inhabitants: 173,600
extension: 133,51 Km2
altitude: 4 m slm.
geographic position: it is placed to the southern edge of the plain of the Campidano in the center of the Gulf of Cagliari , on which it shows itself.
TO SEE:
>>Archaeology:
|Punica Necropoli of Tuvixeddu|Amphitheater Roman|
>>Architecture:
|Bastions|Tower of S. Pancrazio|Tower of the elephant|
>>Nature:
|Pond of Molentargius|Beach of the Poetto|
>>Museums:
|National Archaeological Museum |National Pinacoteca of Cagliari|Communal gallery of Art|
>>clik 
The city landscape:
the city develops on a rather varied territory, between hills, lagoons and beaches.
Eight hills mark the city landscape: the white color cliff, mostly limestone, is a sign that outlines the city clearly. Cagliari appears like a sun and stone place, above all to the traveller who arrives from the sea. (photo: M. Urpino, statue of S. Francesco, M. Vacca)
Monte Urpinu, Monte Claro, Monte Mixi, the Hill of Bonaria, the Hill of S. Michele, S. Elia, Tuvixeddu and Castello, they are the eight hills of the city: from their top it is possible to space with the look on all the Gulf, on lagoons, on the plain of the Campidano, towards the mountains of the Sarrabus and the Sulcis and also to admire unforgettable sunsets.
S. Elia and Monte Claro were the places of the most ancient human enterings, going back to the Neolithic and the Eneolithic, in the zone of Cagliari. Tuvixeddu is deeply marked from the necropolis of hypogean tombs of the Punic- Phoenician period. Monte Urpinu is seat of a beautiful park and a beautiful pin-forest. The Castello finally was the fortified fortress of the city from the years around to the thousands until the unit of Italy and it keeps, in the city system and the buildings, the still manifest traces of its past.
The historical quarters of Cagliari are the Castello, Marina, Stampace and Villanova. 
The castle rises in dominant position on all the city and it marks the city in such as unmistakable way that Cagliari is called in dialet “Casteddu”. The two pisan towers, the bastions, the Cathedral, the Vice-regal Palace , the old Regio Arsenale (today museum complex ), the long and tightened roads with the pavement, the ancient buildings with the spanish balconies in struck iron, the shops of the craftsmen and the antiquarians, bring back continually to the past.
Marina goes from Roma street, Regina avenue Margherita, Manno street and Largo Carlo Felice : it was the quarter of the sailors and of the fishermen, today between narrow streets, arcades, churches and small squares there are tens of typical restaurants and taverns. The quarter shows iteself on the port and still today it is much sprightly: besides the typical shops of the craftsmen, there are storees of varied type and some good night-club .
The quarter of Stampace extends to the feet of Castello towards the West: numerous churches are found to you (church of S.Michele, the baroque period) and situated interesting like the Botanical Garden. To the margins of the quarter they are some important situated archaeological (amphitheater Roman, cove of the vipera, villa of Tigellio). Numerous they are the restaurants, the trattorie, the nocturnal premises and the storees in a generalized manner, to confirmation of the vocation to the commerce of the cagliaritani.
Villanova is distinguished for the low houses from the facade very cured and for the balconies in battered iron embellished from the gerani. Beautiful it is the piazzetta of Saint Domenico, prospiciente the ancient Dominican convent with the pregevole chiostro. To the margins of the quarter they are former mattatoio the communal one (today transformed in the museale structure Exmà), and the paleocristiana church of S. Saturno one of most ancient of the island.
Molentargius and S.Gilla are the two ponds of the city: these two areas cover one remarkable naturalistic importance for the presence of rare numerous a varied avifauna and species. The pond of Molentargius is one of the three European zones where the fenicotteri nidificano stablily: in 1977 the convention of Ramsar sanctioned its insertion between the protected areas of international interest and today it is worked in order to transform the area in a park.
The limestone reefs of head Sant’ Elia, the cape of the Saddleback of the Devil the white woman and thin sand of the Poetto, a long beach more than seven Km, the sea of the still crystalline gulf, although finds itself to the inside of a city area, contributes to the oneness of the city landscape of Cagliari.