Throughout Sardinia, these newly Unesco-inscribed stone necropolises tell the story of the island's pre-Roman funerary customs. But for locals, they're the enchanted homes of fairies.

The remote and ruggedly beautiful Italian island of Sardinia is scattered with more than 7,000 beehive-shaped stone Bronze Age monuments known as nuraghi – rising from the Mediterranean scrub like silent sentinels of a shadowy pre-Roman past. But long before these iconically Sardinian structures were ever built, another series of Tolkien-esque monuments were hewn into the rocks: ancient necropolises called the domus de janas, or "fairy houses".

The domus de janas were erected by the Ozieri (3200-2800 BCE), Sardinia's first great Neolithic civilisation and one of the most sophisticated societies in the western Mediterranean. Settling on fertile plains and hilltops, the Ozieri believed death wasn't an end but the beginning of a new chapter. To embody this credence, they carved approximately 3,500 underground chambers to resemble earthly dwellings; 220 of which were decorated with red ochre and bull motifs, held to symbolise rebirth.

In Sardinian folklore, however, these chambers are believed to be the enchanted homes of benevolent fairy-like women called janas; beings with pale, moonlit skin, often dressed in red, who spun fine fabrics made of golden threads and taught mortals the secrets of baking bread. Their legacy is passed down by school teachers and elder Sardinians through oral tales. According to one such legend, the janas emerge from their dwellings, their hair glinting silver, to sing otherworldly songs. Others warn of humans who vanished after stepping into the janas' hidden homes.

In July 2025, 17 domus de janas were recognised by Unesco as a collective World Heritage Site. They endure not only as archaeological remains, but as cultural symbols that weave together landscape, tradition and community.

They also served as the thread that guided my recent journey across the island.

I set out by camper on Sardinia's northern coast to my first stop: the Necropolis of Su Crucifissu Mannu, a few kilometres from the island's north-western town of Porto Torres, where I was met by my guide, Maurizio Melis. The limestone plateau opened before me with low doorways hollowed into the rock, leading to 22 tombs dating to the 4th and 3rd millennia BCE.

"For the Ozieri civilisation," said Melis, "the narrow dromos that descended into the tombs was a liminal passage through the earth itself, seen as a womb, a place that welcomes and transforms."

Melis led me deeper into the necropolis. "Su Crucifissu Mannu was used for centuries," he explained. "These tombs were first dug thousands of years ago and remained in use for millennia, until the Romans walked these lands." During excavations in........

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