188 Turtas
Under Alexander II, the Cassineses were the first Latin monks to arrive on
the island since the distant monastic accounts of Fulgenzio and Gregory the
Great. In 1063, “Barisone king of Sardinia” sent a delegation to Abbot Desiderius
of Montecassino to request the foundation of a monastery in his kingdom of
Ore (Logudoro). Desiderius promptly complied and sent 12 monks and an
abbot, with everything necessary for a monastery.
This first attempt at installing a monastery in Sardinia failed because of the
intervention of Pisan pirates. Alexander II, probably at the behest of Abbot
Desiderius, expended a great deal of energy getting Pisa to return what was
wrongly taken. On the other hand, the pope’s well-known familiarity with
Montecassino and its Abbot, suggest that the pope was also involved with the
former Cassinese initiative.
In the second attempt to found a monastery (1065), Barisone gave the monks
from Montecassino the entire Monte Santo, the “basilica of the Holy Mary
mother of the Lord God,” and the church of Saint Elias. Moreover, he promised
that the nomination of the abbot would always be reserved for Montecassino.35
And so, it seems, contact between Sardinia and the Holy See, as well as other
areas of Latin Christianity (especially Campania), were very much alive in the
second half of the eleventh century. There is little reason to believe in the isola-
tionist tendencies of Sardinian judges or the episcopalism of the island’s clergy
with regard to papal policy.36
4.2 The Registrum of Gregory VII: From Threats to Compliments
From his first years as pope, Gregory made a vigorous change to his Sardinian
policy: he personally ordained the new archbishops of Torres and Cagliari,
and assigned each his pallium. Yet, nothing suggests that their selection was
made in accordance with the canon (“with the participation of the clergy and
people”). About 20 years later, the judge Constantine Salusius attested that the
Sardinian judges usually interfered in the choice of bishops. Gregory was prob-
ably apprised of the situation, but did not wish to address the problem, be-
cause he wanted to tie the judges to himself. For this reason, he did not hesitate
to threaten them: grave dangers awaited their country if, he wrote, they did not
pliantly receive the words addressed to them in his name by Constantinus, the
newly ordained archbishop of Torres and by another legate to be sent soon.37
aspetti di storia locale: atti del 1. Convegno internazionale di studi, Oristano, 5–8 dicembre
1997 , ed. Giampaolo Mele (Oristano, 2000), pp. 313–421.
35 Hoffmann, Chronica monasterii Casinensis, pp. 387–389.
36 Turtas, Storia della Chiesa in Sardegna, p. 191.
37 Turtas, Storia della Chiesa in Sardegna, pp. 196–200.