The () is the local Florentine nickname for the bronze fountain of a boar. The fountain figure was sculpted and cast by Baroque master Pietro Tacca (1577–1640) shortly before 1634,The commission, from Cosimo II de' Medici, dated to 1621 (Piero Torriti, Pietro Tacca da Carrara, 1975:39, noted in Haskell and Penny). following a marble Italian copy of a Hellenistic marble original, at the time in the Grand Ducal collections and today on display in the classical section of the Uffizi Museum. The original, which was found in Rome and moved to Florence in the mid-16th century by the Medici, was associated from the time of its rediscovery with the Calydonian Boar of Greek myth.
Tacca's bronze, which has eclipsed the Roman marble that served as model, was originally intended for the Boboli Garden in Florence, then moved to the Loggia del Mercato Nuovo; the fountain was placed originally facing east, in via Calimala, in front of the pharmacy that by association gained the name Farmacia del Cinghiale (Italian for "Boar"). To gain more space for market traffic it was later moved to the side facing south, where it still stands as one of the most popular features for tourists. The present statue is a modern copy, cast in 1998 by Ferdinando Marinelli Artistic Foundry and replaced in 2008, while Tacca's bronze is sheltered in the new Museo Stefano Bardini in Palazzo Mozzi.
Visitors to the put a coin into the boar's gaping jaws, with the intent to let it fall through the underlying grating for good luck, and they rub the boar's snout to ensure a return to Florence, a tradition that the Scottish literary traveller Tobias Smollett already noted in 1766,Smollett, Travels Through France and Italy, 1766, Letter XXVIII, noted in Haskell and Penny. which has kept the snout in a state of polished sheen while the rest of the boar's body has patinated to a dull brownish-green.
Copies
Copies of the sculpture can be found around the world. Some of the locations are:
Australia Sydney Hospital, Sydney, New South Wales
Belgium Royal Greenhouses of Laeken, Brussels Place de Bastogne, Koekelberg, Brussels Enghien Park, Enghien Antwerp Zoo
Canada Butchart Gardens, Victoria, British Columbia Modern Languages building, University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, Halifax, Nova Scotia
Denmark Brotorvet, Holstebro
France Musée du Louvre, Paris Place Richelme, Aix-en-Provence
Germany (recreation by ) in the and in front of the German Hunting and Fishing Museum, Munich
Italy Rispescia, Grosseto, Tuscany Loggia del Mercato Nuovo, Florence
Japan Tokyo, Nihonbashi District, Pigeon Corporation Headquarters Fuji City, Shizuoka Prefecture Uroko no Ie, Kitano Ijinkan, Kobe, Hyogo Prefecture
Norway Slemdal skole, Oslo
Spain Parque de El Capricho, Madrid
Sweden Lejonet och svinet, Stockholm
United Kingdom Derby Arboretum, Derby, England Chatsworth House, Derbyshire, England Leweston School, Dorset, England Castle Howard, North Yorkshire St Mary's College, Durham, Durham, England Kimmerghame House, Scottish Borders, Scotland Osborne House, Isle of Wight, England
United States Arkansas University of Arkansas campus, Fayetteville California Eberle Winery, Paso Robles. Viansa Winery, Sonoma Colorado Museum of Outdoor Arts, Englewood Connecticut Choate Rosemary Hall, Wallingford Delaware Delaware Museum of Natural History, Wilmington Georgia Armstrong Kessler Mansion, 447 Bull Street, Savannah Hawaii Honolulu, private collection Illinois, Riverview Inn & Suites, on the Rock River in Rockford Kansas The Villages Shopping Center, Prairie Village Kentucky Louisville, private collection Louisiana R. W. Norton Art Gallery, Shreveport Missouri Country Club Plaza, N.W. Corner of 47th Street and Wornall Road, Kansas City Nevada Main Street Station Casino Brewery Hotel - at casino bar, Las Vegas New York Sutton Park The Great Escape & Splashwater Kingdom amusement park at Queensbury North Carolina Mar Boar Restaurant, Wallace Pennsylvania Former Strawbridge & Clothier store, 801 Market Street, Philadelphia South Carolina Poinsett Plaza, Greenville Armstrong House, Savannah, Georgia Texas Plaza Skillman Shopping Center, Dallas Dallas Zoo, Dallas Rice Village, Houston Vermont Lyndon Center Virginia Stone Tower Winery, Leesburg, Virginia
In popular culture The sculpture appears in literature as well as onscreen.
In literature The figures in Hans Christian Andersen's "The Bronze Hog" in A Poet's Bazaar.Translated by Charles Beckwith, London, 1846. A plaque nearby explains the relationship between this boar and the story.
In film appears in the 2001 film Hannibal when Chief Inspector Rinaldo Pazzi (Giancarlo Giannini) cleans his hands in the fountain.
The statue is also seen briefly in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002) as Harry Potter and Ron Weasley climb the Hogwarts staircase after crashing into the Whomping Willow, and again on the same staircase during the flashback scene where Tom Riddle speaks to Albus Dumbledore. It also appears in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows –Part 2 (2011) in the Room of Requirement.
In the 1962 film Light in the Piazza, Fabrizio (George Hamilton) pats the boar's snout for luck after buying flowers.
Gallery
References
External links
Porcellino (Museum of Outdoor Arts) Smithsonian Institution SIRIS Inventory The Florentine - article » The Porcellino The legend of Porcellino