Domus de Janas
Domus de Janas are a type of pre-Nuragic chamber tombs found in Sardinia. They consist of several chambers quarried out by the people of the San Ciriaco through Ozieri cultures and subsequent cultures, resembling houses in their layout. Built between 3400 and 2700 BC, they date to the late Neolithic and early Bronze Age. A necropolis of them at the site of Anghelu Ruju, near Alghero, consists of 38 tombs. Other large sites are those of Montessu, near Villaperuccio, of Sant'Andrea Priu at Bonorva. Many other domus de janas can be found with the exception of Gallura; the shape of the internal chambers can vary from that of a rounded hut with conical or triangular ceiling. The walls are decorated with reliefs or etchings depicting magical and religious symbols such as spirals, zig-zag motifs and bull's horns; the corpses, painted with red ochre like the tomb's walls, were buried together with common life objects and tools. According to archaeologist Giovanni Lilliu, they were buried under shells of molluscs.
Hypogeum Enchanted Moura Domus de Janas on the Atlas Obscura. Giovanni Lilliu, La civiltà dei Sardi dal neolitico all'età dei nuraghi, Edizioni ERI, 1967 AA. VV. La civiltà in Sardegna nei secoli, Edizioni ERI AA. VV. Ichnussa. Sardegna dalle origini all'età classica, Milano, 1981 Alberto Moravetti, Guide archeologiche Sardegna 2, 1995
Cagliari
Cagliari is an Italian municipality and the capital of the island of Sardinia, an autonomous region of Italy. Cagliari's Sardinian name Casteddu means castle, it has about 155,000 inhabitants. According to Eurostat, the population of the Functional urban area, the commuting zone of Cagliari, rises to 476,974. Cagliari is the largest city on the island of Sardinia. An ancient city with a long history, Cagliari has seen the rule of several civilisations. Under the buildings of the modern city there is a continuous stratification attesting to human settlement over the course of some five thousand years, from the Neolithic to today. Historical sites include the prehistoric Domus de Janas damaged by cave activity, a large Carthaginian era necropolis, a Roman era amphitheatre, a Byzantine basilica, three Pisan-era towers and a strong system of fortification that made the town the core of Spanish Habsburg imperial power in the western Mediterranean Sea, its natural resources have always been its sheltered harbour, the powerfully fortified hill of Castel di Castro, the modern Casteddu, the salt from its lagoons, from the hinterland, wheat from the Campidano plain and silver and other ores from the Iglesiente mines.
Cagliari was the capital of the Kingdom of Sardinia from 1324 to 1848, when Turin became the formal capital of the kingdom. Today the city is a regional cultural, educational and artistic centre, known for its diverse Art Nouveau architecture and several monuments, it is Sardinia's economic and industrial hub, having one of the biggest ports in the Mediterranean Sea, an international airport, the 106th highest income level in Italy, comparable to that of several northern Italian cities. It is the seat of the University of Cagliari, founded in 1607, of the Primate Roman Catholic archdiocese of Sardinia, since the 5th century AD; the Cagliari area has been inhabited since the Neolithic. It occupies a favourable position between the sea and a fertile plain and is surrounded by two marshes. There are high mountains nearby, to which people could evacuate if the settlement had to be given up. Relics of prehistoric inhabitants were found in Cape Sant ` Elia. Karaly was established around the 8th/7th century BC as one of a string of Phoenician colonies in Sardinia, including Tharros.
Its founding is linked to its position along communication routes with Africa as well as to its excellent port. The Phoenician settlement was located in the Stagno di Santa Gilla, west of the present centre of Cagliari; this was the site of the Roman Portus Scipio, when Arab pirates raided the area in the 8th century it became the refuge for people fleeing from the city. Other Phoenician settlements have been found at Cape Sant'Elia. In the late 6th century BC Carthage took control of part of Sardinia, Cagliari grew under their domination, as testified by the large Tuvixeddu necropolis and other remains. Cagliari was a fortified settlement in what is now the modern Marina quarter, with an annexed holy area in the modern Stampace. Sardinia and Cagliari came under Roman rule in 238 BC, shortly after the First Punic War, when the Romans defeated the Carthaginians. No mention of it is found on the occasion of the Roman conquest of the island but, during the Second Punic War, Caralis was the headquarters of the praetor, Titus Manlius Torquatus, from whence he conducted his operations against Hampsicora and the Carthaginians.
