The Giants of Monte Prama, mysterious statues from the Nuragic civilization of Sardinia dating back to the 9th and 8th centuries BC, have been restored and are now on permanent display at the National Archeological Museum in Cagliari.
This is going to be the first time the statues go on permanent display, forty years after their components, which had to be carefully reconstructed, were discovered by a ploughman near Cabras, on the west coast of the island. More than 5,000 pieces were found at the site and it took four years, from 2007 to 2011, to carry out the re-assembling.
The Giants of Monte Prama, standing at 2 meters tall, include statues of archers, wrestlers and boxers carved in sandstone, as well representations of nuraghe buildings, the tower-fortresses that give the name to the Nuragic civilisation.
One of the most striking features of the statues are their perfectly concentric, otherworldly eyes.
The Nuragic civilisation flourished in Sardinia for two millennia until the second century AD.
