Domus de janas di Lotzorai
Photo Mauro Mereu · CC BY-SA 2.5Source file on Wikimedia Commons
Overview
About this site
Overview
The necropolis of Tracucu, also called Fund'e Monti, is a group of fifteen domus de janas (“houses of the fairies”), rock-cut tombs of the Neolithic, on the hill of Tracucu in the territory of Lotzorai, Ogliastra, Sardinia, Italy.
The tombs belong to the Late Neolithic, 3500 – 2700 BCE in the traditional dating. A nearby group on Bruncu Crabiola brings the number of such tombs in the two neighbouring complexes to 24.
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Article
Domus de janas di Lotzorai
A short distance away the mountain group of Bruncu Crabiola, together with other rock outcrops known as Genna Tramonti, holds nine further domus de janas.
SettingSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
The tombs are arranged with differing orientations on the slopes of the hill of Tracucu. A short distance away the mountain group of Bruncu Crabiola, together with other rock outcrops known as Genna Tramonti, holds nine further domus de janas. Two more lie at a greater distance, at Tancau-Sa Murta, also in the territory of Lotzorai.
DescriptionSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
The tombs are cut into the rock. Some have a single chamber and so were intended for one burial; others have two chambers and are thought to have served several burials of the same family group. Access to the chambers is generally through a short area in front of the entrance, rectangular or trapezoidal in shape. In some cases this is a more pronounced corridor (dromos), which in one case reaches five metres in length. Some tombs have an antechamber leading to the burial cells proper, and the entrances of several are finished with mouldings.
One tomb has a carved decorative frame that runs around the entrance in a kind of semicircle. According to some authors this anticipates, or copies, the form of the stele of the giants' tombs of the dolmenic type of the later Nuragic period. Its threshold, among the most finished in the necropolis, is marked by a channel that probably drained the fluids used in the ceremonies of the funerary rites. The same tomb has a cup mark (coppella) on the left wall as one faces the entrance.
FindsSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
The tombs have yielded pottery fragments attributed to the Ozieri culture (Late Neolithic, 3500 - 2700 BCE). In one tomb three intact vessels of the Bonnanaro culture (Early Bronze Age, 1800-1600 BCE) were found. They indicate probable reuse of the burial site in periods after its first construction. This is supported by the remains of a nuraghe on the highest point of the hill, which confirms reuse of the site, with another function, two millennia after its origin as a necropolis.
ContextSources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
Sources for this section
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
Domus de janas, Sardinian for “houses of the fairies” or alternatively “houses of witches”, are pre-Nuragic rock-cut chamber tombs found in Sardinia. The names are folklore: in fact they are tombs with several chambers, laid out in a way that resembles a house. They were built mostly between 3400 and 2700 BCE.
Tradition and region
About this kind of monument
Domus de janas of Sardinia
Domus de janas, Sardinian for "houses of the fairies" or, alternatively, "houses of witches", are a type of pre-Nuragic rock-cut chamber tomb found in Sardinia. The names are folklore: later people imagined the small carved rooms as dwellings of fairies or witches. In fact they are tombs, with several chambers quarried out by the people of the San Ciriaco through Ozieri cultures and later groups, in a layout that resembles a house.
They were built mostly between 3400 and 2700 BCE, and so date to the Late Neolithic, the Chalcolithic and the early Bronze Age, including the Bell Beaker period. At Anghelu Ruju near Alghero a necropolis of them has 38 tombs. Other large sites are Montessu near Villaperuccio and Sant'Andrea Priu at Bonorva. Many more are found throughout the island, with the exception of Gallura, where the dead were usually buried in megalithic circles such as those of Li Muri.
The internal chambers vary in shape, from that of a rounded hut with a conical or triangular ceiling. The walls are often decorated with reliefs or etchings of spirals, zig-zags and bull's horns, and some neolithic murals are arguably the oldest known examples of egg tempera painting. Carved or painted false doors appear in about 20 tombs, mostly in the north-west, among them some at Anghelu Ruju, which are datable to between about 3200 and 1600 BCE; the earliest predate false doors in Egyptian tombs.
The Atlas sometimes files these tombs as chambered cairns, but they are the same Sardinian type, and this article applies to them.
When visiting, look for carving on the ceilings and walls, and note that tombs were reused over many centuries.
Paraphrased from Wikipedia: Domus de janas, Wikipedia: Nuragic civilization, Wikipedia: Nuraghe · CC BY-SA 4.0
From the article
Dated moments in the story
- 2700 BCE
Il sito archeologico prende il nome dalla collina di Tracucu, in territorio di Lotzorai (Ogliastra, Italia) sui cui versanti si dispongono, con diverse orientazioni, le antiche sepolture, risalenti al Neolitico recente (3500 – 2700 a.C. nella datazione tradizionale).
Source - 2700 BCE
Le domus de janas di Lotzorai hanno fornito frammenti di ceramica attribuiti alla cultura di Ozieri (Neolitico recente, 3500 - 2700 a.C.).
Source - 2026
Il paese, che conta 2109 abitanti all’ultimo rilevamento del 2026, conserva ancora un nucleo storico costituito da case in stile campidanese, con ampi cortili interni.
Source
Photographs
6 photographs, each with its author and licence
More photographs
Where it stands
Italy
The pin marks the monument itself — its exact point.
- Coordinates
- 39°58′41″ N, 9°37′55″ EFor a GPS or map app: 39.97794, 9.63205
Access is as our sources describe it; we have not visited the site to check.
Nearby
The closest sites in the Atlas, by straight line.
- NuragheNuraghe Corongiu1900–730 BCE
- NuragheNuraghe Santu Tomau1900–730 BCE
- NuragheNuraghe Perd'e Scarlattu1900–730 BCE
- NuragheNuraghe Perd'e Pizzoriga1900–730 BCE
- NuragheNuraghe Niu Abila1900–730 BCE
- NuragheNuraghe Cugumacci1900–730 BCE
- NuragheNuraghe Genna Olidone1900–730 BCE
- NuragheNuraghe Conk'e Porcu1900–730 BCE
Sources
Every record behind this page, with the link it came from.
1 source behind this page
- 01Wikidata Q15836508wikidata.org
Image files
- Lotzorai domus de janas 2.jpgMauro MereuCC BY-SA 2.5
- Sar03DomusDeJanas02.jpgZiegler175CC BY-SA 3.0
- Sar03DomusDeJanas01.jpgZiegler175CC BY-SA 3.0
- Lotzorai domus de janas 1.jpgMauro MereuCC BY-SA 2.5
- Lotzorai domus de janas 4.jpgMauro MereuCC BY-SA 2.5
- Lotzorai domus de janas 3.jpgMauro MereuCC BY-SA 2.5
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Around this place
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Credit
Text, licence and sources
Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Necropoli di Tracucu" (Italian), licensed CC BY-SA 4.0; authors are listed in the page history. Reused under CC BY-SA 4.0. Read on Wikipedia · Edit history and authors
- Wikipedia (Italian): Necropoli di TracucuCC BY-SA 4.0
- Wikidata Q15836508CC0