Siniscola

About its own name Siniscola holds a different opinion from the linguists: Massimo Pittau derives it from the Latin fīnis scholae, the boundary of the land, while the inhabitants have always read it as fīnis colle, at the foot of the hill. It is the most important centre of the Baronie, and its modern history is entirely a question of defence. In 1514 the Moors landed on the coast without meeting resistance and sacked Siniscola, Torpè and Lodè; the people of the three villages threatened to leave altogether and shelter under the rock of Posada until there was a defensive system worthy of the name. The coastal towers came afterwards, on the strength of the survey made in 1573 by don Marco Antonio Camos.

In February 1581 Barbary corsairs landed in force at Santa Lucia, where the tower had not yet been built: they plundered, killed and took prisoners. On the way back to their ships, however, they ran into the armed squads of Bernardino Puliga, a nobleman from Sassari who became a local hero here, who put them to flight, recovered the booty and freed the prisoners. What followed is even more telling: in 1623 the council of the Royal Patrimony of Aragon confiscated the fief from its lawful holder, Michele Portugues, because he had organised no defence at all against the pirates. He lost both the property and the title.