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Archaeology
- Prehistoric Monuments of Sardinia ____________________________________________
Necropolis of
Montessu
Villaperuccio (Cagliari)
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The
cemetery of Montessu is one of the most significant areas of pre-historic
Sardinia both in terms of its size (around 2 square km) and number
of tombs (more than 40). The necropolis is located in the countryside
of Villaperuccio, a small village at the heart of the Sulcis region.
The territory of Villaperuccio has been inhabited by man from
the earliest times: In 3rd millenium BC people of the Culture
of Ozieri, engaged in farming and hunting, settled on the hill
of "S'Arriorgiu", where today a cylinder-shape acqueduct
rises. (...)
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In
the structure of the mono- or pluricellular tombs, almost always
preceded by corridors or pavilions hewn from the rock, horizontal
planimetric projections are most common. Sometimes these are rectangular
- vertical entrance windows, quadrangular spaces with flat ceilings
and rectilinear walls, all well carved out of the trachyte crags,
sometimes the lines are softer and more curved - small reniform
antechambers, bigger, roundish cells with a concave "oven"
ceiling, widened around the perimeter with (trefoil) niches in
fairly high case racks. The diffusion of this latter type seems
to be more or less limited to the Sulcis area.
Of enormous interest, for their typology, size and way of uniting
interior and exterior ritual spaces, thus drawing out the design
of the megaliths, are the so-called Sanctuary tombs. These were
monumental chapels, opened by entrance doors two metres high and
wide, two of which are diametrically opposite the natural rock
amphitheatre. Obviously, this did not happen by chance.
Besides the large pavilions and megalithic ranging which encloses
them, the Sanctuary tombs are also alike in that they each have
three holes in the wall dividing the two chambers. The image created
is meant to resemble a skull.
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There are other items which enrich and variate the groups of most
interesting tombs and the suggestive symbolic-decorative motives:
graffiti with festoons, spirals, broken lines, triangles similar
to these found cut or impressed into the ceramics of the Ozieri
culture, original bas-reliefs of horn and even stylised taurine
protoms with apotropaic value, negative silhouettes to reproduce
the cross/like geometric figure of the mother goddess, round crucibles
e elliptical basins of different dimensions cut into the floors
and walls, large bands of red ochre, the symbolic colour of blood
and live, and small menhirs or sacral containers on the outside.
Profaned in far times and re-used again, the hypogeae reveal signs
of a protracted ritual activity for at least one millennium, from
the recent Neolithic to the older bronze. The fact that at Montessu,
besides the tombs cut into the rock other ritual spaces build
with megalithic techniques are to be found, makes the site of
even more archaeological importance. Indeed, here one can pick
the witnesses of a pre/nuragic megalithic which matures and lays
the foundation of what will be the developments of the nuragic
architecture in the bronze age.
The whole archaeological area of Montessu is currently contained
within the "Archaelogical Park of Montessu", managed
and looked after by the CSCL (a co-operative of cultural services)
through its consortium Coop. Montessu '90 and Coop. Archeotour.
The necropolis is open during the day, all year round, with guided
tours from expert staff. (...)
Text
and pictures by the Council of Villaperuccio
Translation into English by Laurence Gambella
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