Mysterious Sardinia: 5 Dark Places 0 Comments

by Daniela Toti

Forget the postcards with turquoise seas. If you’re looking for mysterious vibes and 19th-century curses, Sardinia is your new favorite dark destination.

1. Is Lollove really a cursed village?
Yes, according to legend. Just a few kilometers from Nuoro lies Lollove, a village frozen in the 1800s, inhabited by very few souls and wrapped in a suspicious silence. The story goes that some nuns, expelled for alleged romantic scandals, cast a curse of eternal solitude.

• The thrill: Walking among empty houses and motionless alleys, with the impression that time is actually obeying a… permanent command.

• Fun facts: It’s one of the most requested locations by filmmakers for period scenes. In winter, when the fog settles, it becomes a horror set without a crew.

2. Was Villacidro really the The Witches’ Village?
Yes: it was once known as Sa Bidda de Is Cogas. Forget Salem. In the Medio Campidano, Villacidro had a very precise reputation: it was the village of the cogas, women to whom night powers were attributed — sudden transformations and the ability to enter houses through the cracks of doors.

• The thrill: Walking through the ancient alleys knowing that, according to tradition, the cogas preferred to move across rooftops to avoid being seen.

• Fun facts: Some protective symbols against the cogas can still be found behind the doors of very old houses. They were said to be able to transform into nocturnal animals. To protect yourself, all you needed was an upside-down broom or a sprig of rue: magical minimalism.

3. Is The Domus De Janas “La Rocca” In Sedini really a prehistoric condo?
Yes: 5,000 years of history.  Sedini’s “La Rocca” is a gigantic Domus de Janas, carved into the rock and set in the middle of the village like an urban monolith. After serving as a Neolithic tomb, it became a medieval prison, a private home, a workshop, and even a political headquarters in the post-war era.

• The thrill: Entering and finding the carved kitchen area where, thousands of years earlier, the dead were buried. A perfect life-death coexistence in open-space mode.

• Fun facts: It’s one of the very few houses in the world to have passed through every human era without ever changing address.

4. Does the “ghost villa” of The Omodeo Lake really exist?
Yes: it appears and disappears like in the best Gothic tales. On the shores of Lake Omodeo there is an abandoned villa that emerges or sinks depending on the water level — elegant and unsettling at the same time.

• The thrill: Legends tell of a female figure watching from the windows when the lake is still. Some say they’ve heard the sounds of the old pier… which no longer exists.

• Fun facts: Urban explorers love it. When it fully reemerges, it seems to say: “Here I am, I never left.”

5. What about the mysterious Accabbadora… Did she really exist?
Yes. She is the most powerful (and misunderstood) figure in Sardinian folklore. The Accabbadora was the woman families called to put an end to the suffering of the dying. Not a ghost, not a witch: a figure of extreme, silent mercy, armed only with her small wooden hammer, su mazzolu.

• The thrill: Imagining her light footsteps inside stone houses on a moonless night.

• Fun facts: The term comes from accabare, “to finish.” The tradition is documented until the early 20th century. Luras hosts a dedicated museum.

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Want to explore new paths, legends, and authentic wonders?
We’re waiting for you at the Gabbiano Azzurro Hotel & Suites, where every journey becomes a story.