The article mentions pigs wouldn’t be wandering the village streets, but as a counter example there were the “St Anthony’s pigs” owned by the friars that were legally protected and had free run of the city. Dante alludes to these in Paradiso, where they took on a metaphor of some friars’ greed.
And you can still find loose pigs in some places. I personally know the one in La Alberca, Salamanca, Spain, named San Anton (from Antonius/Anthony), the pig wanders the streets for months being fed by random villagers until it's raffled on San Antonio's day.
I have read that perceptions of pigs as dirty differing in various cultures comes back to whether pigs in that region were raised as garbage-scavengers or as wild-feeders. Fun to think about!
