Among the ceramic artefacts found in the tomb of Thomes and on display in the Archaeological Museum of Dorgali, there are four ceramic fragments a few centimetres long which belong to a particular class of raised handles which have horned lugs (figs. 1,2,3,4) pertaining to ceramic types such as cups used as tableware, or carenated vessels and/or olla with a separate rim and a globular body used at home for cooking and storing food (figs. 5, 6).

The vessels to which they belong were shaped by hand using a totally non-purified clay, with a coarse mixture, containing many foreign bodies; the surfaces are greyish-brown and reddish-brown. In order to level out the outer surface of the vessel, it was smoothed before being fired.

Figs. 1, 2 - Fragments of a raised handle with horns from Thomes
(photo by Unicity S.p.A.).

Fig. 3 - Graphic reproduction of the fragments of a raised handle with horns from Thomes (from MORAVETTI 1980, table XXX.2,3).

Fig. 4 - Graphic reproduction of the fragments of a raised handle with horns from Thomes (from MORAVETTI 1980, table XXX.4,5).

For ceramics belonging to the Early Middle Bronze Age Culture in Sardinia called Sa Turricula (1600-1500 B.C.), this particular type of handle, which is common among other things to nearly all other known Sardinian contexts of this period (e.g. the giants’ tomb of Thomes-Dorgali, the giants’ tombs of Li Lolghi and Coddu Vecchiu in the territory of Arzachena, Su Picante near Siniscola, and the dolmen of Mariughia Dorgali), is considered a sort of index fossil, i.e. an essential tool which allows determining the date of the vessel to which it belongs.

Fig. 5 - Tomb II Sa Figu-Ittiri, with elbow-shaped handle with or without axe-shaped extension from the Sa Turricula phase - Middle Bronze Age (from MELIS 2011, Fig. 7, P. 113).

Fig. 6 - Carenated cup with axe-shaped handle on display at the Archaeological Museum of Viddalba (from http://www.museoviddalba.it/MW/mediaArchive/Image/af2f4badace60c24a7e497937c3ea037.jpg).