Strong signs in the island's historic landscape

Archival documents say that after the mid-eleventh century, Sardinia was divided into four kingdoms or judgments. At the head of each one is a king or judge, endowed with supreme authority. Each judge is divided into curatoriums, which correspond to the ecclesiastical division into the diocese.

The territory is militarily defended by castles, which occupy the tops of the hills. The population is gathered in coastal cities and in numerous villages scattered throughout the territory, which are headed by churches. The largest are cathedrals and abbeys, on which other churches, parish or monastic, depend.

Until the beginning of the 14th century, Romanesque architecture flourished, especially along the coastal strip and in the fertile plains of the western half of the island. The eastern one, mountainous and stingy with large flat areas that lend themselves to the intensive exploitation of agro-pastoral resources, is poor in cities and consequently in Romanesque churches even in the countryside. The latter are concentrated from Logudoro to Campidano, with important monuments in Gallura, Montacuto, Goceanarium, Meilogu, Planargia, Montiferru, Trexenta, Marmilla or Sulcis, where they still constitute a strong sign in both urban and rural island landscapes.

When inserted into the city context, they function as the fulcrum of an often intact medieval fabric. When they stand alone in the countryside, they document the ancient existence of an abandoned village. Much more than medieval castles, mostly reduced to ruins, Romanesque churches best represent what remains of a past era, in which the island was able to express an architectural civilization of European level.

Romanesque is the first truly international artistic language. Romanesque architecture is particularly important in Sardinia, for a number of reasons. First of all, the absence of seismic activity has preserved it from the destruction suffered, for example, in southern Italy. Then, the impoverishment of the island after the Aragonese conquest in the 14th century has often prevented Romanesque churches from being transformed over time, so that many of them come to us with their original forms from the 11th to the 13th century.

Finally, we must not overlook the originality and the objective relevance, even numerical, of the Romanesque churches in Sardinia: there are more than 150 those that preserve significant structures. In this landscape, cathedrals and parishes, abbeys and monastic churches stand out, mostly built of stone and devoid of the wall paintings that decorated them. Some, however, have preserved frescoes or interesting sculptural decorations.

Update

22/9/2023 - 10:56