The Anghelu Ruju necropolis, Neolithic tombs with bull horns carved in the stone.

Ten kilometres from Alghero, beside the road to the airport and Porto Torres, there is a field of vines with holes in the ground. They are the mouths of 38 tombs cut into the sandstone, most of them domus de janas, "fairy houses" in Sardinian. It is the largest Neolithic necropolis in northern Sardinia and it was used for two thousand five hundred years, from about 4300 BC until about 1800 BC: it is older than Stonehenge and the first pyramids of Egypt.

What a tomb is like inside

You enter by a shaft or a corridor cut into the rock. First you reach an antechamber, the main room, where offerings were left and rites held; behind it open the cells where the dead were placed with their grave goods. The walls have reliefs: carved false doors, pillars and, above all, bull horns, the symbol of a deity who protected the sleep of the dead. Looking for the horns in each tomb is the best way to get children involved.

Part of what was found inside, vessels and grave goods, is in the National Museum in Cagliari and the Archaeological Museum of Alghero. The necropolis is on UNESCO's tentative list.

Hours and price

From November to February it is open every day from 10:00 to 14:00; in October, from 10:00 to 18:00; for the rest of the year check the ticketing website. Admission costs €7, reduced €5 (ages 6 to 17, students up to 26) and is free for under-6s. With a guided visit, €3 more. The Palmavera nuraghe has the same rate, and both are in the Alghero Ticket.

Getting there

By car, along the SP 42 dei Due Mari, the airport road: about ten minutes from Alghero. By bus, with lines ARST 9322 or 9325 to the Z.I. San Marco stop. It is a few minutes from the Sella & Mosca winery and the airport: it is a good visit for the day of arrival or return.