At other times it was the Romans' chief naval station on the island and the residence of its praetor. The Romans built a new settlement east of the old Punic city, the vicus munitus Caralis mentioned by Varro Atacinus; the two urban agglomerations merged during the second century BC. Florus calls it the urbs capital of Sardinia, he represents it as taken and punished by Gracchus, but this statement is wholly at variance with Livy's account of the wars of Gracchus, in Sardinia, according to which the cities were faithful to Rome, the revolt was confined to the mountain tribes. In the Civil War between Caesar and Pompey, the citizens of Caralis were the first to declare in favor of the former, an example soon followed by the other cities of Sardinia. A few years when Sardinia fell into the hands of Menas, the lieutenant of Sextus Pompeius, Caralis was the only city which offered any resistance, but was taken after a short siege. Cagliari continued to be regarded as the capital of the island under the Roman Empire, though it did not become a colony, obtained the status of Municipium.
Remains of Roman public buildings were found to the west of Marina in Piazza del Carmine. There was an area of ordinary housing near the modern Via Roma, richer houses on the slopes of the Marina distinct; the amphitheatre is located to the west of the Castello. A Christian community is attested in Cagliari at least as early as the 3rd century, by the end of that century the city had a Christian bishop. In the middle decades of the 4th century bishop Lucifer of Cagliari was exiled because of his opposition to the sentence against Athanasius of Alexandria at the Synod of Milan, he was banished to the desert of Thebais by the emperor Constantius II. Claudi
Olbia
Olbia is a city and comune of 60,345 inhabitants in the Italian insular province of Sassari in northeastern Sardinia, in the Gallura sub-region. Called Olbia in the Roman age, Cività in the Middle Ages and Terranova Pausania before the 1940s, Olbia was again the official name of the city during the period of Fascism, it is the economic centre of this part of the island and is close to the Costa Smeralda tourist area. It was one of the administrative capitals of the province of Olbia-Tempio, operative since 2005 and canceled after a referendum seven years later. Olbia is a tourist destination thanks to its sea and beaches and for the large number of places of cultural interest to visit. Although the name is of Greek origin, due to the Greek presence during the 7th century B. C. the city of Olbia was first settled according to the archaeological findings. It contains ruins from the Nuragic era to the Roman era, when it was an important port, the Middle Ages, when it was the capital of the Giudicato of Gallura, one of the four independent states of Sardinia.
During the First Punic War, the Romans fought against the Carthaginians and the Sardinians near Olbia, where the general Hanno died in battle. From 1113 it was the episcopal see of the Diocese of Cività, renamed in 1839 as Diocese of Civita–Tempio until its formal suppression in favor of the Diocese of Tempio–Ampurias Romanesque former cathedral of San Simplicio. Church of St. Paul Apostle National Archaeology Museum Pedres Castle Several dolmens and a menhir Several nuraghes Remains of the Roman forum and aqueduct Remains of Carthaginian walls Fausto Noce park, the largest in Sardinia River park of Padrongianus Olbia is the main connection between Sardinia and the Italian peninsula, with an airport, a passenger port, a railway from Olbia railway station to Porto Torres, Golfo Aranci and Cagliari. There is an expressway to Nuoro and Cagliari and national roads to Sassari, Tempio Pausania and Palau. Olbia has a Mediterranean climate, with warm springs and autumns and hot summers. Air Italy is an air company headquartered on the grounds of Olbia - Costa Smeralda Airport.
Olbia travel guide from Wikivoyage Official website City of Olbia GCatholic
Francesco Ciusa
Francesco Ciusa was an Italian sculptor. Born in the town of Nuoro, on the island of Sardinia in Italy, his father was an Ébéniste, or cabinet maker, he attended the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence from 1899 to 1903, where he had as teachers affirmed artists such as Adolfo De Carolis, the sculptor Domenico Trentacoste and the master of the Macchiaioli's movement Giovanni Fattori. He moved to Sassari Sardinia in 1904, where he knew famous artists like Giuseppe Biasi returned to his hometown Nuoro in 1905, he won the first prize at the Biennale di Venezia with the sculpture La madre dell'ucciso. Five copies of the sculpture were realised, one in bronze is today exhibited at the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Moderna in Rome, another one in plaster is exhibited at Galleria comunale d'arte in Cagliari. In 1913 he worked on the completion of the Cagliari's City Hall, together the artists Mario Delitala, Felice Melis and Filippo Figari. In 1923, he focused on the production of small ceramics. In 1924 he opened a School of Art in Oristano.
