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Discovering
the Island
Main Attractions Edition
34 - PORTO FLAVIA
Iglesias is a town of 26,000 inhabitants in the province of South Sardinia.
The Iglesiente was already a popular area in prehistoric times, in the Ancient Neolithic. In the mountainous area of San Benedetto have been found finds, domus de janas and hypogeic tombs, dating back to the Ozieri Culture (4th millennium B.C.). Traces of the Nuragic Age and the passage of Phoenicians, Punic, Carthaginians and Romans remain.
In the early Middle Ages the area was scarcely populated and only from the 9th century A.D. do urban traces appear, in particular the late Byzantine church of San Salvatore and that of Sant'Antonio Abate.
The construction of the city itself dates back to 1250, with the aim of encouraging the exploitation of the silvery resources of the subsoil. The town was baptized Villa di Chiesa (Villa Ecclesiae in Latin, Bidda de Cresias in Sardinian language).
It was the first Sardinian city to fall under Aragonese rule in 1324, and the change of name, Iglesias, is due to this period.
In 1720, together with the whole island, it passed to the Savoys and became the royal holiday resort.
From the middle of the 19th century Iglesias, like the whole Sardinian sub-region, experienced an important economic growth due to the development of the mining industry. Iglesias grew from 6,000 to 20,000 inhabitants over 40 years. In the aftermath of the Second World War there was a coal crisis that affected the entire mining sector of Sulcis-Iglesiente.
The importance of the mines in the area is still evident and underlined by the tourist enhancement of some sites, such as the Museum of Mining Machines, in the hamlet of Nebida.
Another site is Porto Flavia. It is a port of embarkation for the mining material obtained on a cliff overlooking the sea and consisting of a tunnel of about 600 meters. The structure is divided into two overlapping tunnels. In the upper one, via railways, the product extracted directly from the mines arrived, in the lower tunnel the coal was unloaded on an extractable conveyor belt that led to the holds of the large cargo ships at anchor.
The work was carried out between 1922 and 1924 under the direction of the Venetian engineer Cesare Vecelli and was named after his eldest daughter, Flavia.
Today Porto Flavia is an interesting tourist destination where guided tours are organized and from which you can observe the suggestive Pan di Zucchero, a natural monument of 132 meters.
Iglesias boasts a whole series of attractions among which:
- Salvaterra or San Guantino Castle;
- Church of Santa Chiara (1284 A.D.);
- Church of Nostra Signora di Valverde (1285 A.D.);
- Walls of Iglesias, remains of medieval fortifications.
