Porcellino, Bronze fountain in Loggia del Mercato Nuovo, Florence, Italy

Porcellino is a bronze boar with a pronounced snout and upright ears, seated on a bronze base scattered with leaf and animal forms, itself set on an octagonal stone pedestal of light brown and grey panels. Pietro Tacca cast the figure around 1633; the base, modelled with marsh plants, insects and small animals, was probably added when Ferdinando II turned the work into a fountain, documented under the Loggia del Mercato Nuovo by 1640.

Pietro Tacca created this bronze sculpture in 1633 when commissioned by Cosimo II de Medici, drawing inspiration from an ancient Roman marble version. Over time it became a defining feature of the marketplace loggia.

Visitors touch the boar's snout and drop coins into its mouth as a gesture believed to bring good fortune and promise a return to Florence. This ritual has become woven into the daily rhythm of the marketplace.

The fountain stands on the south side of the Loggia del Mercato Nuovo, facing the former Borsa Merci, a short walk from the Ponte Vecchio. The bronze basin has a small front trough shaped like a bean where the water falls. The surrounding market is often crowded, so approach from the side to avoid the main flow of shoppers.

The bronze basin beneath the boar, cast by Pietro Tacca, is covered with a dense thicket of plants, insects and small animals evoking a marsh. Tacca probably modelled real animals into the wax base, a common practice of the time. The worn original basin is now kept at the Museo Bardini.