Fuente del Porcellino

It is located in the New Market, near the Ponte Vecchio. It is an adult wild boar, in bronze, and many copies can be found in other cities such as Australia, Denmark or France, among others. Having been part of the collections of the Grand Duchy, the marble original can currently be enjoyed in the classical section of the Uffizi Gallery.

The bronze statue was made by the Baroque master Pietro Tacca, around the year 1633, and comes from the Roman marble copy of the Hellenistic period. Pope Pius VI offered Cosimo I de' Medici this statue in 1560 during his visit to Rome and Cosimo II de' Medici commissioned a bronze copy. Despite being a copy, the naturalistic details such as the animal hair demonstrate the great artistic ability of Tacca, who has always been considered Giambologna's outstanding student. The original Tacca statue and base can be found in the new Bardini museum since 2004.

Legend has it that visitors must put a coin in the boar's mouth to get lucky and return to Florence. The procedure to have a good omen and return to the city consists of putting the coin in after having rubbed the boar's snout. Later, if the coin falls and goes over the grate of the basin and reaches the area where the water is, it will bring good luck. fortune. But, on the contrary, if the process is not this, it will not have the desired effect. The trick is to deposit a heavy coin, since the inclination is such that these heavy coins are the ones that easily fall through the cracks. This tradition was witnessed by Tobias Smollett in 1766.