Overview Of Sardinian History 91
It is believed that Sardinia also suffered the great demographic crisis of the
sixth century, which was offset somewhat by immigration from the coasts of
Africa. Another hypothesis is that the population during the Roman period has
been overestimated, meaning that the demographic slump that occurred dur-
ing Late Antiquity and the high Middle Ages (ninth and tenth centuries) was
considerably less pronounced than previously thought.17
3 The Four Kingdoms or Giudicati
After the Arab expansion into the African coastal countries, the political con-
text of the Mediterranean countries changed. Sardinia was isolated and distant
from Byzantine influence and was periodically threatened by Muslim raids in
the ninth and tenth centuries. The inhabitants of the coastal cities, lacking
strong political-military support and adequate structural fortifications, sought
refuge in the internal regions. It is interesting to note that in the decades lead-
ing up to the eleventh century (after 971), the indirect testimony of Rodulfus
Glaber, which was probably passed down through Iberian monks, revealed the
presence of heretical movements in Sardinia. From this island “where the her-
etics always abound” some left and “went to corrupt a part of the population of
Spain—and ended up being massacred by the Catholics.”18
In the meantime, the island had been divided internally into four kingdoms,
judgeships or giudicati: Gallura, Cagliari, Arborea, and Torres or Logudoro
(moving clockwise from the northeast). Although the scarcity of written docu-
mentation makes it difficult to fully understand their origins, historians have
formulated various hypotheses as to the origin of the giudicati and the social
components that combined to form these local, juridical institutions.19
The giudicato (or Rennu), as it is defined in rare sources from the eleventh
century, was a true kingdom, with the giudice (Donnu) exercising sovereignty
17 Karl Julius Beloch, Die Bevölkerung der griechisch-römischen Welt (Leipzig, 1886); Antonio
C. Corda, “Popolazione e società nella prima età cristiana (IV–VII sec.),” in Karales.
Un’antica città marittima nel cuore del Mediterraneo (Cagliari, 2002), pp. 133–138.
18 “Ex Sardinia quoque insula, que his plurimum abundare solet, ipso tempore aliqui egressi,
partem populi in Hispania corrumpentes, et ipsi a viris catholicis exterminati sunt.” See
Rodulfus Glaber, Cronache dell’anno Mille (Storie), eds Guglielmo Cavallo and Giovanni
Orlandi (Milan, 1990), pp. 108–109.
19 Enrico Besta, “Nuovi studi su le origini, la storia e l’organizzazione dei Giudicati sardi,”
Archivio Storico Italiano 27 (1901), pp. 1–74; Enrico Besta, La Sardegna medioevale (Bologna,
1966 [1909]), vol. 2; Arrigo Solmi, Studi storici sulle istituzioni della Sardegna nel medio evo
(Cagliari, 1917); Francesco Cesare Casula, La storia di Sardegna (Pisa, 1992).