In the southern part of the island of Sant’Antioco in the “Turri” area, there is a watchtower which was built under the government of Count Lorenzo Bogino.
In fact, he reorganized the administration of the coastal towers built under the Spanish domination of King Philip II. Already some time before, the citizens of Iglesias, interested in cultivating land on the island of Sant’Antioco, had made a plea to the king of Sardinia, in which they offered their help for the construction of towers on the island.
For this reason, Carlo Emanuele III gave orders to the viceroy Cacherano of Bricherasio to prepare the construction of the two towers already planned on the island. In 1757 the tower designed by the military engineer Vallin was built; it stands on the “su moru” cape, the southern promontory of the island of Sant’Antioco, today called “Turri”.
Turkish flotillas used to anchor in this stretch of sea until the first decades of the nineteenth century. The Tower carried out an important work of sighting and communicating news to the military departments responsible for the defense of the island of Sant’Antioco during the French invasion attempt of 1793 and on the occasion of the last two Tunisian incursions of 1812 and 1815 on the island .
The Canai tower remained active until 1815. In recent times the tower has been used as a tourist residence by a private individual who, for this purpose, has “remodelled” it in a questionable way. Only in 1994 was it finally returned to collective use by the Italia Nostra association which, after obtaining it under concession, carried out a restoration project in collaboration with the Superintendency of Cultural Heritage of Cagliari and the Ministry of the Environment.
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