Conversano, formerly the ancient Cupersanum, was inhabited as early as the Iron Age, the last of the epoch of the protohistory of humanity after the Stone Age and Bronze Age, when the Peucetians founded Norba. Later on, in the 6th century, it flourished into a trading town with strong influence from the neighboring Greek colonies.

It was then conquered by the ancient Romans in 268 B.C. and came the invasion of the Visigoths, the nomadic tribes of the Germanic peoples during the Migration Period. Under the Normans, it gained importance when on 1054, Lord Geoffrey, the Count of Conversano, turned the town into the capital of a large county.