"...the unruly Sherden whom no one had ever known how to combat, they came boldly sailing in their warships from the midst of the sea, none being able to withstand them...”
Ramesses II (1279-1213 BC)

The Sherden ("Shardana” or "Sherdanu”) are one of ethnic groups of the Sea Peoples from the eastern Mediterranean in the late 2nd millennium BC. On reliefs, they are shown carrying round shields and spears, dirks or swords. In some cases, they are shown wearing corselets and kilts, but their key distinguishing feature is a horned helmet, which, in all cases but three, features a circular accouterment at the crest.

The earliest known mention of Shardana is thought to the Pharaoh Amenhotep III or Akhenaten in the 14th century BC. Though they have been referred to as sea raiders and mercenaries, who were prepared to offer their services to local employers, these texts do not provide any evidence of that association, and they shed no light on what the function of these "Å¡irdannu-peopl e" was at the time.

The first certain mention of the Sherden is found in the records of Ramesses II (ruled 1279-1213 BC), who defeated them in his second year (1278 BC) when they attempted to raid Egypt's coast. The pharaoh subsequently incorporated many of these warriors into his personal guard.

Years later, other waves of Sea People, the Sherden included, were defeated by Merneptah, son of Ramesses II, and Ramesses III. An Egyptian work written around 1100 BC, the Onomasticon of Amenope, documents the presence of the Sherden in Palestine. After being defeated by Pharaoh Ramesses III, they, along with other "Sea Peoples", would be allowed to settle in that territory, subject to Egyptian rule. They may have assisted in the construction of the hybrid Egyptian warships as shipwrights or advisers on maritime technology. Michael Wood has suggested that their raids contributed greatly to the collapse of the Mycenaean civilization.
No mention of the Sherden has ever been found in Hittite, Sardinian, Sicilian, Etruscans or Greek legends or documents, suggesting that they did not originate from either sphere of influence.

"... few dominating leaders arrived as heroes only a few centuries before Phoenician trading posts were established, several features of Sardinian prehistory might be explained as innovations introduced by them: Oriental types of armour, and fighting perpetuated in the bronze representation of warriors several centuries later; the arrival of the Cypriot copper ingots of the Serra Ilixi type; the sudden advance in and inventiveness of design of the Sardinian nuraghes themselves at about the turn of the first millennium; the introduction of certain religious practices such as the worship of water in sacred wells – if this fact was not introduced [later] by the Phoenician settlers...”