Since the REST concepts are built on the HTTP protocol, a RESTful API is an extension to an HTTP service. For robust, high-performance, secure operations, a common practice is to build on a server such as Apache HTTPD or NGINX. These servers don't support Python directly; they require an extension module to interface with a Python application.
Any interface between externally-facing web servers and Python will adhere to the Web Services Gateway Interface (WSGI). For more information, see http://www.wsgi.org. The Python standard library includes a WSGI reference implementation. See PEP 3333, http://www.python.org/dev/peps/pep-3333/, for details on this standard. See https://wiki.python.org/moin/WebServers for a number of web servers that support WSGI. When working with NGINX, for example, the uWSGI plugin provides the necessary bridge...
