La storia delle Cantine Spanu ha radici antiche, che risalgono al 1773, quando il capostipite Giovanni Maria Spanu, impiantò il primo vigneto nel Salto di ILOGHE in agro di Dorgali, uno dei più fertili dell'intera regione Dorgalese, da cui deriva il nome vino.

The planting of a new vineyard in the ILOGHE countryside was a very rare occurrence at the time because vineyards were often located in the immediate urban peripheries of Sa Costa, Filieri and Murisinu.

Origin of the name ILOGHE, according to several studies conducted by a Dorgali scholar, who is passionate about history and tradition, seems to be attributable to the morphology of these soils, which are predominantly derived alluvial, but also volcanic features of this jump, as represented by the marshes (Sas Paules), now dry, of Oddonue, Biriddo, Porcarzos, from whose Latin name "Idiles" where marsh waters flow, which combined with the suffix "oghe" from mouth, gave rise to "Idiloghe." Later as time went on, with the dropping of the intervocalic "D," it gave rise to the name ILOGHE.

We cannot fail to recall the significance of this leap into the Nuragic Age, judging from the evidence of the finds, and the multitude of important settlements, which have come down to the present day in good condition, such as Serra Orrios, the nuraghe of Su Casteddu, Biristeddi, to mention only the most important and best preserved.

The predominantly Cannonau vines were grafted predominantly to barefoot, but very often native white varieties, such as Cannonau Bianco, a very rare vine, were also found there, serving in most cases for pollination.

Later it was joined by another varietal clone from Spain, probably a bovale, thanks to trade that took place in the port of Cala Gonone.

With the advent of the infrastructure work in Sardinia, carried out by the family Savoy, and the construction of one of the most important roads of the time, such as the Carlo Felice, in the early 1920s, crossing from Cagliari Island to Porto Torres, many workers came to the island, including another ancestor of mine, Pasquale Caroti, a true Tuscan, potter and winemaker also in that of Impruneta, together with his wife Anna Frizzi, which gave birth to Luigi Caroti, later became Carotti, due to incorrect transcription in local records.

The viticulture and the winemaking continued with the children as well as the production of bricks, tiles and ceramic wares, which soon became an important business in the province, awarded in 1941 by King Vittorio Emanuele as the best manufacturing, coupled with the establishment of the country's first industrial bakery, then closed shortly after the war.

Maddalena, my grandmother, third of five children, later married Giovanni Maria Spanu, my grandfather. In 1912 he founded with the related Mulas, Murgia and Carotti family the first social wine cooperative in Dorgali, in the Oddoene leap, on one of the few private plots of land at the time, commonly known as Vigna Sociale.

Thus it was that an area of land once considered unsuitable for viticulture, despite the abundance of water, was reclaimed to create the first vineyard in the leap that the heirs of these families still lead today.

In Iloghe in 2007 I replanted the first vineyard, using the scions of the surviving varietal clones in the old Oddoene vineyard now more than 90 years old.

Still standing in time, the old stone house, built by my great-grandfather Pietro Spanu in the upper part of the vineyard, where the concrete vats used for fermenting the grapes that used to be vinified on site are mostly preserved intact, and then transported to the cool and renowned cellars, with their characteristic brick vaulted ceilings, located in the old district of Goritto, where the current one still exists today.

This winery is an important testimony to the history of a small community of qualified winemakers, but also of jewelers, craftsmen, shepherds, and merchants, who have always been distinguished by their industriousness, genius and innovation, not forgetting that currently the municipality of Dorgali occupies the fourth place in Sardinia in the per hectare of viticulture, including the presence of a major social winery, included at the top of the island in the number of hectoliters of wine produced.

This is the story of a family that looks at centuries-old tradition and intends to project it into the future with the hope of being able to transform ancient knowledge into an innovative winemaking project.