Overview Of Sardinian History 101
Catalan-Aragonese at the beginning of the fourteenth century, they were des-
tined to an inevitable decline in power.
Pisa found in Sardinia, its overseas territory, a confluence between the west-
ern, eastern, and African worlds. The Pisan port statute that regulated the com-
mercial and maritime activities at Castello di Castro (Breve Portus Kallaretani,
1318) testifies to the international nature of the traffic. The established tariffs for
the intermediaries document the importance of cloth from Narbonne, Paris,
Ypres, and Stamford, as well as spices, ivory, pearls, precious stones, and gems
from faraway countries. The products that were exported from the island in-
cluded linen, cotton, wool, cheese, wine, and varieties of leather and hide skins.41
Giovanni Villani, a Florentine merchant and chronicler at the beginning of
the fourteenth century, describes Pisa at the height of its power, summing up
the privileged political-economic relations that the municipality and some
families had with Sardinia:
The city of Pisa was a great and noble state of the greatest and most
powerful citizens of Italy, where peace and unity reigned throughout;
and the resident citizens maintaining the greatness of the state included
the Giudice of Gallura, Count Ugolino, Count Fazio, Count Nieri, Count
Anselmo, and the Giudice of Arborea, each holding a grand court. They
rode through the land accompanied by many subjects and feudal knights;
and by their greatness they were lords of Sardinia, Corsica, and Elba,
where they brought in the greatest profits for themselves and for the
State; and they almost completely controlled the sea with their ships and
goods; and overseas in the city of Acri they were very great, having many
relatives among the great Bourgeois of Acri.42Sardinia over the centuries has been politically desirable for its wealth in
goods, especially its silver mines. The Arab geographer Muhammad al Idrisis
(1154) described the island as being “large, mountainous, having water in short
supply,” and he reported that “it has mines of the best silver, which is exported
Battaglia della Meloria, Genova, 24–27 ottobre 1984, nella sede della Società ligure di storia
patria (Geneva, 1984), pp. 283–347.
41 Francesco Artizzu, Gli ordinamenti pisani per il porto di Cagliari “Breve Portus Kallaretani”
(Rome, 1979); after the Catalan-Aragonese conquest, Pinuccia Francesca Simbula,
L’organizzazione portuale di una città medievale: Cagliari XIV–XV secolo (Aonia, 2012).
42 Giovanni Villani, Nuova Cronica, ed. Giuseppe Porta, 3 vols (Parma, 1990), vol. 1, p. 540;
Vincenzo D’Alessandro, “La conquista della Sardegna nella Cronaca di Giovanni Villani,”
Nuovo Bollettino Bibliografico Sardo e Archivio Tradizioni Popolari 41/42 (1962), pp. 3–4
(the same article is reprinted in Anuario de Estudios Medievales 1 (1964), pp. 593–597).