Fontana Dei Tritone - Roma, Italy - Epic Beings and Creatures on Waymarking.com

The Triton Fountain (Fontana dei Tritone) is a seventeenth century fountain in Rome, by the well-known Baroque sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini. Commissioned by his patron, Pope Urban VIII, the fountain is located in the Piazza Barberini, near the entrance to the Palazzo Barberini (which now houses the Galleria Nazionale d'Arte Antica) that Bernini helped to design and construct for the Barberini, Urban's family.

The fountain was executed in travertine in 1642–43. At its centre rises an larger than lifesize muscular Triton, a minor sea god of ancient Greco-Roman legend, depicted as a merman kneeling on the sum of four dolphin tailfins. His head is thrown back and his arms raise a conch to his lips; from it a jet of water spurts, formerly rising dramatically higher than it does today. The fountain has a base of four dolphins[2] that entwine the papal tiara with crossed keys and the heraldic Barberini bees in their scaly tails.[3]

The Tritone, the first of Bernini's free-standing urban fountains, was erected to provide water from the Acqua Felice aqueduct which Urban had restored, in a dramatic celebration. It was Bernini's last major commission from his great patron who died in 1644. At the Triton Fountain, Urban and Bernini brought the idea of a sculptural fountain, familiar from villa gardens, decisively to a public urban setting for the first time; previous public fountains in the city of Rome had been passive basins for the reception of public water.

Bernini has represented the triton to illustrate the triumphant passage from Ovid's Metamorphoses book I, evoking godlike control over the waters and describing the draining away of the Universal Deluge. The passage that Urban set Bernini to illustrate, was well-known to all literate Roman contemporaries

Two finished terracotta bozzetti at the Detroit Institute of Arts,[4] securely attributed to Bernini, reflect his exploration of the fountain's themes of the intertwined upended dolphins and the muscular, scaly-tailed Triton.

The Triton Fountain is one of those evoked in Ottorino Respighi's Fontane di Roma. The legend applied to Trevi Fountain has been extended to this: that any visitor who throws a coin into the water (while facing away from the fountain) will have guaranteed their return to Rome.

From Wikipedia
(visit link)
(visit link)

Time Period: Modern Approximate Date of Epic Period: 17th century Epic Type: Mythical Exhibit Type: Figure, Statue, 3D Art

Visit Instructions:
To post a log for this waymark, take a picture of the location and tell at least 'a little' bit about your encounter, impression or experience.

Recent Visits/Logs:

Date Logged Log   02/12/2023 gemeloj visited it 04/27/2022 Theodd1 visited it 08/24/2020 Ariberna visited it 10/15/2019 Cyrano-Bella visited it 03/25/2018 Lillemaider&Dr.Pallo visited it 08/10/2017 Chrysafenios visited it 06/21/2017 LeBourguignon visited it 04/17/2015 Rymyhomie visited it 09/26/2014 Croupsie Croupso visited it 05/12/2014 juhanili visited it 09/18/2013 Kulpakko visited it 08/07/2005 Titahi & M@2t visited it

View all visits/logs