The county was founded by the
Normans after their conquest of Apulia in the 1050s. Several Norman monarchs held their court at
Lecce, and
Tancred of Hauteville, who was Count of Lecce from 1149 to 1194, was born here. His daughter Elvira Maria Albina married
Walter III of Brienne, whose family held the duchy of Lecce in the following centuries. In 1384
Mary of Enghien, a granddaughter of
Isabella of Brienne, became Countess of Lecce. When she married
Raimondo Orsini del Balzo, Count of Soleto and (from 1393 to 1406)
Prince of Taranto, all of the
Salento was united into one of the largest fiefdoms in the
Kingdom of Naples and of the Italian peninsula. Raimondo improved the administration of the county and the city. After his death, the county went to his son,
Giovanni Antonio Orsini Del Balzo, who had also inherited the
Principality of Taranto in 1420. At his death in 1463,
Ferdinand I of Naples named himself as the heir to Giovanni Antonio's rich legacy, annexing the county to the royal estates of the
Kingdom of Naples. ==References==