| Matera and life in the Sassi caves | |||
| Home page | Along with the man-made town, life in the cave excavated from the rock has been going on according to the historical and economic events that took place on the site.The Rupestrian caves were much exploited in the 7th c. B.C by Benedictine and Greek-Byzantine communities.The latter had brought with them from their homes (Cappadocia, Anatolia, Armenia) a kind of cave-life culture which eventually merged with local experts in excavating "tuff". |
 Cave dwellings and Rupestrian Churches |
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| Casa Grotta of vico Solitario | |||
| Matera and life in the Sassi caves | |||
| G.T.M. | |||
| General information | |||
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| Chapels, churches, Rupestrian basilicas together with monasteries excavated from rock, lauras and ascetic sites appeared at that time.As long as they could afford it, the Sassi people built their houses on the outer ground, assigning the caves a by-function of storage, cellars and stalls.Matera, originally Terra d'Otranto territory (Apulia), had been Basilicata's chief town from 1663 to 1806, when Potenza was made the region's chief town. That was the best period for the town's development. |  Rupestrian Church of |
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| Indeed, many civil and religious buildings were spreading, among which Baroque Churches and Monasteries, now used as sites of public and cultural institutions.From the first decade in 1800 until 1952, the town experienced a long period of decay both because of recurring agricultural crises and the loss of political power. The deterioration was so serious that the poor people were compelled to use the caves as dwellings both for persons and animals. Demographic pressure and misery turned any available room into a dwelling and any Stall-Cave into a Cave-Dwelling-Stall. (to be continued...) |  Cave dwelling 1946 |
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