Marmotina — street entertainer with a trained marmot — Zompini — Arti #9

Gaetano Zompini - Arti che vanno per via - plate 09 - Marmotina - street entertainer with a trained marmot

Marmotina — plate 9

The Arti che vanno per via nella città di Venezia (1753, 1770, 1785, etc.), by Gaetano Zompini (1700–1778), contains sixty engravings of common, mostly poor people, peddling their trades on the streets of Venice in the mid-1700s.

Text

De Carneval mi dalla neve scampo,
E porto dal Piemonte una marmotta,
E col farla ballar quà me la campo.

Translation

For Carnival, I escape the snow
And bring from Piedmont a marmot
And by making it dance, I get by.

Notes

Entertainment in the alleyways and squares with trained animals must have been fairly common. See also plate 54 — Far ballar i Cani — dancing dogs.

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Bibliography

Zompini, Gaetano. Le arti che vanno per via nella città di Venezia inventate ed incise da Gaetano Zompini, Aggiuntavi una memoria di detto autore. Venezia, 1785.

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