Chap. XI.
SARDINIA. — NURHAG OF SANTA BARBARA.
429
They are, at the same time, absolutely without any architectural ornament which could give us any hint of their affinities; and no inscriptions, no images, no sculptures of any kind, have been found in them. They are in this respect as uncommunicative as our own rude-stone monuments.
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187. Nurhag of Santa Barbara. From De la Marmora.
Written history is almost equally silent. Only one passage has been disinterred which seems to refer to them. It is a Greek work, generally known as 'De Mirabilibus Auscultationibus,'[1] and ascribed doubtfully to Aristotle. It is to the following effect: — "It is said that in the island of Sardinia there exist, among other beautiful and numerous edifices, built after the manner of the ancient Greeks, certain domes (Θόλοι) of exquisite proportions. It is further said that they Avere built by Iolas, son of Iphicles, who, having taken with him the Thespiadæ, went to colonise this island." This certainly looks as if the Nurhags existed when this book was written, though the description is by a person who evidently never saw them. Diodorus so far confirms this that he says: "Iolaus, having founded the colony, fetched Dedalus from Sicily, and built numerous and grand edifices, which subsist to the present day, and are called Dedalean, from the name of their builder;"[2] and in another paragraph he recurs to the veneration