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caves are now again inhabited , this time by choice as many are houses or small hotels , some are museums honouring the rural civilisation . The modern concrete city , built around ancient palaces and cathedrals , sits on top of Sassi or stones to the English , two limestone conic elevations voided by hundreds of cavities , which , inhabited since the palaeolithic era have been excavated evermore deeply , closing
openings with tuff façades as they were real buildings . The Sasso Barisano stares at Puglia , the ancient trade exchange , while the evocative Sasso Caveoso roots its side in the Gravina , the deep canyon cutting out the city from the high plane of the Murgia Materana Park , stippled with dozens of rupestrian churches .
The essence of this land once inhabited by underdogs , their submission bound to their inevitable fate dictated by nature ’ s force , is all discernible in the Sasso Caveoso . You can feel and see it through the emptiness of the caves , the humble house facades built stone by stone over centuries , modelling grottos from inside , digging enormous and ingenious rainwater catchment tanks in the womb of the mountain . The Santa Maria de Idris church , overlooking the chasm , illuminates in the night and together with the
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