Sardinia Sardinia Sardinia ( ; ; or ; ; ; ; ) is the second-largest island in the Mediterranean Sea (after Sicily and before Cyprus). It is located west of the Italian Peninsula and to the immediate south of the French island of Corsica. Sardinia is politically a region of Italy, whose official name is "Regione Autonoma della Sardegna" / "Regione Autònoma de Sardigna" (Autonomous Region of Sardinia), and enjoys some degree of domestic autonomy granted by a specific Statute. It is divided into four provinces and a metropolitan city, with Cagliari being the region's capital and its largest city as
Sardinia occupied the territory. The Giudicato of Arborea, having Oristano as its capital, had the longest life compared to the other kingdoms. Its later history is entwined with the attempt to unify the island into a single Sardinian state ("Republica sardisca" "Sardinian Republic" in Sardinian, "Nació sarda" or "sardesca" "Sardinian Nation" in Catalan) against their relatives and former Aragonese allies. In 1297, Pope Boniface VIII established on his own initiative ("motu proprio") a hypothetical "regnum Sardiniae et Corsicae" ("Kingdom of Sardinia and Corsica") in order to settle the War of the Sicilian Vespers diplomatically. This had broken out in 1282 between