ローマ・フィレンツェ・ベネチア・ミラノのレストラン、ホテルなど観光情報を紹介 イタリア観光ブログ

 Dear bloggers,

Today I’d like to introduce you the beautiful “Fountain of Turtles” in Rome.

 The Fontane delle Tartarughe (The Turtle Fountain) is a founain of the late Italian Renaissances, located in the Piazza Mattei, in the Sant'Angelo district of Rome, Italy. It was built between 1580 and 1588 by the architect Giacomo della Porta and the sculptor Taddeo Landini.

In the historic center, the Turtle Fountain is one of the most beautiful in Rome. Built towards the end of 1500 and designed by Giacomo della Porta  is related to a romantic legend.

In fact, it seems that the Duke Mattei wanted to show to the father of his sweetheart to be a powerful man, because this person doen’t thin that so the Duke built the beautiful fountain in front of their windows in just one night.

The fountain is composed of square basin with a circular vasque of African marble mounted on a pedestal in the center. Around the edge of the vasque are the four heads of putti which spout water into the basin below. There are four marble conch shells surrounding the base of the fountain.The sculptures of the four children who raise their arms to help the turtles to enter the upper basin is attributed to Taddeo Landini, while the turtles were added in 1658 by Bernini.

The Fontana delle Tatarughe, like all Renaissance fountains, was designed to supply drinking water to the Roman population. It was one of a group of eighteen new fountains built in Rome in the sixteenth century following the restoration of a ruined first century Roman acqueduct, the Acqua Vergine, by Pope Gregory XIII.

A replica of the fountain, made in Rome in the early 1900s, was bought by William H. and Ethel Crocker for their estate at Hillsborough, California. It was given to the city of San Francisco by their four children and installed in Huntington Park, Nob Hill, in 1954. It stands rather lower in the water than the Roman original.

I hope these the blog liked you…

See you soon...in Rome! ;)

Pamela :)