The Valonia Oak is an arboreal species of the Oriental Mediterranean basin and particularly of the Balkan Peninsula. In Italy at the present time there are many specimens especially in the Salento. The Valonia oak of Tricase, that according to the tradition it would be 800 years old, is really 600 and it is the most ancient specimen of Europe. Its impressiveness has fed for a long time many legends as that of Federico II and his knights who had take refuge under its great foliage.

Every year there are many visitors that come to see this monument of the nature and above all experts from every part of the world; In the whole territory that surrounds the oak it is possible to see many specimens of valonia oak born spontaneously, some have big trunks and they are very high. In times past in the low Salento the vegetation was mainly characterized by this specimen. Its fruit, the acorn, constituted a source of profit because it was used to dye textiles or in the tanning activity. In the quarter Finocchiara, not very far from the Valonia oak, you can admire the "grove", a group of about 50 centuries-old valonia oak trees.