In 1928 he exhibited a sculpture for the second time at the Venice Biennale. In March 1937 he began to write his autobiography, describing his memories and visions as a child, the ideal path of his works in the background of an ancient world. In 1943 he was professor of design at the faculty of engineering at the University of Cagliari, he died in Cagliari in 1949. Giuliana Altea, Francesco Ciusa, Ilisso, 2004, testo disponibile online Giuliana Altea e Marco Magnani,'Pittura e scultura dal 1930 al 1960, collana "Storia dell'arte in Sardegna", Ilisso per Fondazione Banco di Sardegna, 2000 Remo Branca, La vita nell'arte di Francesco Ciusa, Editrice Sarda Fossataro, Cagliari, 1975. Rossana Bossaglia, Francesco Ciusa, Nuoro, 1990. F. Spano Satta, Il monumento nuorese a Sebastiano Satta, in L'Isola, Sassari, 28 gennaio 1931 Francesco Ciusa, Una lettera di Francesco Ciusa ne L'Unione Sarda, Cagliari, 18 gennaio 1944
Ozieri culture
The Ozieri culture was a prehistoric pre-Nuragic culture that occupied Sardinia from c. 3200 to 2800 BC. The Ozieri was the culmination of the island's Neolithic culture, takes its name from the locality where early findings connected with it have been found, the cave of San Michele near Ozieri, in northern Sardinia; the Ozieri existed contemporaneously with the Arzachena culture, sharing some similarities, its influence extended to nearby Corsica. Archeological excavations have identified some 200 Ozieri sites, located both in plain and mountain areas, but with a preference for low ridges, organized around an economy of Hunter-gatherers mixed with an initial presence of husbandry and agriculture; the settlements consisted of small stone huts, with a circular wall supporting a wooden frame with a ceiling of boughs. One, near Sestu, consisted of 60 huts. Another, near Mogoro, included 267 huts also erected on poles driven into the ground, with pavements composed of limestone slabs, basalt cobbles or clay.
Su Coddu, the largest known settlement, consisted of more complex structures and multiple room dwellings. The finding of unique tools and objects in individual huts, early evidence of metal-working, suggests the Ozieri culture was well organized and specialized; the villages had no walls, findings of weapons in the tombs are scarce, indicating the Ozieri civilization was a peaceful one different from the Nuragic civilization. The tombs consisted of rock-cut hypogeous structures that became known as domus de janas, which were built underground or in rock faces, with the largest example being the Necropolis of Anghelu Ruju; some tombs, of more monumental appearance, belonged to chiefs, in the fashion of those in Crete. The Ozieri burial practices differ from what is found in the region of Gallura, where the dead were interred in Megalithic circles; the Ozieri produced finely made ceramic pottery with complex patterns and surface decoration. Archaeological excavations held in 1914 and 1949 found fine worked vases with geometrical motifs carved in the clay and colored with red ochre.
The oldest ones were still rather crude, while the more recent examples were more refined and slender. Such ceramics were a novelty for prehistoric Sardinia, since up to that point they had been considered typical of the Cyclades and Crete; the development of the Ozieri culture, therefore stemmed from contacts with other eastern Mediterranean civilizations, in particular from the area of Neolithic Greece. The Ozieri culture appears to have been much involved in the obsidian trade, due to rich deposits on the island, which may have led to increased trading contact. Figurines recovered indicate the Ozieri may have worshiped a mother goddess, with the most well known example being an alabaster statuette found at Ponto Ferro Tomb, Senorbì, sharing some stylistic characteristics with Cycladic figures. Female statuettes similar to those of the Ozieri culture have been found in Malta. Bull horns were recovered from tombs and elsewhere, indicating the sacred bull was an important concept; the religious center of the Ozieri culture may have been the Monte d'Accoddi, a massive stone structure, an altar, has been called "the most singular cultic monument in the early Western Mediterranean."
