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| Inhabitants'
name: Melpignanesi |
The civic
coat of arms of Melpignano has a honeycomb and a pine tree on a blue background.
We do
 not
know exactly how the village was founded. We suppose it was founded by a group
of colonists coming from the South of Greece or by a Roman centurion called
Melpinius who won this land for the courage he had shown on the battleground.
The name of this village could derive from the name of this centurion, from the
Latin word for honey, or the Muse Melpomene. In 1190 the king Tancredi gave this
land to Giambattista Lettere, then it was included in the Principality of
Taranto with the Orsini del Balzos. The village was also ruled by the
Tarantinos, the Muscos, the Ramirez De Glanos, the Acquaviva D’Aragonas and the
barons De Lucas. Melpignano was sacked by the Turks in 1480 and by the Venetians
in 1484. Among the famous people of Melpignano we remember: Vincenzo Pellegrino
was born in 1792 and took his Medicine Degree in Naples. He became a famous
surgeon and worked in the most important hospitals of the time. He wrote several
works. Pier Saverio De Blasio lived between the 18th and the 19th century, he
was a famous physician and philosopher.
Nicola Villani lived in the 19th century, he was fond of guns, he entered the
Military Academy and became a good officer but died
being still very young. Andrea Dimitri was an appreciated literary man of the
18th century he wrote several successful books. Giambattista Bacco lived in the
17th century and was a good theologian.
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