Guardare a Nord: contributi didattici nello studio dell’area di San Pancrazio a Cagliari

The walled city, with its wall palimpsest, its stratified urban texture and the formal-architectural identity of the intramural structures, still represents a transversal document of the history of architecture – not only military – and the history of restoration, with an undoubted international importance. The study integrated between research and teaching started from the area of the Tower of San Pancrazio, which was the northern entrance to the city and has always represented the most vulnerable part since it opened directly onto the hinterland. This is why it is one of the most stratified portions of the city walls, from the Pisan period to the crucial nineteenth-century restorations. Based on this awareness, a systematic scientific study of the curtain walls started in 2012. The first phase of the research involved the reorganisation of the many historical sources and the detailed analysis of four sites: the Altamira Urban Gate, the adjacent Dusay bastion, the ‘Seziate’ Palace and the northern St. Filippo bastion. The overall interest of this study lies in the fact that it provides a substantial contribution to the definition of a methodology for the study of the growth and transformation of walled cities and to the critical reconstruction of the local history of restoration, specifically referred to defence heritage.