Learned pig

The original "learned pig" was trained by a Scotsman, Samuel Bisset, who ran a travelling novelty show. The idea of an "intellectual" animal was not new. A similar attraction known as "Marocco the thinking horse" (c.1586–c.1606) had been exhibited over a century earlier; there were also contemporary examples of the "horse of knowledge", exhibited for example at Astley's Amphitheatre. But performing horses were nothing unusual. No performing pigs are known to have been trained before. The pig was shown with great success in Dublin. After Bisset's death the pig was taken over by a Mr Nicholson, who toured it in Britain. It was exhibited in Nottingham in 1784, coming to London in the following year." The discussion about how the pig had been trained also led to disputes about the cognitive abilities of pigs; whether the animal actually recognised letters or even words, or whether it was simply responding to direct prompting. The phenomenon was also discussed in instructional literature aimed at children, to describe the essential difference between human and animal capacities and to warn against cruelty to animals, on the assumption that the pigs were badly beaten by their trainers to force them to behave. Mrs Trimmer in her children's book The Robin Redbreasts (1788), "designed to teach children the proper treatment of animals", mentions the pig in chapter entitled "The Cruel Boy": aiming to teach that animals are not "mere machines, actuated by the unerring hand of Providence", it says that the sight of the Learned Pig, "which has lately been shown in London, has deranged these ideas, and I know not what think". ==Later pigs==

In 1798 a learned pig appeared in the United States. William Frederick Pinchbeck displayed a "Pig of Knowledge" in New England. He claimed to have toured all the major towns of the Union and introduced the pig to President John Adams, to "universal applause". Pinchbeck later explained his methods of training the pig in a pamphlet. He denied that any form of torture was involved, insisting that it was better to "coax" the pig to follow instructions. The animal would soon learn to respond to the slightest hints of movement from the trainer. "Toby" became a standard name for a learned pig. The writer Harrison Weir depicts a learned pig called Toby, which he saw a "year ago at Camberwell Fair" for a penny. According to Harrison, the pig carried a correctly numbered card to a person who had called out a number; it spelled "vittels," and then it left to have some, "with a joyful grunt, and the show was over." ==Caricature==

The original learned pig inspired a large number of satirical comments and comic prints. Thomas Rowlandson published a caricature of "The Wonderful Pig" in 1785, in which the pig is shown displaying his erudition to a crowd of amazed ladies and gentlemen. A placard states "The Surprising PIG well versed in all Languages, perfect Arethmatician Mathematician & Composer of Musick." Other caricatures used the appeal of the pig to poke fun at theatrical fads of the day. The Theatrical War satirises the actor-impresario John Palmer, dressed in Shakespearean costume, being threatened by other attractions including the pig. The 1784 print The Downfall of Taste and Genius, or, The World As it Goes by Samuel Collings ridicules "the taste that prefers the Dancing Dogs, the Learned Pig, and Harlequin to Shakespeare". This was a "recurrent theme" of prints at the time. An anonymous print entitled "The Wonderful Pig of Knowledge" shows a pig performing in a parlour apparently engaged in spelling the word "PORC[INE]" Politicians were also satirised by being compared to the pig. William Pitt was referred to as "the Wonderful Pig" on several occasions. One satirical print showed Pitt with the body of a pig; the caption asserted that among his powers was the ability to explain recent Acts of Parliament, a feat "before never having been even attempted in these our realms!!!" In one print Pitt and his opponent Charles James Fox were both depicted as competing learned pigs. ==Literature==

The concept of the "learned pig" became a common motif in satirical literature by the late 18th century, playing on the implied contrast between gross physicality and intellectual superiority. The poet William Cowper lamented that his fame had been unfavourably compared to both the pig and a "prostitute" (the notoriously promiscuous actress George Anne Bellamy). picked up the theme of reincarnation. This presents itself as the personal reminiscences of the pig, as told to the author. He describes himself as a soul that has successively migrated from the body of Romulus into various humans and animals before becoming the Learned Pig. He recalls his previous incarnations. After Romulus he became Brutus, and then entered several human and animal bodies. Adapting the Shakespeare theme, the pamphlet states that he became a man called "Pimping Billy", who worked as a horse-holder at a playhouse with Shakespeare and was the real author of his plays. He then became a famous British aristocrat and general — identified only by asterisks — before entering the body of a pig. Puns on the name "Bacon", referring to the philosopher Francis Bacon, also appeared in the literature. In the poem "The Prophetic Pig", in The Whim of the Day (c.1794) a believer in reincarnation states, "I can easily trace...A metempsychosis in this pig's face!...And in transmigration, if I'm not mistaken,/This learned pig must be, by consanguinity,/Descended from the great Lord Bacon." Thomas Hood's poem The Lament of Toby, The Learned Pig also uses the Bacon pun, adding another on the poet James Hogg. He describes the thoughts of a learned pig forced to retire from his intellectual pursuits to be fattened for slaughter. The pig says "Goodbye to the poetic Hogg!/The philosophic Bacon!": :In this world, pigs, as well as men, :Must dance to fortune's fiddlings, :But must I give the classics up, :For barley-meal and middlings? William Blake attacked debased public taste in a poem (c. 1808-11) dedicated to the artist James Barry, writing that the nation which neglected Barry might "give pensions to the Learned Pig / Or the Hare playing on a Tabor". He also alludes to it in his 1784 satire An Island in the Moon. In 1807 Robert Southey parodied the contrast between real genius and meretricious celebrity by referring to the pig, noting that "the learned pig was in his day a far greater object of admiration to the English nation than ever was Sir Isaac Newton." , 1840s The pig continued to be a common reference point for writers such as Mary Wollstonecraft and Charles Dickens. In the 1837-8 The Mudfog Papers Dickens describes a moving lecture given at the Mudfog Society for the Advancement of Everything by Mr Blunderum on the dying moments of the learned pig. The lecturer was asked whether the learned pig was related to the Pig-faced Lady, causing embarrassment to an audience member who was related to the lady, but who refused to admit a family connection to the learned pig. Mrs Beeton begins her recipe for cooking sucking pig, from her 1861 bestseller ''Mrs Beeton's Book of Household Management'', with the observation that pigs are capable of "education" "and though, like the ass, naturally stubborn and obstinate, that he is equally amenable with other animals to caresses and kindness". This is proven by "the instance of the learned pig, first exhibited about a century since, but which has been continued down to our own time by repeated instances of an animal who will put together all the letters or figures that compose the day, month, hour and date of the exhibition, besides many other unquestioned evidences of memory." Most recently, the "Learned Pig" has made a reappearance of sorts in popular culture; in 2003 he was the subject of a song, "The Learned Pig," which was part of a concept concert and recording by the UK band the Tiger Lillies, based on a poem by Edward Gorey. The musical "Toby the Incredible Learned Pig", written by Daniel Freedman, was a finalist in the Wonderland One Act Festival at Theater Works 42nd St. NYC in 2007. In 2011 there appeared a novel, Pyg: The Memoirs of a Learned Pig, by Russell Potter, based on the career of the original "Toby". () ==See also==