194 Turtas
condition that the Cassinese send “at least three or four monks sufficiently well
trained that they could be promoted” to the episcopate, and that they were
“able to manage the affairs of the kingdom at the Roman or imperial curia.”50
5.2 Foundations of the Victorines
Orzocco Torchitorius’s aforementioned donation, made before his death in
August of 1081, is supported by another document, written in late 1089 by his
son Constantine Salusius, who sought to ensure that the donation of his fa-
ther was not lost to oblivion. That document recalled the names of the church-
es—Saint George of Decimo and Saint Genesius—and their destination: the
monks of Saint-Victor of Marseilles, who had to build a “reformed monastery”
and live there “keeping the rule of Saint Benedict.”51
After this document, the Victorines received the most prestigious martyrs’
sanctuaries of that realm: Saint Saturnus of Cagliari, Saint Ephisius of Nora, and
Saint Anthiocus of Sulci, along with many other churches scattered through-
out the realm. Some of these donations are known through the confirmation
of archbishops, at least until the time of Archbishop William.52
It was in this way that the Victorine “monoculture” took root in Cagliari,
reinforced at the beginning of the new century by the indecorous expulsion
of certain nuns from a monasterium castarum mentioned by the well-known
letter of the Archbishop William, so that their buildings could be turned over
to the Victorines. Pope Paschal II (1099–1118), who had ordered Judge Mariane
Torchitorius II (1107–1121) to compensate for the damages suffered by the
church in Cagliari, also intervened to mitigate this favoritism. In total, judges
or bishops donated almost 50 churches.53
Regarding the Victorines, it is impossible not to mention that, at the end of
the eleventh century, they had already received the “church of Saint Mary de
portu salis and a part of the salt-works of Cagliari with a team of workers already
trained to operate them.” Thus began a very active line of production that could
“rely on the merchants and sailors of Marseilles who were interested in the traf-
fic and on a sizeable market of consumption in the south of France.”54 However,
the power that was being consolidated in Cagliari was considerably more
50 Saba, Montecassino e la Sardegna medioevale; Turtas, Storia della Chiesa in Sardegna,
pp. 229–230, 242.
51 Tola, Codex diplomaticus Sardiniae, vol. 1, pp. 160–161.
52 Guérard, Cartulaire de l’abbaye de Saint-Victor, p. 464.
53 Alberto Boscolo, L’abbazia di San Vittore, Pisa e la Sardegna (Padua, 1958), pp. 135–142.
54 Ciro Manca, “Aspetti dell’economia monastica vittorina in Sardegna nel Medio Evo,” in
Studi sui vittorini in Sardegna, ed. Francesco Artizzu (Padua, 1963), p. 60.