In the mountains of Capoterra, a few kilometers from the town, stands the small church of Santa Barbara Vergine e Martire Cagliaritana. Erected in 1280 at the expense of the archbishop of Cagliari Gallo, it was enlarged in 1739 to worthily accommodate the Saint’s devotees, who were growing in number after her relics were rediscovered in Cagliari on June 23, 1620. The Romanesque structure is characterized by its exuberant ornamentation with hanging arches, simple or lobed, on corbels with geometric, phytomorphic or figured decorations, but especially by the presence of numerous nests for ceramic basins in the Pisan fashion, more than seventy, of which only four are still preserved. The high altar, in polychrome inlaid marble, was built at various times between 1739 and 1804. The statue of the saint, in polychrome wood, is an interesting product of a Cagliari workshop datable to the early decades of the 19th century. A short distance from the church, a little further upstream, is the Sa Scabitzada spring, which, according to legend, began to gush forth at the moment when Santa Barbara’s head, thrust out by the executioner’s sword blow, fell to the ground. It still turns out to be a destination of continuous and devout pilgrimage, although the tragic flood of October 22, 2008, almost completely destroyed the small chapel that, between the 14th and 17th centuries, had been built to protect it.
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