Overview Of Sardinian History 95
the initial support of Genoa, he received solemn royal investiture by Emperor
Frederick I (3 August 1164), who then gave Sardinia to the municipality of Pisa
as a fiefdom a year later.25
Meanwhile, inland and around the agricultural areas of the island, Sardinian
society began to slowly change. Knowledge of the rural communities at that
time is provided by the condaghe in churches and monasteries. The registry of
sales, exchanges, and the processes or kertu related to the possession of land
or servants were kept in these cartularies, or registers. Here, much information
regarding Sardinian private law, lay owners, servants, means of cultivating the
land, and the breeding of livestock can be found.26
In the Sardinian countryside, a few large landowners (liberi maiorales),
who were often related to the giudici but not subjected to vassal restrictions,
constituted the most elevated social class. The liberi maiorales possessed enor-
mous herds of livestock. They were owners of open fields used for harvesting
grain (wheat and barley) and, at times, enclosed fields (cuniadus) destined for
vineyards or orchards. Inhabitants of the surrounding towns dedicated other
lands to communal use according to custom. Customarily, the small landown-
ers were forced to supplement their meager harvests by earning wages as day
workers employed by the larger landowners, especially during specific periods
of the agricultural year.
25 Johann Friedrich Böhmer, Regesta Imperii: 4.2.2: Die Regesten des Kaiserreiches unter
Friedrich I: 1152 (1122)–1190; Lfg. 2, 1158–1168, ed. Ferdinand Opll (Vienna, 1991), p. 206 reg.
n. 1388, p. 225 reg. n. 1468, p. 226 reg. n. 1469.
26 On the condaghi regarding Logudoro (San Pietro di Silki, San Nicola di Trullas, San Michele
di Salvennor, and San Pietro di Sorres) and Arborea (Santa Maria di Bonarcado), see
Giuliano Bonazzi, ed., Il condaghe di San Pietro di Silki. Testo logudorese inedito dei secoli
XI–XII (Sassari, 1900); Paolo Merci, ed., Il condaghe di San Nicola di Trullas (Sassari, 1992);
Paolo Maninchedda and Antonello Murtas, eds, Il condaghe di San Michele di Salvennor
(Cagliari, 2003); Antonio Sanna, Il codice di San Pietro di Sorres, testo inedito logudorese
del sec. XV (Cagliari, 1957); Maurizio Viridis, ed., Il condaghe di Santa Maria di Bonarcado
(Sassari, 2002). The condaghe Hospital of San Leonardo di Bosove, affiliated with the San
Leonardo di Stagno of Pisa, recorded secular life; Giuseppe Meloni and Andrea Dessì,
Mondo rurale e Sardegna del XII secolo. Il condaghe di Barisone II di Torres (Naples, 1994).
See also, Giuseppe Meloni, ed., Il Condaghe di San Gavino. Un documento unico sulla nas-
cita dei giudicati (Cagliari, 2005); Barbara Fois, “L’insediamento umano nella Sardegna
meridionale in età giudicale (secc. XI–XIV),” Mélanges de l’École Française de Rome: Moyen
Âge 113:1 (2001), pp. 27–39.