Elephants Never Forget

See his little ‘tusk’ smile ?

Papa has driven me by the lovely piazza Minerva in which a church, Santa Maria sopra Minerva stands ove r the ruins of a temple erroneously ascribed to the Greco-Roman goddess, Minerva, when actually the temple was dedicated to the Egyptian goddess, Isis.

But enough of goddesses. What I loved is the little elephant in the piazza by Bernini, supporting an obelisk from Egypt brought to Rome by Diocletian. When Bernini designed the elephant, he was confronted by the Dominican monks whose quarters faced the piazza and was instructed to include a support for the little darling.

“I am the artist, I am the sculptor,” Bernini might have responded, “and I know my sculptures—my elephant will stand on his own four feet well enough and needs no ugly support!”

The Dominicans insisted and evidently had some pull, being in direct contact with you know who, and so Bernini included a support for the elephant’s tummy, but if you look closely at the BACK of the little animal, you will see that its tail is to the side in order to allow for a…well…a symbolic peto or scoreggia (fart) to the monks!

Oh, boy, I laughed at that one. I mean, who is to tell Bernini how to sculpt marble, I ask you? That’s like thinking you can teach your grandmother to suck eggs or non far sapere a contadino quanto e’ buono il formaggio con le pere—don’t teach a farmer that parmesan is good with pears!

The nerve of those guys!

So when we are out, I always ask papa or mama to drive me by the little elephant and I tip my paw at him for good luck and now I find that after his recent cleaning, he is getting even more adorable and has started smiling a bit more than before when he was covered with smog.

Probably thinking of all the tourists who may not know why his tail is…well…aside.

He would have been so much more beautiful without the support!

More on Rome’s beauty as I gaze from my window over the piazza.