Early Water Supply Solutions in Rome
Early Water Supply Solutions in Rome Aqua Anio Vetus, the first raised aqueduct founded in Rome, started supplying the men and women living in the hills with water in 273 BC, even though they had depended on natural springs up until then.
If people residing at higher elevations did not have access to springs or the aqueduct, they’d have to count on the other existing solutions of the day, cisterns that accumulated rainwater from the sky and subterranean wells that drew the water from below ground. To deliver water to Pincian Hill in the early sixteenth century, they employed the brand-new process of redirecting the stream from the Acqua Vergine aqueduct’s underground channel. Pozzi, or manholes, were constructed at standard intervals along the aqueduct’s channel. The manholes made it more straightforward to maintain the channel, but it was also possible to use buckets to pull water from the aqueduct, as we saw with Cardinal Marcello Crescenzi when he possessed the property from 1543 to 1552, the year he died. The cistern he had built to gather rainwater wasn’t satisfactory to meet his water needs. Thankfully, the aqueduct sat just below his property, and he had a shaft established to give him access.
The Genesis Of Outdoor Fountains
The Genesis Of Outdoor Fountains
The incredible architecture of a fountain allows it to provide clean water or shoot water high into air for dramatic effect and it can also serve as an excellent design feature to complete your home. From the beginning, outdoor fountains were simply there to serve as functional elements. Cities, towns and villages made use of nearby aqueducts or springs to provide them with potable water as well as water where they could bathe or wash. Up until the 19th century, fountains had to be more elevated and closer to a water source, including aqueducts and reservoirs, in order to take advantage of gravity which fed the fountains. Serving as an element of decoration and celebration, fountains also provided clean, fresh drinking water. The main materials used by the Romans to create their fountains were bronze or stone masks, mostly illustrating animals or heroes. Muslims and Moorish landscaping designers of the Middle Ages included fountains to re-create smaller models of the gardens of paradise. The fountains seen in the Gardens of Versailles were meant to show the power over nature held by King Louis XIV of France. The Popes of the 17th and 18th centuries were extolled with baroque style fountains constructed to mark the place of entry of Roman aqueducts.
Since indoor plumbing became the standard of the day for clean, drinking water, by the end of the 19th century urban fountains were no longer needed for this purpose and they became purely decorative. Amazing water effects and recycled water were made possible by replacing the force of gravity with mechanical pumps.
Nowadays, fountains adorn public areas and are used to pay tribute to individuals or events and fill recreational and entertainment needs.
The Origins of Contemporary Outdoor Wall Fountains
The Origins of Contemporary Outdoor Wall Fountains
Himself a learned man, Pope Nicholas V headed the Roman Catholic Church from 1397 till 1455 and was responsible for the translation of scores of ancient documents from their original Greek into Latin. It was important for him to embellish the city of Rome to make it worthy of being known as the capital of the Christian world. In 1453 the Pope commissioned the reconstruction of the Aqua Vergine, an historic Roman aqueduct which had carried clean drinking water into the city from eight miles away. The ancient Roman tradition of marking the arrival point of an aqueduct with an imposing celebratory fountain, also known as a mostra, was restored by Nicholas V. At the behest of the Pope, architect Leon Battista Alberti undertook the construction of a wall fountain in the spot where we now find the Trevi Fountain. The Trevi Fountain as well as the well-known baroque fountains found in the Piazza del Popolo and the Piazza Navona were eventually supplied with water from the altered aqueduct he had rebuilt.