15 - Cultural Interactions in Iron Age Sardinia

Summary

This chapter examines the island of Sardinia during the Iron Age to identify the types of interactions between the local Nuragic culture, which was already open to Mediterranean contacts in the Recent and Final Bronze Ages, and other populations around the Tyrrhenian Sea and in the Near East. In the Iron Age, as Sardinians managed contacts with Villanovan and Levantine peoples, they carefully selected ideological contributions and foreign materials, changing, adapting and integrating them into their own culture. Phoenicians first established themselves within Nuragic communities and later in coastal settlements, where their presence favoured the integration process. It contributed to the creation of a culture that was neither Nuragic nor Phoenician but that can define as Sardinian. The main differences between the coastal Phoenician sites and Nuragic sites of the interior consist of different proportions of handmade and domestic Phoenician pottery. Finally, the chapter discusses the variety of foreign imports in later Iron Age Sardinia.