The Nuragic civilization, also known as the Nuragic culture, was a civilization or culture on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia, Italy, which lasted from the 18th century BC (Middle Bronze Age) (or from the 23rd century BC ) up to the Roman colonization in 238 BC. Others date the culture as lasting at least until the 2nd century AD and in some areas, namely the Barbagia, to the 6th century AD or possibly even to the 11th century AD.
The adjective "Nuragic" is neither an autonym nor an ethnonym. It derives from the island's most characteristic monument, the nuraghe, a tower-fortress type of construction the ancient Sardinians built in large numbers starting from about 1800 BC. Today more than 7,000 nuraghes dot the Sardinian landscape.
No written records of this civilization have been discovered, apart from a few possible short epigraphic documents belonging to the last stages of the Nuragic civilization. The only written information there comes from classical literature of the Greeks and Romans, and may be considered more mythical than historical.
History
Pre-Nuragic Sardinia
In the Stone Age the island was first inhabited by people who had arrived there in the Paleolithic and Neolithic ages from Europe and the Mediterranean area. The most ancient settlements have been discovered both in central and northern Sardinia (Anglona). Several later cultures developed on the island, such as the Ozieri culture (3200−2700 BC). The economy was based on agriculture, animal husbandry, fishing, and trading with the mainland. With the diffusion of metallurgy, silver and copper objects and weapons also appeared on the island.
In 2014, early Chalcolithic period Sardinia was identified as one of the earliest silver extraction centres in the world. This took place during the 4th millennium BC.
Remains from this period include hundreds of menhirs (called perdas fittas) and dolmens, more than 2,400 hypogeum tombs called domus de Janas, the statue menhirs, representing warriors or female figures, and the stepped pyramid of Monte d'Accoddi, near Sassari, which show some similarities with the monumental complex of Los Millares (Andalusia) and the later talaiots in the Balearic Islands. According to some scholars, the similarity between this structure and those found in Mesopotamia are due to cultural influxes coming from the Eastern Mediterranean.
The altar of Monte d'Accoddi fell out of use starting from c. 2000 BC, when the Beaker culture, which at the time was widespread in almost all western Europe, appeared on the island. The beakers arrived in Sardinia from two different regions: firstly from Spain and southern France, and secondly from Central Europe, through the Italian Peninsula.
Nuragic era
Early Bronze Age
The Bonnanaro culture was the last evolution of the Beaker culture in Sardinia (c. 1800–1600 BC), and displayed several similarities with the contemporary Polada culture of northern Italy. These two cultures shared common features in the material culture such as undecorated pottery with axe-shaped handles. These influences may have spread to Sardinia via Corsica, where they absorbed new architectural techniques (such as cyclopean masonry) that were already widespread on the island.
New peoples coming from the mainland arrived on the island at that time, bringing with them new religious philosophies, new technologies and new ways of life, making the previous ones obsolete or reinterpreting them.
The widespread diffusion of bronze brought numerous improvements. With the new alloy of copper and tin (or arsenic), a harder and more resistant metal was obtained, suitable for manufacturing tools used in agriculture, hunting and warfare.
At a later phase of this period (Bonnanaro A2) probably dates the construction of the so-called proto-nuraghe, a platformlike structure that marks the first phase of the Nuragic Age. These buildings are very different from the classical nuraghe having an irregular planimetry and a very stocky appearance. They are more numerous in the central-western part of Sardinia, later they spread in the whole Island.
Middle and Late Bronze Age
Dating to the middle of the 2nd millennium BC, the nuraghe, which evolved from the previous proto-nuraghe, are megalithic towers with a truncated cone shape; every Nuragic tower had at least an inner tholos chamber and the biggest towers could have up to three superimposed tholos chambers. They are widespread in the whole of Sardinia, about one nuraghe every three square kilometers.