Modern Garden Decor: Outdoor Fountains and their Roots
Modern Garden Decor: Outdoor Fountains and their Roots
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 complement your home. From the onset, outdoor fountains were soley meant to serve as functional elements. Residents of urban areas, townships and small towns utilized them as a source of drinking water and a place to wash up, which meant that fountains needed to be connected to nearby aqueduct or spring. Up to the late 19th century, water fountains had to be near an aqueduct or reservoir and higher than the fountain so that gravity could make the water flow downwards or jet high into the air. Fountains were an optimal source of water, and also served to adorn living areas and celebrate the artist. The main materials used by the Romans to build their fountains were bronze or stone masks, mostly illustrating animals or heroes. During the Middle Ages, Muslim and Moorish garden planners incorporated fountains to create mini variations of the gardens of paradise. Fountains enjoyed a considerable role in the Gardens of Versailles, all part of French King Louis XIV’s desire to exercise his power over nature. The Popes of the 17th and 18th centuries were glorified with baroque style fountains built to mark the place of entry of Roman aqueducts.
The end of the 19th century saw the rise in usage of indoor plumbing to provide drinking water, so urban fountains were relegated to purely decorative elements. Gravity was substituted by mechanical pumps in order to permit fountains to bring in clean water and allow for beautiful water displays.
Beautifying city parks, honoring people or events and entertaining, are some of the uses of modern-day fountains.
A Chronicle of Landscape Fountains
A Chronicle of Landscape Fountains Himself a learned man, Pope Nicholas V led the Roman Catholic Church from 1397 till 1455 and was responsible for the translation of hundreds of age-old documents from their original Greek into Latin. In order to make Rome worthy of being the capital of the Christian world, the Pope decided to embellish the beauty of the city. At the behest of the Pope, the Aqua Vergine, a damaged aqueduct which had transported clean drinking water into Rome from eight miles away, was renovated starting in 1453. A mostra, a monumental dedicatory fountain constructed by ancient Romans to mark the point of arrival of an aqueduct, was a tradition which was restored by Nicholas V. The Trevi Fountain now occupies the area formerly filled with a wall fountain built by Leon Battista Albert, an architect commissioned by the Pope. The Trevi Fountain as well as the renowned baroque fountains located in the Piazza del Popolo and the Piazza Navona were eventually supplied with water from the modified aqueduct he had rebuilt.