Necropolis of Anghelu Ruju

Anghelu Ruju is one of the largest and best-preserved prehistoric necropolises in the Mediterranean, situated about 10 km north of Alghero on Sardinia. Its 38 rock-cut tombs — known as Domus de Janas, or 'fairy houses' — were carved vertically into the local limestone by communities of the Ozieri and Bonnanaro cultures, roughly between 3200 and 1800 BCE. When archaeologist Antonio Taramelli excavated the site between 1903 and 1907, he found the burial chambers unlooted, an extraordinary rarity for the region that made Anghelu Ruju a cornerstone of Mediterranean prehistoric research. Grave goods including ceramics, animal bones, and ritual objects shed direct light on the funerary beliefs of Sardinia's earliest farming societies. Carefully restored and fenced in the 1990s and designated an Italian national monument, the site today allows visitors a close look at carved threshold reliefs and the low, intimate scale of the burial chambers.