Among the known traditional settlements in the territory of Dorgali (fig. 1), nowadays uninhabited and abandoned, even harder to identify and only partly surviving, it is worth mentioning Isarle, Nurule, Longe and Dorgali itself, which belonged to the curatoria of Galtellì which in turn fell under the Giudicato of Gallura.

Fig. 1 - Atlas of the island of Sardinia, scale 1: 50,000, sheet XXV Dorgali, year 1881 (from http://www.igmi.org/ancient/immagine.php?cod=28506).

During the XIII century, the territory of Dorgali was subject to the dominion by Pisa until the war against the Crown of Aragon.. The wars which took place during the fourteenth century caused great difficulties for the village which, after the division of Gallura at the hands of the Spanish kings, fell under the administration of the Giudicato of Arborea. Giudice Mariano IV waged a war against the invading Iberians, but during the fifteenth century his successors were defeated and Dorgali was also subjugated by the feudal lords chosen by the Spanish kings.

Villa Dorguali does not appear in any document prior to the fourteenth century, although the presence, in the town and nearby, of numerous religious buildings dedicated to the saints belonging to the eastern menologium suggests the existence of the current town already during the Byzantine Age. In the early fourteenth century there were roughly 250/300 inhabitants.

The medieval village of Isarle during Pisan Age (early fourteenth century), included about 60 people and was a reference point for the churches of Santa Cristina e’ Isalle and San Giorgio, of which only a few ruins survive, together with the findings attributed to an ancient settlement of the Historic Period. It was abandoned or destroyed in the early fifteenth century. Traces of an ancient Roman and Medieval Age settlement remain of the village of Nurule. Today, of the medieval core only the church of San Pietro survives. It was already abandoned during the fifteenth century. Among the medieval ceramic materials brought to light in the territory of Dorgali, those originating from Thomes, from the shelter of Rio Flumineddu, from Codula Fuili and from the caves of Sirios and Sirieddos should be mentioned (figs. 2, 3).

Fig. 2 - Clay artefacts from the cave of Sos Sirios (from Caprara 1980, table LXXII).

Fig. 3 - Clay artefacts from the caves of Sos Sirios and Sos Sirieddos (from Caprara 1980, table LXXIV).