The ancient statue is a verraco de piedra, from the V b.C., there is more statues like that on that region and its belived they come from a pre-roman cattle rancher people called the vettones. The most famous one is the statue that is at the salamanca roman bridge, its existence by the bridge was first documented on the XIII century, and got its fame thanks to being mentioned on the picaresque novel "El lazarillo de Tormes". On the year 1834 the city governor Jose Maria Cambronero ordered the statue and similar ones to be destroyed because he believed it was put there by the king Carlos I to mark the city as a punishment for the participation on the Comunidades de castilla(a popular revolt against the king), despite him being told that he was wrong and the statues were in fact much older the statue was thrown to the river. In 1867 the statue was rescued from the river by the monument commission of Salamanca and put into the provincial musseum. It was there until 1954 when it was put back on its original place on the roman bridge to celebrate the IV centenary of the Lazarillo de Tormes book.