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinople. It survived the fragmentation and fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century AD and continued to exist for an additional thousand years until it fell to the Ottoman Turks in 1453. During most of its existence, the empire was the most powerful economic and military force in Europe. Both the terms "Byzantine Empire" and "Eastern Roman Empire" are historiographical terms created after the end of the realm. Several signal events from the 4th to 6th centuries mark the period of transition during which the Roman Empire's Greek East and Latin West diverged. Constantine I reorganised the empire, made Constantinople the new capital, legalised Christianity. Under Theodosius I, Christianity became the Empire's official state religion and other religious practices were proscribed.
Under the reign of Heraclius, the Empire's military and administration were restructured and adopted Greek for official use in place of Latin. Thus, although the Roman state continued and its traditions were maintained, modern historians distinguish Byzantium from ancient Rome insofar as it was centred on Constantinople, oriented towards Greek rather than Latin culture, characterised by Eastern Orthodox Christianity; the borders of the empire evolved over its existence, as it went through several cycles of decline and recovery. During the reign of Justinian I, the empire reached its greatest extent after reconquering much of the Roman western Mediterranean coast, including North Africa and Rome itself, which it held for two more centuries; the Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628 exhausted the empire's resources and contributed to major territorial losses during the Early Muslim conquests of the 7th century, when it lost its richest provinces and Syria, to the Arab caliphate. During the Macedonian dynasty, the empire expanded again and experienced the two-century long Macedonian Renaissance, which came to an end with the loss of much of Asia Minor to the Seljuk Turks after the Battle of Manzikert in 1071.
This battle opened the way for the Turks to settle in Anatolia. The empire recovered during the Komnenian restoration, by the 12th century Constantinople was the largest and wealthiest European city. However, it was delivered a mortal blow during the Fourth Crusade, when Constantinople was sacked in 1204 and the territories that the empire governed were divided into competing Byzantine Greek and Latin realms. Despite the eventual recovery of Constantinople in 1261, the Byzantine Empire remained only one of several small rival states in the area for the final two centuries of its existence, its remaining territories were progressively annexed by the Ottomans over the 15th century. The Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 ended the Byzantine Empire; the last of the imperial Byzantine successor states, the Empire of Trebizond, would be conquered by the Ottomans eight years in the 1461 Siege of Trebizond. The first use of the term "Byzantine" to label the years of the Roman Empire was in 1557, when the German historian Hieronymus Wolf published his work Corpus Historiæ Byzantinæ, a collection of historical sources.
The term comes from "Byzantium", the name of the city of Constantinople before it became Constantine's capital. This older name of the city would be used from this point onward except in historical or poetic contexts; the publication in 1648 of the Byzantine du Louvre, in 1680 of Du Cange's Historia Byzantina further popularised the use of "Byzantine" among French authors, such as Montesquieu. However, it was not until the mid-19th century that the term came into general use in the Western world; the Byzantine Empire was known to its inhabitants as the "Roman Empire", the "Empire of the Romans", "Romania", the "Roman Republic", as "Rhōmais". The inhabitants called themselves Romaioi and as late as the 19th century Greeks referred to Modern Greek as Romaiika "Romaic." After 1204 when the Byzantine Empire was confined to its purely Greek provinces the term'Hellenes' was used instead. While the Byzantine Empire had a multi-ethnic character during most of its history and preserved Romano-Hellenistic traditions, it became identified by its western and northern contemporaries with its predominant Greek element.
The occasional use of the term "Empire of the Greeks" in the West to refer to the Eastern Roman Empire and of the Byzantine Emperor as Imperator Graecorum were used to separate it from the prestige of the Roman Empire within the new kingdoms of the West. No such distinction existed in the Islamic and Slavic worlds, where the Empire was more straightforwardly seen as the continuation of the Roman Empire. In the Islamic world, the Roman Empire was known as Rûm; the name millet-i Rûm, or "Roman nation," was used by the Ottomans through the 20th century to refer to the former subjects of the Byzantine Empire
Dedication of the Basilica of St Mary Major
The Dedication of the Basilica of St Mary Major is a feast day in the General Roman Calendar, optionally celebrated annually on 5 August with the rank of memorial. In earlier editions of the General Roman Calendar, down to that of 1960, it is called the Dedication of the Basilica of St Mary of the Snows, a reference to the legendary story about the foundation of the basilica. For the same reason the feast is known popularly as Our Lady of the Snows; the reference to the legend was removed in the 1969 revision of the General Roman Calendar. Pope Pius V inserted this feast into the General Roman Calendar in 1568, when, in response to the request of the Council of Trent, he reformed the Roman Breviary. Before that, it had been celebrated at first only in the church itself and, beginning in the 14th century, in all the churches of the city of Rome. Accordingly, it appears in the Tridentine Calendar for celebration as a Double. In Pope Clement VIII's Missal of 1604, it was given the newly invented rank of Greater Double.
