Giants from Mont'e Prama

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Coordinates: 39 ° 58 '  N , 8 ° 27'  E

Map: Italy
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Giants from Mont'e Prama​
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Italy
Figure of Mont'e Prama
Nuragic settlements on the Sinis Peninsula, dating back to the 7th century BC. Was inhabited by Nuraghi. The peninsula was already inhabited in the early Neolithic.
Plan of the necropolis of Monte Prama. The necropolis had not been fully excavated until 2012.

The giants of Mont'e Prama ( ital. Giganti di Mont'e Prama ; sard. Zigàntes de Mònt'e Pràma ) are formerly free-standing sandstone sculptures of the Sardinian nuragic culture . About 30 intact nuragic stool graves were found on the Sinis Peninsula in the province of Oristano , covered by a sandstone slab about 15 cm thick and one square meter in size. Lined up in a curved line, these formed a paved path about 40 m long, which was partially lined with orthostats on the sides . Under the slabs, the dead without gifts lay in pits 70–80 cm deep, mostly facing east, their heads occasionally covered with a small stone slab.

description

In 1974 the farmer Sisinnio Poddi plowed out the head of a statue on Mont'e Prama on the Sinis peninsula in the province of Oristano in Sardinia . The authorities in Cabras informed the archaeologists Giovanni Lilliu and Enrico Atzeni, who carried out four excavation campaigns between 1975 and 1979. About 5000 fragments of statues came to light that were between 2 and 2.5 m in size. Among them were 15 heads and 22 busts. After the end of the excavations, the finds were brought to the Museo archeologico nazionale di Cagliari . Restoration work could only begin in 2007 after the responsible Ministry of Culture had guaranteed the financing. The coordination was at the Centro di Conservazione Archeologica di Roma in cooperation with the local institutions. For the first time in 2009, 25 restored warriors, archers and boxers, plus 13 nuraghi models, were exhibited; a permanent exhibition has existed since November 2011. Most of the nuraghi models were found around Monte Prama. The remains were probably part of more than 44 statues. The objects that the excavations brought to light between 2007 and 2012 were very numerous. The 5,178 objects also had a total weight of more than ten tons.

2000 pieces of 30 archaic sandstone statues that were once 2.0 to 2.6 m high were found on a nearby heap of rubbish . In addition to the intentionally destroyed statues, destroyed baityloi , bronzes and nuragic models, as well as a wide range of ceramics ranging from the Nuragic period to the Roman era, were discovered.

The statues mainly include depictions of archers and warriors, which are very similar to the bronze figures of the Nuragic culture (Abini, Serri, Teti) from the 8th to 6th centuries BC. Have. One has the habit of a Lusitan warrior statue . Many show Celtic hairstyles and oriental clothing (wide belt and short kilt ). The helmets of the figures have horns, their shields are worked out. They have deep-set eyes made of precisely concentric circles, large noses, but their mouth is only a line. What makes them unique for time and the island is their larger than life size.

Since they were excavated, they lay almost unnoticed in a cellar of the Museum of Cagliari. It was not until 2003 that they were outsourced for restoration under public pressure.

Some of the statues are now at the Archaeological Museum in Cagliari and some near the excavation site at the Archaeological Museum of Cabras (Oristano). After the renovation and expansion of the museum, it is planned to exhibit all the figures in convertibles.

In 2014 and 2016 new excavations were carried out using more modern methods. More statues, nuraghi models and a long wall were found, which caused a sensation. New excavations will begin in September 2017.

Time position

Their age could not be determined exactly. The assumptions initially fluctuated between 800 and 700 BC. In order to underpin a late dating, comparisons were made with the bronzes of the Abini group. However, some researchers have recently dated these bronzes two to three centuries earlier, ie before the geometric epoch. The oldest Sardinian bronze art probably originated before the Mediterranean upheaval, which took place around 1200 BC. Chr. The Mediterranean shook and existing contacts of the island to the eastern Mediterranean ( Cyprus ) interrupted. That would mean that the oldest free-standing large sculpture in Europe was created in Sardinia, even before a corresponding development began in Greece . A discovery made in the 1980s at the well sanctuary near Sorso shows that the idea of ​​a nuragic sculpture that is independent of Eastern Mediterranean influences is not completely absurd . It confirms the plastic bull's head made of limestone, which was discovered at the Santa Vittoria fountain sanctuary in the 1920s , but could not be assigned due to the unclear finding circumstances. In 2015, the age of three dead was examined using the radiocarbon method (C-14) and measured between 1,100 and 900 BC. Set. This dating is still controversial.

  • Carlo Tronchetti: Le tombe e gli eroi. Considerazioni sulla statuaria di Monte Prama in Il Mediterraneo di Heracles , Carocci, Rome, 2005, pp. 145–167 ( PDF )
  • Andreina Costanzi Cobau, Le sculture di Mont'e Prama viste da vicino (pdf), Rome 2011 ( online , PDF)
  • Giovanni Lilliu: Sculture della Sardegna nuragica , 1966.
  • Giovanni Lilliu: Cuoiai o pugilatori? A proposito di tre figurine protosarde (PDF; 40.4 MB), 2008 in: Alberto Moravetti (Ed.): Sardegna e Mediterraneo negli scritti di Giovanni Lilliu , vol. 3.
  • Giovanni Lilliu : Betili e betilini nelle tombe di giganti della Sardegna , in: Atti della Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei, Memorie, Series IX, Vol. VI.
  • Massimo Pittau: Il Sardus Pater ei guerrieri di Monte Prama . EDES, Sassari 2008, ISBN 978-88-6025-108-4 .
  • Roberto Sirigu: Le tombe degli eroi di Monti Prama (PDF; 4.8 MB), in: Darwin 141.1 (2006) 40–45.
  • Alfonso Stiglitz: La Sardegna e l'Egitto, il progetto Shardana . In: G. Cavillier (ed.): L'Egitto di Champollion e Rosellini, fra Museologia , Collezionismo e Archeologia, Genova, 2010.
  • Alfonso Stiglitz, Giovanni Tore, Giuseppe Atzori, Salvatore Sebis: La penisola del Sinis tra i bronzo finale e la prima età del ferro , in: Un millennio di relazioni fra la Sardegna ei paesi del Mediterraneo , Selargius, Cagliari 1986.
  • Carlo Tronchetti: I Sardi: traffici, relazioni, ideologie nella Sardegna arcaica , Longanesi 1988.
  • Carlo Tronchetti: Le tombe e gli eroi. Considerazioni sulla statuaria nuragica di Mont'e Prama , in: Paolo Bernardini, Raimondo Zucca: Il Mediterraneo di Herakle , 2005 (PDF; 978 kB), pp. 145–167.
  • Michel-Claude Weiss, François de Lanfranchi: Les Statues-menhirs de la Corse et le contexte méditerranéen , 1997.

Web links

Commons : Monte Prama  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Remarks

  1. ^ Museo archeologico nazionale di Cagliari. Accessed December 31, 2018 .
  2. ^ Antonio Meloni: Giganti di Mont'e Prama verso Cabras e Cagliari ( Memento of March 13, 2014)
  3. ↑ Valentina Leonelli: Rappresentazioni di architettura ( Memento of the original from December 20, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , in: La pietra e gli eroi. Le sculture restaurate di Mont'e Prama, 2011, pp. 31–34 | @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.sardegna.beniculturali.it