Sardinia As A Crossroads In The Mediterranean 27
motivators for the Tuscan families, such as the Donoratico, who had already
invested in the metal-rich hilltops between Piombino and Siena.67
At the beginning of the twentieth century, the arts and architectural monu-
ments of Sardinia were first officially catalogued by Dionigi Scano for the
Ministry of Public Education.68 The expansive survey he produced has helped
identify and define settlement patterns. Scano’s Castelli medievali in Sardegna
was the model for a series of periodic revisions, first by Raimondo Carta Raspi
in 1933, and more recently Foiso Fois.69 The romantic idealization of medieval
Sardinia is well captured in the beautiful sketches and formalist description in
these volumes on castles. Raffaello Delogu has contributed greatly to the peri-
odization and classification of Sardinian churches built in the second half of
the eleventh century, until the subsequent Catalan introduction of the Gothic
style. Delogu’s success as a scholar placed his work on Sardinia’s Romanesque
and Gothic architecture into a wider European context.70 The most important
revision to Delogu’s body of work was completed by Roberto Coroneo, whose
recent passing has left a big vacuum in the fields of both architecture and
sculpture. His two major publications consist of a monograph on the entire
medieval arc of Sardinian architecture, and another on sculpture.71 He was de-
termined to further explore the Muslim presence from an architectural point
of view. Unfortunately, we have lost an important voice.72
In the Sardinian context, urban studies have mostly fallen upon archae-
ologists. That said, Marco Cadinu, an architectural historian who has also
67 Giovanna Bianchi, ed., Castello di Donoratico (LI). I risultati delle prime campagne di scavo
(2000–2002) (Florence, 2004).
68 Dionigi Scano, L’arte medievale in Sardegna (Rome, 1905); Dionigi Scano, Storia dell’arte
in Sardegna dal XI al XIV secolo (Bologna, 1979 [1909]); Dionigi Scano, Chiese medievali in
Sardegna (Cagliari, 1991 [1929]).
69 Dionigi Scano, Castelli medievali in Sardegna (Cagliari-Sassari, 1907); Raimondo Carta
Raspi, Castelli medioevali di Sardegna (Cagliari, 1933); Foiso Fois, Castelli della Sardegna
medioevale, ed. Barbara Fois (Milan, 1992); Sara Chirra, ed., Castelli in Sardegna (Oristano,
2002).
70 Raffaello Delogu, L’architettura del medioevo in Sardegna (Rome, 1953).
71 Roberto Coroneo, Architettura romanica dalla metà del mille al primo ‘300 (Nuoro, 1993);
Roberto Coroneo, Scultura mediobizantina in Sardegna (Nuoro, 2000).
72 Roberto Coroneo, Arte in Sardegna dal IV alla metà dell’XI secolo (Cagliari, 2011); Roberto
Coroneo, Ricerche sulla scultura medievale in Sardegna, 2 vols (Cagliari, 2004–2009);
Roberto Coroneo, ed., La Cattedrale di Santa Giusta. Architettura e arredi dall’XI al XIX
secolo (Cagliari, 2010); Roberto Coroneo, ed., La chiesa altomedievale di San Salvatore di
Iglesias: architettura e restauro (Cagliari, 2009); Martorelli and Coroneo, “Chiese e Culti di
Matrice Bizantina, pp. 47–64; Roberto Coroneo and Renata Serra, Sardegna preromanica
e romanica (Milan, 2004).