Allai

Allai lies in the Barigadu, on the floor of the rio Massari valley, just before it joins the Tirso. Its oldest mark is a Roman bridge of local red trachyte, the Ponti Ecciu, a few hundred metres from the houses: it carried the road between Forum Traiani and the interior of the island, and it was restored in 1157 under Barisone I, judge of Arborea. The name first appears in 1341, in a list of tithes paid to the Church, and for centuries the documents write it Alay or Alai: the present form settles only in the nineteenth century.

In the peace signed between the king of Aragon and Eleanor of Arborea on 24 January 1388 the village's representatives appear: the majore and four jurors. The Carta de Logu laid down ten jurors for a villa manna and five for a villa picinna, and from that count one can tell how small the place was. On the surrounding hills stood other villages — Loddu, Barbagiana, one on the Pranu Ollisa — that emptied out, their people probably coming down here: tradition holds that the parish silver comes from Barbagiana, and the church of the Madonna del Rimedio keeps a wooden statue brought from the little church of Loddu.