page_title: History of Sardinia
section_title: Roman Empire
hierarchical_section_title: History of Sardinia / Early and Classical Antiquity / Roman Empire
caption_attribution_description: Antas temple near Fluminimaggiore, Sardinia, Italy.
context_page_description: Archaeological evidence of prehistoric human settlement on the island of Sardinia is present in the form of nuraghes and other prehistoric monuments, which dot the land. The recorded history of Sardinia begins with its contacts with the various people who sought to dominate western Mediterranean trade in Classical Antiquity: Phoenicians, Punics and Romans. Initially under the political and economic alliance with the Phoenician cities, it was partly conquered by Carthage in the late 6th century BC and then entirely by Rome after the First Punic War. The island was included for centuries in the Roman province of Sardinia and Corsica, which would be incorporated into the diocese of Italia suburbicaria in 3rd and 4th centuries.
  In the Early Middle Ages, through the European barbarian movements, the waning of the Byzantine Empire influence in the western Mediterranean and the Saracen raids, the island fell out of the sphere of influence of any higher government; this led to the birth of four independent kingdoms called Judicates in the 8th through 10th centuries.
context_section_description: In 240 BC, in the course of the First Punic War, the Carthaginian mercenaries on the island revolted and gave the Romans, who some years earlier had defeated the Carthaginians in the naval battle of Sulci, the opportunity to land on Sardinia and occupy it. In 238 BC the Romans took over the whole island, without meeting any resistance. They took over an existing developed infrastructure and urbanized culture (at least in the plains). Along with Corsica it formed the province of Corsica et Sardinia, under a praetor. Together with Sicily it formed one of the main granaries of Rome until the Romans conquered Egypt in the 1st century BC.
  A revolt, led by two Sardo-Punic notables from Cornus and Tharros, Hampsicora and Hanno, broke out after the crushing Roman defeat at Cannae (216 BC). A Roman army of 22.000 infantrymen and 1.200 knights, under Titus Manlius Torquatus, reached Sardinia landing in Caralis and defeating Hiostus, the son of Hampsicora, near Milis. The Romans then met the Carthaginian-Sardinian allied forces in the south of the island, defeating them in a pitched battle that took place between Sestu and Decimomannu, and killing 12.000 men. Another major revolt took place in 177-176 BC when the Balares and the Ilienses were defeated by Tiberius Gracchus the Elder, who, according to Livy, killed or enslaved about 80.000 natives. The last organized revolts were repressed by Marcus Caecilius Metellus in 115-111 BC and Titus Albucius in 106. However the Sardinians living in the impervious mountains of the interior resisted the Roman colonization well into Imperial times.
  Punic culture remained strong during the first centuries of the Roman domination, however in the long run Romanization prevailed and Latin became the speech of the majority of the inhabitants, ultimately developing into the modern Sardinian language. The Roman religion began to spread among Sardinians as well. Caralis, the provincial capital, Nora and Sulci obtained the status of Municipium within the 1st century AD and a Roman colony named Turris Libissonis (Porto Torres) was founded in the north-west  while the village of Usellus become perphans a Roman colony under Trajan. 4 great roads were built: 2 along the coasts and 2 in the interior connecting all the major cities.
  During the Roman period, the geographer Ptolemy noted that Sardinia was inhabited by the following tribes, from north to south: the Tibulati and the Corsi, the Coracenses, the Carenses and the Cunusitani, the Salcitani and the Lucuidonenses, the Æsaronenses, the Æchilenenses (also called Cornenses), the Rucensi, the Celsitani and the Corpicenses, the Scapitani and the Siculensi, the Neapolitani and the Valentini, the Solcitani and the Noritani.
  In the year 212 AD every inhabitant of the empire became Roman citizen by the Constitutio Antoniniana, better known as the "Edict of Caracalla". At that time, many islanders from the Municipia and Coloniae were Roman citizens, while those living in the interior were not. Around the year 286 AD, Sardinia was incorporated into the Italian diocese during the empire of Diocletianus, and in 324 AD, under the rule of the emperor Constantine the Great, in the suburbicaria Italian diocese, until the conquest by the Vandals in 456 AD.
caption: Antas Temple near Fluminimaggiore
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