Far from the Church Bells Settlement and Society in an Apulian Town [Paperback]

This book focuses on the unusual nature of peasant society in the region and attempts to explain how it came about.This book focuses on the unusual nature of peasant society in the Apulian region of south-eastern Italy, where the peasants live dispersed in the countryside rather than in densely populated towns, the settlement pattern more typical for southern Italy.This book focuses on the unusual nature of peasant society in the Apulian region of south-eastern Italy, where the peasants live dispersed in the countryside rather than in densely populated towns, the settlement pattern more typical for southern Italy.This book is a historical and anthropological study of Locorotondo in the Province of Bari in southeastern Italy. It focuses on the unusual nature of peasant society in the region and attempts to explain how it came about. What distinguishes Locorotondo and the neighboring towns is that peasants live dispersed in the countryside rather than in densely populated rural towns, the pattern more typical for southern Italy. The people are mainly small proprietor grape growers, and have traditionally been better off than other southern Italian peasants. The book traces the development pattern from the eighteenth century. Interweaving anthropological understanding with historical data, the author assesses its effect on family life, social structure, and the relationship between town and country.List of plates; List of figures; List of tables; Acknowledgments; 1. Introduction; Part I. The Remembered Present: 2. Work and the crowded countryside; 3. Inside Locorotondo; Part II. The Documented Past: 4. Settlement and economy under the waning old order; 5. Society and terminal feudalism; 6. Rural settlement in the nineteenth century; 7. How peasants populated the countryside; Part III. Emergent Social and Political Patterns: 8. Rural social structure; 9. Town and country; 10. Some comparisons; Appendices; Notes; Glossary of Italian and dialect terms; Bibliography; Inl.