Source of Giuturna - Roma, Italy - Natural Springs on Waymarking.com

The source of Giuturna was among the oldest and most important in the city and flowed at the foot of the Palatine. Giuturna was a nymph sister of King Turno, who was the deification of the source itself, as often happened in the ancient world.

The shrine marks a place where, according to Roman legend, the divine twins Castor and Pollux stopped to water their horses while passing through the city, and where they announced Roman victory at the Battle of Lake Regillus, 495 BCE.

The spring had been monumentally decorated in the Republican era and was excavated in 1900 by Giacomo Boni. The basin is approximately square, covered with marble and with a rectangular pedestal in the center. About a meter deep, on the pavement of the Augustan period, there is the lower basin of the Republican period , built in an almost reticulated work, typical of the period between the end of the II and the beginning of the I century BC. The most accepted dating is the one connected to the restoration of the nearby temple of the Càstori by Lucio Cecilio Metello Dalmatico in 117 BC. Some restorations can be seen later, probably from the beginning of the imperial phase, in different tuff, datable to the restoration in the Tiberian era of the temple.

In the basin the statues of the Dioscuri pieces were found, originally placed, almost certainly, on the central pedestal and today preserved in the Antiquarium Forense. They depicted the Dioscuri in the act of watering their horses at the source, as in their legendary appearance in the Forum before the victorious battle of Lake Regillo.

These are works in archaic style, typical of the late Hellenistic period at the end of the 2nd century BC They were probably damaged in the fire of 12 BC, as shown by the restorations in different marble ( Carrara marble instead of Pentelic marble ) and traces of fire.

The relief that is seen today in the basin is a copy (the original is in the Antiquarium) of a Trajanic relief with the Dioscuri (Castor and Polux), their parents Jupiter and Leda and Giuturna.

The marble well in front of the shrine has a double inscription with the name of Marco Barbazio Pollione, a Curule aediles, who lived in the Cesarean-Augustan period. The shrine dates back to the period of Septimius Severus and presents a representation of Giuturna and Turno.

Source: Wikipedia (visit link)

Public or Private Land?: Public Public Land Fees?: €12 Private Land access?: Not listed

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Date Logged Log User Rating   08/28/2011 Ariberna visited it