In Pope John XXIII's 1960 calendar, it became a Third-Class Feast. This 1960 calendar, included in the 1962 edition of the Roman Missal, is the calendar whose continued use and, under certain conditions, publicly is authorized by the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum. Nine years the celebration became an optional memorial; the feast commemorates the dedication by Pope Sixtus III of the rebuilt Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore just after the First Council of Ephesus. This major basilica, located on the summit of the Esquiline Hill in Rome, is called the Basilica of Santa Maria Maggiore because it is the largest church in Rome dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary; the original church, replaced by that of Pope Sixtus III, was built during the pontificate of Pope Liberius, is thus sometimes known as the Basilica Liberii or Basilica Liberiana. Until 1969 the feast was known as Dedicatio Sanctae Mariae ad Nives, a name that had become popular for the Basilica in the 14th century in connection with a legend about its origin that the Catholic Encyclopedia summarizes: "During the pontificate of Liberius, the Roman patrician John and his wife, who were without heirs, made a vow to donate their possessions to the Virgin Mary.
They prayed that she might make known to them how they were to dispose of their property in her honour. On 5 August, at the height of the Roman summer, snow fell during the night on the summit of the Esquiline Hill. In obedience to a vision of the Virgin Mary that they had the same night, the couple built a basilica in honour of Mary on the spot, covered with snow. From the fact that no mention whatever is made of this alleged miracle until a few hundred years not by Sixtus III in his eight-line dedicatory inscription... it would seem that the legend has no historical basis."In fact there is no reference to the legend before the year 1000. The popularity of the legend in the 15th century is shown in the painting of the Miracle of the Snow by Masolino da Panicale of around 1423, now in the Museo di Capodimonte, Naples, in which the miracle is depicted as witnessed by a crowd of men and women, with Jesus and the Virgin Mary observing from above, by the building in that century and the following centuries of many churches dedicated to Our Lady of the Snows, of which 152 still exist in Italy.
A more critical attitude began to prevail in the 18th century, as evidenced by the proposal that a congregation set up by Pope Benedict XIV presented to him in 1741 that the reading of the legend be removed from the Roman Breviary and that the original name, "Dedicatio Sanctae Mariae", be restored. This recommendation was implemented only in 1969, 228 years later. On 5 August each year, during the celebration of the liturgical feast of the Dedication of the Basilica of St. Mary Major, a custom that commemorates the story of the miraculous snowfall is still maintained: at the conclusion of the Solemn Mass in the basilica, a shower of white rose petals is dropped from the dome of the Chapel of Our Lady. At sunset on the same day, an artificial "snowfall" is staged as a tourist attraction in the square outside the basilica. Apart from the above-mentioned many shrines of the Madonna della Neve in Italy, the United States has a "National Shrine of Our Lady of the Snows" in Belleville and parishes dedicated to "Our Lady of the Snows" are located in Reno, Nevada.
In Croatia, Bol on the island of Brač as well as the parish church in Mamre on the island of Pag are dedicated to the Lady of the Snows. There's a dedicated temple on Calvary hill in Bratislava, Slovakia - Kostol Panny Márie Snežnej History of Saint Mary's Our Lady of the Snows "The Dedication of St. Mary ad Nives", Butler's Lives of the Saints
listen) or less correctly [ˈnwɔːro];[4] Sardinian: Nùgoro [ˈnuɣoɾo])[4][a] is a city and comune (municipality) in central-eastern Sardinia, Italy, situated on the slopes of the Monte Ortobene. It is the capital of the province of Nuoro. With a population of 36,347 (2011),[5] it is the sixth-largest city in Sardinia.
Nuoro
