Decimoputzu, Baptistery and Church of San Giorgio

The church of San Giorgio is on the immediate outskirts of S/E of Decimoputzu, on the edge of the square behind the parish church of Our Lady of Grace.
The first documentary evidence of the church of San Giorgio dates back to the end of the eleventh century and is contained in a document that confirms the donation, by the Cagliari judge, to the Victorian monks of Marseille. The monks reconstructed it in Romanesque form, on an older worship room.
The pre-existing building, with a Latin cross plan, consisted of a single nave with an E-shaped apse. Inside, in an S-shaped room of the classroom, there was a square-shaped baptismal bath (0.65 m on the side) covered with plaster, comparable in size and processing technique with that identified in the area below the church of San Giovanni Battista di Nurachi. The paving in phase with the tub reused fragments of a mosaic dating back to the third century AD, probably recovered from a public building located near the same church. No finds have been recovered to chronologically frame the phases of use of the site, just as no burial linked to the religious building has been identified. The church and baptistery can, however, be assigned to the 6th century and refer to a settlement located along the tenth mile of the street “a Karalibus Sulcos”, as indicated by the name of the modern center, referring to the ancient toponym “Ad Decimum (milliarium)”.
The Romanesque church has a carved plan and has undergone serious changes. Only the limestone façade, surmounted by a sailing bell tower, remains of the installation phase. The hall was renovated in the 16th century, when the church was also equipped with a pictorial polyptych.

History of excavations
In 1989, Donatella Mureddu oversaw the archaeological excavation on behalf of the Superintendence of Archaeological Heritage for the Provinces of Cagliari and Oristano.

Bibliography by
R. Coroneo, Romanesque architecture from the middle of the thousand to the early thirteenth century, series “History of art in Sardinia”, Nuoro 1993, sch. 40;
S. Basciu, The Church of San Giorgio a Decimoputzu between charm and mystery, Cagliari, 1997;
P.G. Spanu, Byzantine Sardinia between the 6th and 7th centuries, series “Late Antique and Medieval Mediterranean. Excavations and research”, Oristano, S'Alvure, 1998, pp. 150-152;
P.G. Spanu, “The Christianization of the Rural Environment in Sardinia”, in Early Christian Sardinia between Eusebio and Gregorio Magno. Proceedings of the National Study Conference, Cagliari, 1999, pp. 485-495;
P.G. Spanu, “Sardinia”, in At the origins of the rural parish (4th-8th century). Proceedings of the theme day of the Christian Archaeology Seminars, Vatican City, 1999, pp. 181-204; V. Fiocchi Nicolai-S.
Gelichi, “Decimoputzu (CA), San Giorgio”, in “Baptisteries and rural churches (4th-7th century)”, in The baptismal building in Italy. Aspects and problems. Proceedings of the VIII National Congress of Christian Archaeology, Bordighera, 2001, pp. 370-371;
D. Mureddu, “Saint George of Decimoputzu: an early medieval rural ecclesia”, in Insulae Christi. Primitive Christianity in Sardinia, Corsica and the Balearic Islands, edited by P.G. Spanu, Oristano, S'Alvure, 2002, pp. 453-464;
P.G. Spanu, “Roads and Rural Settlements”, in On the Borders of the Empire. History, art and archeology of Byzantine Sardinia, edited by P. Corrias-S. Cosentino, Cagliari, M&T Sardinia, 2002, pp. 115-125.