Food disseminated in a determined territory usually presents a certain constancy over time, as it is determined, at least in part, by long duration natural factors, such as climate and soil nature, capable of conditioning plant and animal species that best fit the characteristics of the place. It is also for this reason that many raw materials and some meals are part of a deep-rooted food tradition.

For example, pork meat is certainly a food of long and significant presence in Perugia and, more generally, in Umbria, and the “porchetta” (Italian spit-roasted pork) is a centuries-old culinary tradition, which in our collective imagination remains linked to the triumphant Renaissance banquets, to the prototype of the whole roasted piglet served with an apple in its mouth.

Yet, still today, it is very successful on our tables and aims at contemporaneity as a local type of street food.

In the ancient collections of the University the “porchetta” comes in a dual role: object of study for doctors and holidays delicacy for College residents.

Of course, meat was not present, if not only sporadically, on the tables of the underprivileged classes, whose diet was very poor, often limited to cereals and legumes.

However, pork-meat, mostly processed into sausages, constituted a source of animal proteins relatively inexpensive and accessible.

With regard to vegetables, instead, they physically appear in Universities in the sixteenth century, with the creation of botanical gardens and the establishment of the first chairs related to them.

This represents a significant evolution compared to the preexisting “simple” teachings: during the Humanism decades plants, as nature in general, gain a scientific-naturalistic interest, regardless of their potential use in medicine.

This multiplies the plants under study, but also radically changes the perspective of analysis enhanced by direct observation in botanical gardens, supported and accompanied by the study of printed Herbaria.