Raffaele Pettazzoni (1883-1959), the greatest Italian historian of religions, citing Aristotle and other classical authors, recalled a Protosard legend where it was “narrated that in Sardinia there once lived powerful chiefs and the illustrious (Heraclidi) and, after death, their bodies were preserved intact, still offering semblances of sleepers rather than of the deceased. Behind this legend, we found the Sardinian rite of incubation at the tombs of ancestral heroes, namely at the Tombe dei Giganti. Those Sardinians who performed the rite were freed from visions and night terrors; so much so that they could sleep for five days and as many nights in an uninterrupted slumber, without being conscious of the passage of time” (R. Pettazzoni “la Religione Primitiva in Sardegna”).
The photos of the tomb of giants of Barrancu Mannu (Santadi) are by Giovanni Sotgiu; those of the TdG of San Cosimo (Gonnosfanadiga) are by Bibi Pinna and Lucia Corda; those of the TdG of Iloi (Sedilo) are by Diversamente Sardi and Bibi Pinna. The photos of the TdG Di Conca ‘e Pira Onne o Padru su Chiai (Villagrande Strisaili) are by Maurizio Cossu and Sergio Melis.
