Sardinia

The Carthaginians (Phoenician colonists based in North Africa) founded trading stations in Sardinia. Rome seized it in 238 bc. After the fall of the Roman Empire, Sardinia was overrun by the Vandals and then passed to the Byzantines in the 6th century ad. From the 8th to the 11th century Sardinia was repeatedly harassed by the Saracens. From the 11th to the 14th century the Pisans and Genoese fought each other for possession of the island. In the 14th century the pope, who claimed the overlordship, gave Sardinia to the king of Aragón. The Aragonese and their sovereign successors, the Spanish, ruled Sardinia until the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, which gave it to Austria. In 1720 it came under the rule of the House of Savoy. United with Savoy, Piedmont, and Nice, Sardinia became the Kingdom of Sardinia. In 1861 Sardinia became part of the kingdom of Italy.