Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
Among the Celts, the boar was seen as a symbol of fertility, power, and prosperity, and the an-
imal was sacred to the goddess of the hunt, Arduinna. The bones and joints of pigs have been
discovered buried in Celtic tombs, suggesting the importance of these animals in their culture.
The Druids referred to themselves as boars and emulated the animals' solitary forest existen-
ce. Throughout the Middle Ages, the importance of pigs to the developing agrarian economy
grew steadily, and the boar appears in many examples of heraldry.
In 1493, Christopher Columbus arrived on the island that would come to be known as Puerto
Rico with eight pigs that Queen Isabella had ordered him to bring. Almost 50 years later,
Hernando de Soto landed in Florida with a small herd of pigs that would grow to many hun-
dreds in just a few years. De Soto and other Spanish explorers offered some of these animals
to the indigenous peoples as a token of goodwill, and numbers of them escaped into the wild
and became the ancestors of the razorbacks and feral pigs of the southern United States.
Sir Walter Raleigh brought a number of sows to the Jamestown colony in 1607, and although
the settlers endured a great deal of hardship, they were to be the first permanent English estab-
lishment in the New World. Over the course of the next century, pigs were to become a staple
throughout the colonies because of their natural adaptability and utility.
As pioneers moved west, they brought pigs with them in their wagon trains, and soon large
herds were to be found across the settled regions. In the War of 1812, salt pork was shipped to
American troops in barrels stamped “U.S.” Although the “U.S.” stood for the meat packer
“Uncle” Samuel Wilson, soldiers coined the term “Uncle Sam,” one of America's most
widely recognized patriotic symbols. Throughout the history of the United States, the import-
ance of hogs to the nation's economy has continued to grow, along with the relationship
between pigs and politics. In the 19th century, the term “pork barrel politics” was coined to
describe actions undertaken by politicians to solely benefit their constituencies. The “pork
barrel” was a container that held lard or salt pork, and keeping it well supplied was a matter of
constant concern for the average American.
In 1961, pigs broke into the financial markets when the Chicago Mercantile Exchange began
trading pork belly futures contracts as an innovative risk management device for meat pack-
ers; because frozen pork bellies can be kept in cold storage for extended periods, they can be
held in inventory and sold when market prices meet the sellers' needs. Pigs are no less im-
portant elsewhere in the world; today, every continent has a pig population, except Antarctica.
