The Giants of Mont'e Prama
In 1974, a farmer near Cabras accidentally came across stone fragments under his field – the beginning of one of the most significant archaeological discoveries in the western Mediterranean.
The chance find
During excavations between 1975 and 1979, over 5,000 stone fragments came to light. Only an extensive restoration between 2007 and 2011 turned these back into reassembled figures: in the end, 28 monumental statues could be reconstructed – boxers, archers, and warriors – along with numerous nuraghe models.
Why the find matters so much
The statues, dated to roughly 900 to 750 BC, are considered the oldest known large-scale stone sculptures in the western Mediterranean – older than comparable Greek kouros statues. They show that the nuraghic culture was capable of monumental stone sculpture, something archaeologists hadn't previously expected.
A find that's not yet finished
Even decades after the initial discovery, further excavations in the region continue to turn up new fragments – archaeologically, the story of the Giants of Mont'e Prama is still not fully written.