CANA COSTA FORMENTERA

In the late 1970s an amateur archaeologist exploring the eastern edge of Estany Pudent the larger of the two salty lakes to the north of Sant Frangesc, discovered the megalithic remains of Cana Costa. The site is being carefully excavated, but can be visited. So far, finds have included human remains, pottery and jewellery, together. With axes that date the site to the Bronze Age to about 4,000 years ago.

Cana Costa is an unusually complex site for its period, and is now recognized as one of the most important sites on the Balearic Islands. It seems likely that Bronze Age man found a forested island but that their slash and burn agriculture destroyed the forests, allowing the fertile top soil to be sun baked and blown away. By the time the Greeks and Romans came it was a strategic outpost rather than the welcoming, fertile paradise the builders of Cana Costa had known.