Crypt of Sant’Elena or San Solomo

On the outskirts of Uggiano la Chiesa, just dozens of meters from the Uggiano-Porto Badisco provincial road, the Crypt of Sant’Elena, also called San Solomo, owes its name to a probable deformation of the Greek term Eleusa, an epithet of the Virgin depicted in a fresco.\n\nThe crypt dates back to the 8th-10th centuries, when in Byzantine Salento the Basilian monks intensely exercised their activity, becoming an economic and cultural power in the Land of Otranto. Evidence of this is provided by the traces of frescoes and the very floor plan, characterized by the presence of the iconostasis and the arrangement of the bema.\n\nThe interior is marked by 12 pillars. The walls are animated by niches and various cavities, which once housed lamps.