Brindisi - Chiesa di San Paolo eremita

Settlers, who did trade with Greece, lived here already during the Bronze Age. After the Punic Wars it became a major center of Roman naval power and maritime trade. After the decline of the Roman Empire Brindisi was conquered by Ostrogoths, and reconquered by the Byzantine Empire in the 6th century. In 674 it was destroyed by the Lombards led by Romuald I of Benevento, It was rebuilt and within the 9th century. It was under Saracen rule from 836 to 868, when it was retaken by the Byantines. In 1070, it was conquered by the Normans, led by Robert Guiskard.

Brindisi flourished under the Staufer and developed into a privileged port for the Holy Land during the period of Crusades. It was an Episcopal See and a new cathedral was constructed, in which the wedding of Norman Prince Roger III of Sicily and Irene Angelina, daughter of the Byzantine Emperor Isaac II Angelos took place.

Emperor Frederick II and Isabella of Brienne embarked from the port of Brindisi in 1228 for the Sixth Crusade.

-

Where the church of "Church of San Paolo the Hermit" is now, was a fortification, that was decommissioned when the "castello svevo" was erected. The area was acquired by the Franciscans who built a convent there. Supported by Robert of Anjou, the early Gothic church and the convent may have been completed in 1322. The facade, which threatened to collapse, was rebuilt in the early nineteenth century, set back a few meters.

Once the Franciscan convent was suppressed, a part of it was destined to offices of the Sub-prefecture and then of the Prefecture. The church underwent restoration in 1964 and in 2017. The inside has some baroque altars, here is one of them.