THE MUNICIPALITY OF PULA

The fertile valley in which Pula is set reaches to the sea with the long sandy beach (about 10 km) of the tourist area of Santa Margherita. Its sea is truly magnificent – transparent and in all hues of blue, with a wide choice of accommodation, ranging from B&B to the luxurious Forte Village resort & spa, and the marina of Calaverde.

In the summer, every evening, the town is enlivened with shows, events and celebrations while the Roman theatre of Nora hosts plays and musical events by starlight.

The neo-classic villa of S. Maria, designed in 1803 by Gaetano Cima in the Palladian style, is now included in the town.

In the Aquarium, on the shores of the Nora lagoon, there are fish, crustaceans and turtles from the seas round Sardinia; there is also a tank for treating injured dolphins, and information on the secrets of sea and lagoon [www.lagunadinora.it].

The archaeological park of Nora

From the town, a tree-shaded avenue (3000 m) leads to the beach of Nora and the archaeological park, set in a splendid position on the small peninsula of Capo Pula, a safe haven which attracted the Nuragic peoples, the Phoenicians, Carthaginians and Romans. The Nuragic folk (about 1500 BC), set up at Nora one of the first centres of their civilisation, as is shown by the ruins of a nuraghe and a sacred well; in the surrounding countryside there are ruins of several Nuragic towers while the menhirs of S'Abuleu remind us that there were also proto-Sardinian settlements here (4th-3rd millennium BC).

The treasure trove of this municipality also includes interesting geological formations, with exceptional samples of zeolite, calcite and quartz.

Archaeological digs have revealed the Roman city of Nora in its heyday and period of greatest prosperity: Nora became a Municipium in the 1st century AD and already in the 2nd century AD the Romans equipped it with a theatre, a large bath complex and paved streets with an efficient sewer system. The area of Nora was abandoned towards the 7th century AD and has revealed Phoenician-Punic and Roman artefacts (in part exhibited in the Pula town museum), including the stele of Nora (IX century AD) which bears – in Phoenician characters – the first written indication of the name Sardinia: B SRDN.

On the beach of Nora the first Sardinian Christians, in the 4th century AD, built an oratory over whose ruins the Romanesque church of Sant'Efisio subsequently built: consecrated in 1102, it is much loved by all Sardinians because it marks the place where the Christian soldier Ephysius was martyred.

On 1 May, a tradition followed for some 500 years, the saint’s statue, held in Cagliari, is carried in procession on his coach to Nora, honoured by costume groups from many towns and villages of the island and giving life to the fascinating tapestry of the "Sagra di S. Efisio". The next day, the statue – again in procession – returns to Cagliari. The feast of S. Efisio involves the whole town, with truly magic moments such as the procession with the statue of the saint along the beach of Nora.

The coast of Pula is dotted with several Spanish towers, built in the early the 17th century: the tower of Coltellazzo (12 m) is set on the summit (53 m) of the peninsula of Cape Pula and dominates Nora’s archaeological park; this tower, now housing a beacon light, is within sight of the tower of S. Macario whose ruins stand on the islet to the north of Cape Pula.

On the beach of S. Margherita is the tower of Cala d'Ostia on whose knoll was found the Phoenician-Punic acropolis of Nora, with ruins of Punic and Roman fortifications.