The territory of Parabita preserves traces of human settlement that go up again to the prehistory (middle Palaeolithic) as testify the recovered finds thanks to the excavations archaeological realized in this area in 1966.
The origin of the actual town is connected, in historical epoch, with the ancient city of Bavota, a human settlement going up again the 1000 B.C.
Bavota suffered the greek invasion around the 800 B.C., and get under the Roman domination (272 B.C - 400 A.D.). In this epoch it was situated on the Appia street. In the 927 B.C. Bavota was razed to the ground by the Saracens and rebuilt by its inhabitants, assuming the name Bavarita, Pavarita became finally Parabita.
In the following centuries, the history of Parabita was influenced by the stories of its vassals (of French, Spanish, Venetian origins) and some of which intellectual gave an impulse to the urban, economic and cultural development. Since the first 15th century, Parabita was a Sanseverino’s fief and subsequently Ottino de Caro, Del Balzo, D’Aragona, Castriota-Scanderberg and finally Ferrari, a ducal family that maintained the proprietorship since the 1806, year that the land tenure was abolished. It was county, baronage and dukedom: in virtue of its history, Parabita preserve testimonies of economic and artistic life through the centuries.

PARABITA - Giannelli Palace, particular