The appellation of Red Giant is due to its majestic proportions and to the red shades of the lichens that color its basaltic stone walls. The complex of Nuraghe Arrubiu, in the territory of Orroli, covers five thousand square meters and consists of a central tower (keep) 15 meters high – originally twice as high – surrounded by a mighty bastion formed by five towers, in turn surrounded by a defensive wall with seven towers joined by curtains. Inside there are various courtyards. To the south-east there is another antemurale with five towers connected by walls. In total there are 21 towers. Inside the keep, of which remains the first of three floors, along a narrow passage, you will reach the central chamber, which contains a hearth and a ritual vase. The tholos (false dome) covering is intact, as in some of the minor towers. In the courtyards have come to light: docks, cisterns, fireplaces, niches, stairs, entrances, corridors and covered rooms. Around, many remains of huts. Along the eastern side there is a large and round one: it is the one of the meetings, with a seat along the perimeter and a hearth in the middle. The monument ‘lived’ between the fourteenth and ninth centuries BC, with alternating phases. After a collapse, it remained uninhabited until the second century B.C. when the Romans adapted it as a laboratory for the production of wine: two tanks and tools for pressing grapes testify to this. The dating and the importance of the site are confirmed by the finds: there are ceramics imported from Peloponnese attesting contacts with the Mycenaean civilization.
The archaeological area of Orroli is in the middle of the sweet relief of Pran’ e muru, controlling the territory along the middle Flumendosa. The gorges, through which the river flowed, are now partly submerged by two artificial lakes. A territory deeply marked by man since prehistory, as confirmed by the extraordinary concentration of vestiges of the past: from the Neolithic to the Bronze and Iron Ages, up to Roman and early medieval relics. The Arrubiu was the stronghold, all around gravitated satellite nuraghi, which dominated strategic points and access routes. Near the complex, there is the tomb of the Giants of the Sword. While in the park of su Motti, in a forest of oaks, there is a necropolis of 15 domus de Janas. In the village, instead, there is the Casa del Nuraghe Arrubiu, a museum obtained from an ancient manor house that presents in twelve rooms the results of the excavations from 1981 to 1996 (resumed then from 2012).
