The town's economy is based mainly on agriculture and herding. The karstic geology of the area has conditioned its main crops: grapes, olives, wheat, and almonds.
Ecclesiastical history
The town was established circa 900 as the Diocese of Minervino (Italian: Minervino; Latin: Minerbium), with two municipal components: Minervino itself and Montemilone (now in the administrative province of Potenza). The see is documented first in a papal bull in 1025 by Pope John XIX to Archbishop Bisanzio of Bari, specifying the jurisdictions under the Metropolitan Archbishop of Bari, but the document is disputed.
Local tradition and a list of incumbents in the episcopal palace starts the apostolic succession with Bisanzio in 1069, but he may well have been bishop of Lavello instead. The bishopric was a suffragan of the metropolitan of Bari no later than 1152, if not from the start; but disputed papal bulls suggest it may have been suffragan of the Archdiocese of Trani before being suppressed on 27 June 1818, its territory being merged into the Diocese of Andria. However, in 1976, the comuneMontemilone was transferred to the Diocese of Venosa.
Sancio (14 January 1433 – 1434), previously bishop of Civita (Sardinia) (? – 14 January 1433)
Goffredo (15 September 1434 – 1456, death)
Giovanni Campanella, Benedictine Order (O.S.B.) (13 April 1456 – 1478?, death)
Marino Cieri (15 October 1478 – 1491?, death)
Roberto de Noya, Dominican Order (O.P.) (13 January 1492 – 15 May 1497), then bishop of Acerra (Italy) (15 May 1497 – 15 April 1504) and bishop of Naxos (insular Greece) (15 April 1504 – 1515, death)
Bernardino Fumarelli (7 August 1528 – 16 August 1529), then bishop of Alife (Italy) (16 August 1529 – 4 November 1532), bishop of Sulmona (Italy) (4 November 1532 – 5 June 1547), bishop of Valva (Italy) (4 November 1532 – 5 June 1547, death)
Giovanni Francesco de Marellis (16 August 1529 – 1536, death)
Gian Vincenzo Micheli (2 March 1545 – 1596, death, as centenarian), participant at the Tridentine Council (1545–1563), previously bishop of Lavello (30 May 1539 – 2 March 1545)
Giacomo Antonio Caporali (9 January 1606 – 1616), consecrated the rebuilt cathedral
Altobello Carissimi (30 January 1617 – 1632, death)
Giovanni Michele Rossi, Carmelite Order (O. Carm.) (12 January 1633 – 11 April 1633, death)
Gerolamo Maria Zambeccari, O.P. (11 April 1633 – 1635), previously Bishop of Alife (Italy) (7 April 1625 – 11 April 1633)
Antonio Maria Pranzoni (6 May 1635 – 1663, death)
Francesco Maria Vignola (24 September 1663 – 1700, death)
Marcantonio Chenevix (20 November 1702 – July 1717, death)
Nicola Pignatelli (9 February 1719 – 28 October 1734, death)
Fabio Troyli (1 December 1734 – 1 February 1751), then Bishop of Catanzaro (Italy) (1 February 1751 – 1 August 1762, death)
Stefano Gennaro Spani (15 March 1751 – April 1776, death)
Pietro Silvio Di Gennaro (15 July 1776 – 12 July 1779), then Bishop of Venosa (Italy) (12 July 1779 – 1786, death)
Pietro Mancini (27 February 1792 – 1808, death)
Titular see
The diocese was nominally restored in 1968 as Latin Titular bishopric of Minervino Murge (Curiate Italian) / Minervium (Latin) / Minerbinen(sis) (Latin).
It has had the following incumbents, of the fitting episcopal (lowest) rank:
Ryszard Karpiński (28 September 1985 – present), as auxiliary bishop of Lublin (Poland) (28 September 1985 – 31 December 2011) and, later, emeritus.
City sights
Former Cathedral of Mary Assumed
The medieval former cathedral, now the Chiesa di Santa Maria Assunta[it], was built under Norman rule, but mostly rebuilt from 1519 until the consecration on 30 August 1608 by Bishop Giacomo Antonio Caporali (9 January 1606 – 1616).
A document from 1667 specifies that it has 43 ecclesiastical officials, including an archdeacon, an archpriest, a primicerius, a cantor, 10 canons, 26 other priests, a deacon and two subdeacons.
Other sights
The castle (14th century), later remade as a palazzo
Pius Bonifacius Gams, Series episcoporum Ecclesiae Catholicae, Leipzig 1931, pp.897–898
Michele Garruba, Serie critica de' Sacri Pastori Baresi, Tipografia Fratelli Cannone, Bari 1844, pp.965–966
Norbert Kamp, Kirche und Monarchie im staufischen Königreich Sizilien, vol. 2, Prosopographische Grundlegung: Bistümer und Bischöfe des Königreichs 1194 - 1266; Apulien und Kalabrien, Munich 1975, pp.640–642
Paul Fridolin Kehr, Italia Pontificia, vol. IX, Berlin 1962, p.344
Papal Bulla De utiliori, in Bullarii Romani continuatio, Vol. XV, Rome 1853, pp.56–61
Apulia
