Meana Sardo, Nuraghe Nolza

The nuraghe is located on Cuccuru Nolza, the highest relief of the Su Pranu schist plateau, in the Barbagia di Belvì, in the mountainous heart of Sardinia.
The building consists of a central tower and a quadrilobed bastion; the village covers an area of about 2.5 hectares around it.
The maximum remaining height of the keep is about 12-13 m.
The monument reveals different structural phases: the keep, two of the four perimeter towers (E, F) and the wall curtains E and N, are built with shale blocks arranged in a sub-filaric structure; the other two towers C and D and the related curtains S and O are built with porphyry blocks arranged in a polygonal technique.
Close to the wall curtains, numerous perfectly worked shelves and others in trachyte have been found that belong to the upper parts of the monument.
Of particular interest is the excavation of one of the structures located on the top of the quadrilobate, between the keep and the N curtain: the so-called room I. Deprived of the original “tholos” roof, paved with a crawl space made of slabs and clay wrought with cotta, it has a counter and a fireplace built with trachyte stones. It has returned an interesting stratigraphic sequence useful for defining the chronological phases of the monument.
In the current state of research, it can be considered that the primitive settlement, probably consisting of a village of huts, dates back to the 16th-15th century BC.
In the 14th-13th century BC, the keep and the quadrilobate with an entrance to curtain were built in schist. In the 12th century BC, the towers and curtains of the S and O sectors were rebuilt with porphyry blocks, while a new entrance was opened
in curtain O and the keep was affected by a conspicuous restoration.
The new entrance led to a room that allowed both to enter the S-O tower and to climb - via a staircase - into an elevated courtyard. This was paved with a pavement of shale stones, cork sheets and one often beaten with concotta clay; the courtyard opened the entrance to the first floor of the central tower, perfectly preserved except in the last blocks that closed the 'tholos'. The lower floor was perhaps accessible from the N-O tower, currently cluttered with collapses. Also from the courtyard, via a narrow staircase, it was also possible to descend into the S-E tower.

History of excavations
Described in abundance of detail by Angius in 1842, the monument was affected by seven excavation campaigns, which followed one another almost without interruption, starting in 1994. The excavations in 1998 were directed by Mauro Perra.

Bibliography
M. Sequi, Nuraghi. Modo per conoscere 90 grandi torri megalitiche della Sardegna, Como, 1985, p. 54;
G. Lilliu, "Meana dalle origini all'alto medioevo", in Meana. Matrici e tradizioni, Cagliari, 1989;
M. Perra-T. Cossu, "Meana Sardo (Nuoro). Località Su Pranu", in Bollettino di Archeologia, 43-45, 1997, pp. 247-253;
T. Cossu-M. Perra, "Two contexts of the Bronze Age in the nuraghe Nolza of Meana Sardo (NU)", in Papers of the EAA Third Annual Meeting at Ravenna 1997. BAR International Series 719, Oxford, 1998, pp. 97-109;
M. Perra, "Reperti del Bronzo Finale dal nuraghe Nolza di Meana Sardo (Nuoro)", in Etruria e Sardegna Centro Settentrionale tra l'Età del Bronzo Finale e l'Arcaismo, Atti del XXI Convegno di studi Etruschi ed Italici (Sassari-Alghero-Oristano Torralba, 13-17 ottobre 1998), Roma, 2002 pp. 515-522.

How to get there
From the SS 131 at the Uras-Laconi junction, take the direction to Ales, take the SS 442 through Morgongiori, Ales, Escovedu and Senis. Continue to Nureci, without crossing the town, to Laconi. Leave the town in a direction N and take the SS 128 which leads directly to Meana Sardo. Before arriving at the town, about 1 km away, turn onto the s. on a rough paved road; continue for just over 4 km, turn to s. for a natural road road, turn again to s. at the first crossroads and to d. at the next two, for a total of about 3 km. The road runs until it runs along the Nuraghe, about 100 m away on the left.