The Practice of Cattle Raiding in Sardinia: From the Past to the Present

Abstract

The article takes the case of Sardinia, an archaic and conservative region of Italy, and its central mountainous area of Barbagia in particular, to examine the phenomenon of cattle raiding in historical perspective. I draw primarily on my own field materials to support the analyses provided in the available scholarly literature, since the latter predominantly discuss the topic from the legal point of view. The anthropological standpoint will be helpful in presenting a more complex and multidimensional vision of the Sardinian cattle raiding, shedding light on its intricacies, folk philosophy, and place in the local cultural context, as well as in identifying its connections to the ancient code of customary law and the present values and norms of behavior in the region. I argue that, in the emic views of the villagers, cattle raiding is considered as a phenomenon organically inscribed in the local social-economic and cultural context, being sometimes disapproved of, sometimes “decriminalized” or “heroized” and shown as requiring certain dignity of its actors. By examining this practice in the context of Sardinia, we will be able to better understand many other realities in this European region in its present and historical past.