Introduzione e diffusione in Italia di animali esotici dal Nuovo Mondo: il caso del tacchino (Meleagris gallopavo L.)

The turkey (Meleagris gallopavo L.)was imported most likely from America to Spain in 1511, as evidenced by a document dated to the 24th October of the same year and signed by the Bishop of Valencia, which required every ship to transport ten breeding turkeys, half males and half females, from the Islands and Tierra Firme to Seville. The bird arrived in Italy in 1520, when a couple of turkeys, one male and one white female, was sent as a gift from the Bishop of Hispaniola Geraldini to the Cardinal of Rome Pucci. Instead the first iconographic document of this bird could be represented by the stucco made for the decoration of the Loggia of Vatican, Rome. Later, in the mid-16th century,numerous sumptuary laws prohibited the sale and consumption of turkeys in northern Italy. In the last years the discoveries of turkey remains from archaeological excavations dated to 16th-17th centuries have been numerous highlighting a slow but a gradual spread of this bird in Italy.