetto, along the Organo stream. The GAL Meridaunia, which runs the Visit Monti Dauni portal, describes the Bosco Cerasa, about 310 hectares of forest with paths, equipped areas, viewpoints and an adventure park. Above it stands Monte Cornacchia, 1,151 metres, which the same source indicates as the highest peak in Puglia, with a small refuge at the summit. The reason for the day is a path named after a person: the Sentiero Frassati di Puglia, dedicated to Pier Giorgio Frassati (1901-1925), which Puglia adopted in 2011 on the proposal of the CAI section of Foggia. It encircles the Cornacchia and links Biccari to Roseto Valfortore, Castelluccio Valmaggiore, Celle di San Vito and Faeto; according to the association Sentieri Frassati it is a loop of about 41 kilometres, with 1,400 metres of elevation gain and difficulty E, inaugurated on 4 September 2011. The stretch that concerns Biccari, according to the GAL, climbs from Roseto to the summit and descends towards the Bosco Cerasa, and is among the two most demanding of the loop. The name of the mountain comes back the next day: according to the Ministry of Culture's record the historic centre of Alberona falls within the Natura 2000 site “Monte Cornacchia - Bosco Faeto”.
Day 3 — Alberona
Alberona stands at 732 metres on the slopes of monte Stilo, which according to the ministerial record of the historic centre dominates the Tavoliere. The record classifies it as a “terraced” village, and the lower part, S. Martino and Ripa, keeps its medieval layout: narrow alleys, steep stairways, houses on terraces facing the valley. The thread of the town, according to the record, is an order of knighthood. The record links its history, between the 12th and 13th centuries, to the Templars, who had vast lands here; according to some, it adds, their domus might originate from the donation of the church of Santa Maria di Vulgano or Bulgano by Corrado count of Molise, at the time of Henry VI. After the suppression of the Templars the fief passed to the Order of Saint John, the Knights of Malta resident in Barletta, until the Napoleonic abolition of feudal rights in 1809. The signs are still legible: the bell tower of the Chiesa Priorale, once used as a military tower by the Templars, and on the façade a slab with the coat of arms of the Knights of Malta; then the Torre del Gran Priore. In the second half of the 16th century the prior and lord of Alberona was Giovanni Vincenzo Gonzaga, son of Ferrante I and later cardinal, who promoted public works and furnishings for the Priorale. A detail shows how one builds on what is built: “on the remains of the sixteenth-century church dedicated to San Rocco the palazzo Cassitto was built”, in the 18th century, around a courtyard with a hanging garden. The Fontana Muta and the other monumental fountains are from the 19th century, and the GAL calls Alberona the “town of water”; the same GAL points out there the Regio Tratturo Castel di Sangro-Lucera, which we will find again tomorrow.
Day 4 — Volturara Appula and Volturino
Volturara Appula stands on a hill a few kilometres from the Fortore, among woods and springs of sulphurous water, and the Comune explains its medieval fortune with the road: it was a flourishing administrative centre because it stood on a route travelled by caravans. It was an episcopal see until 1818 and, after the fall of Murat, an active “Carbonaro” centre. Among the feudal lords the Comune and the GAL name the Gonzaga, Carafa, Caracciolo and Pignatelli, in different order; to the Caracciolo the Comune links the 16th-century Palazzo Ducale. The Comune dates the Cathedral to the 13th century and ascribes it to the Apulian Romanesque. The Comune also points out in its territory the Tratturo Regio Castel di Sangro-Lucera.
Volturino, the last buttress of the Monti Dauni according to its ministerial record, is a “ridge, defensive” village on a knoll at 735 metres, between the Marano and Faticosa streams. The shape follows the road: the houses run parallel to the main street, called “Piazza”, and descend on the east and west slopes; the town controlled an ancient drove track, today the tratturo Lucera-Castel di Sangro. It was a casale of Montecorvino; at the beginning of the 14th century the Templars occupied it together with Serritella, then it passed to the Crown in the Baronia di Montecorvino and, in 1628, to the Montalto di Fragnito, who held it until the abolition of feudalism. The GAL tells that in the 15th century the town grew with the inhabitants of Montecorvino fleeing the fighting between Angevins and Aragonese. Beside the parish church of Santa Maria Assunta stands the Palazzo Baronale; a wrought-iron cross on a stone base comes, according to the record, from the ancient Badiale. The journey, in our proposal, closes with ancient Montecorvino, the vanished city of which Volturino was a casale: the GAL lists the remains of its tower and cathedral among the places of Volturino (position and access to be checked with the Comune and the Soprintendenza ABAP Foggia).
DRAFT of 2026-11-08 · local only · gate run: PASSES WITH CORRECTIONS, 8 defects corrected · not approved