Figure 1.--Here we see a donkey cart in Cervelletta, a country area east of Rome with a bedautiful church and mansion. The Casale della Cervelletta is a mansion built in 12th century. Since 1835 it was the propriety of Salviati family. Here we see Salviati children with a donkey cart in July 1911. Notice the expensive children's cart made for the children. The Salviati boys wear white summer sailor suits, a popular style for children of well-to-do families.

We see images of Italian children enjoying carts pulled by animals. The children seem to enjoy them. Very young children were just passengers. Older children would actually drive them. They seem particularly prevalent in the late-19th and early-20th century. They may have been popular earlier in the 19th century, but we have no photographic evidence. After the early-20th century as automobiles became more common we see fewer examples. Propulsion for childens' carts varied. Richer children might have a pony cart. Affluent children might have a goat or dog cart. Because they were commonly pulled by goats, they were often called billycarts. We note rural images, here there was a wider social class pattern as animals were more common in the countryside. The popularity with children meant that we also note these carts in America, Britain, and Germany, but suspect they were also found in many other countries as well. They were quite popular and as goats never pulled them at any speed, were safe even for younger children. The pony carts required a little more supervision. We see more donkeys pulling the carts in Italy than other countries. This is probably because donkeys were a more common farm animal and beast of burden in Italy than other major countrues. The childrn who had pony carts almost by definition were well to do, or lived in rural areas. Children with pony carts might live on estates. We see fewer Italian animal cart images than other other major countries. This is part because our Italian archive is more limited, especially our 19th century archive. It may also be an economic matter as Italy was a relatively poor country, especially southern Italy.

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Created: 8:53 PM 4/11/2019
Last updated: 8:54 PM 4/11/2019