Su Nuraxi is located on a short marsh plateau, at the foot of the Giara di Gesturi, in the Marmilla region.
The monument shows one of the most extraordinary planimetric and architectural plans that the Nuragic culture has produced. It was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1997.
The fortress was the cornerstone of a strategic system that included other nuraghi staggered along the slopes of the Giara, in an area not devoid of natural resources and in a position that allowed the control of the important route of penetration that led from the Cagliari Campidano to the interior of the island. The complex has several construction phases characterized by the use of local stone: the Giara basalt, which is largely prevalent, and the calcareous marl.
The first phase, of advanced Middle Bronze (late 15th century BC - beginning of 13th century BC), saw the creation of a central truncated conical tower (or keep) surrounded by a bastion.
The keep, now soaring, made of polygonal work, had a basal diameter of about m 12, three floors and a terrace, and developed for a height of almost 19 m. The entrance opened to S, the rooms had turned to 'tholos'. The bastion consisted of four towers connected by straight curtains. The towers had two floors and were equipped with two orders of louvers. Keep, curtains and towers were crowned with shelves that supported ballatoi-plumbatoi.
A complex vertical connection system, which used staircases and inclined interwall passages, stairs and movable bridges for elevated accesses, united the inner floors of the keep and the stands of the curtains, with the marginal towers, the keep and the inner courtyard. This had a semi-elliptical shape and was also accessible from the ground floor through an entrance that opened into the SE curtain. The same courtyard, equipped with a 20 m well of spring water, overlooked the entrances to the lower chambers of the keep and the towers O, E, S, as well as the ambulance that led to the chamber of the tower N. The erection of a primitive antumural of five towers also dates back to this chronological phase.
In recent Bronze Age (beginning of 13th century BC - end of 12th century BC), due to static problems caused by the subsidence of the marl support, it was necessary to reassemble the bastion with a powerful wall (m 3 thick) that occluded slits and entrance. A new elevated entrance was opened in the NE curtain, while defensive reasons led to the erection of a larger antewall of seven towers. Huts were built around the monument. Significant Mycenaean finds (1210-1100 BC) come from these layers.
The agglomeration of 200 huts, now visible to the E and S of the fortress, outside and inside the antewall, developed starting from the Final Bronze Age (late 12th century BC - beginning of 9th century BC). From this period, hut 135, which revealed a founding ritual; hut 80 (or “of the council”), equipped with a circular seat and niches in the walls, which returned a model of nuraghe and was probably intended for meetings with political and religious values.
The village developed further in the Iron Age (beginning of the 9th century BC - beginning of the 7th century BC), with a primitive but clear attempt at urban planning: narrow streets, water channeling and sewerage systems appeared, while the houses, of the multicellular “court” type, were equipped with a central atrium, radial rooms and sometimes a well (isolated 11, 20, 42, 162). Environments with annular seats and basins in the center were perhaps destined for rites related to the cult of water.
At the end of the Iron Age, the complex was largely destroyed. Long uninhabited, it was reused in the Punic and Roman ages (5th century BC - 3rd century AD) for settlement, funerary and sacred purposes. There were sporadic visits even in the 5th-7th century AD.

History of excavations
It was the first among the nuraghs to be excavated with scientific criteria, by Giovanni Lilliu, in the fifties of the twentieth century. In the eighties Giovanni Ugas carried out other stratigraphic investigations.

Bibliography
G. Lilliu, “The Nuraghe of Barumini and Nuragic Stratigraphy”, in Studi Sardi, XII-XIII, 1, 1955, pp. 137-469; G. Lilliu-R. Zucca, Su Nuraxi by Barumini, series “Archaeological Sardinia. Guides and Itineraries”, Sassari, Carlo Delfino, 2001;
V. Santoni, Il nuraghe Su Nuraxi di Barumini, Cagliari, Archaeological Superintendence of Cagliari and Oristano, 2001; G. Lilliu, The Nuraghe. Prehistoric Towers of Sardinia, preface by A. Moravetti. Nuoro, Ilisso, 2005, pp. 109-111, 181-191, 254-257, 328-349, tavv. LVI-LXXVII;
E. Usai, Barumini Su Nuraxi, “Mirabilia” series, Ministry for Cultural Heritage and Activities, 2006.

How to get there
Along the SS 131, a few kilometers away from Sanluri, an overpass allows you to enter the junction that leads to the SS 197, towards Villamar. You cross Villamar and Las Plassas and reach Barumini; from the center of the town, turn south on the SP 44 in the direction of Tuili. A kilometer away, the archaeological area is immediately visible on the left edge.