16 Hobart
collecting data and rebuilding Sardinia’s identity. Among these eminent figures
were the Jesuit Pietro Martini, who recounted the church history of Sardinia;
the traveler and cartographer, Alberto Della Marmora (see below); and the
neo-Guelf, Carlo Baudi di Vesme.27 The need to codify Sardinia at this time was
part of the nationalization of Italy, in which fragmented regions were slowly
being patched together under the monarchy of Victor Emanuel II. With the
same re-ordering spirit, Sardinian documents were assembled to form a sort of
idealized collective memory of the island.28
Several medieval histories written at the turn of the twentieth century are
still valid, but must be integrated with more recent studies.29 Later, after the
Second World War, Spanish historians and paleographers organized a series of
conferences in older Mediterranean cities dedicated to the study of archival
material, called the Crown of Aragon.30 These conferences continue today, pro-
ducing editions and commentaries, and remain important for the historiogra-
phy of, not only the realm of Aragon, but also the other Hispanias along the ruta
de las islas: Sardinia, the Balearic Islands, Sicily, and Malta.31 Essays on Sardinia
regularly appear in the published proceedings, and most Sardinian scholars of
the last few generations emerged, researching topics that could be unearthed
from documents, correspondence, and diplomatic relations with their conti-
nental counterparts.32 It was not until the late 1940s that Sardinian scholars
27 Pietro Martini, Storia Ecclesiastica di Sardegna (1839–1841); Carlo Baudi di Vesme, Codex
Diplomaticus Ecclesiensis (Turin, 1877).
28 Pasquale Tola, ed., Codex diplomaticus Sardiniae. Historiae Patriae Monumenta, 2 vols
(Turin, 1861–1868).
29 Enrico Besta, La Sardegna medioevale, 2 vols (Bologna: 1966 [1909]); Arrigo Solmi, Studi
storici sulle istituzioni della Sardegna nel medio evo (Cagliari, 1917).
30 The first conference of the Corona of Aragon was in 1920 at Heusca, followed by 1923 in
Valencia, 1955 in Seville, and the fifth in 1956 at Palma of Maiorca.
31 Alberto Boscolo started to bring attention to Sardinia at the Conference of Aragona,
started a long relationship with his Iberian collegues, and published extensively. For his
bibliography, see Luisa D’Arienzo, ed., Sardegna, Mediterraneo e Atlantico tra Medioevo
ed Età Moderna. Studi Storici in memoria di Alberto Boscolo (Rome, 1993); see also, Marco
Tangheroni, “Il ‘Regnum Sardiniae et Coriscae’ nell’espansione mediterranea della Corona
d’Aragona (secc. XIV–XVIII),” in XIV Congresso di storia della Corona d’Aragona: Sassari-
Alghero 19–24 maggio 1990 sul tema La Corona d’Aragona in Italia (secc. XIII–XVIII), eds
Giuseppe Meloni and Olivetta Schena (Sassari, 1993–1997), pp. 49–88; Giuseppe Meloni,
“La Sardegna nel quadro della politica mediterranea di Pisa, Genova e l’Aragona,” in
Guidetti, Storia dei Sardi e della Sardegna, vol. 2, pp. 49–96.
32 Besides the conferences mentioned above, there are at least four key journals for the
study of Sardinia in the medieval and modern period: Archivio Storico Sardo (1905–), Studi