In 1595 the Capuchin friars founded their first Sardinian convent on the hill west of the Amphitheater, endowed with a vast expanse of land used as a vegetable garden for the cultivation of medicinal plants, inside which some ancient cisterns were incorporated. In 1867 the convent and kitchen garden were acquired by the City of Cagliari and converted into a Rest Home for the elderly.
The monumental cisterns dug into the limestone rock were for a long time attributed to the Punic period. In reality, they are ancient quarries for the extraction of blocks, opened in Roman times, possibly used for the construction of the nearby Amphitheater (I-II cent. AD). They were used as cisterns only later, once they had been waterproofed with cocciopesto (a plaster of lime mixed with crushed shards). The largest cistern could hold up to a million liters of rainwater, coming from the amphitheater through a long underground tunnel that is still passable.
Recently, the municipal administration has planned a series of interventions to return the use of this significant historical and cultural site to citizens. Recalling the ancient agricultural vocation of the place, the first batch of works involved the creation of a garden-garden, in a renewed identity that sees the establishment of multiple functions.
