Where did Large Outdoor Fountains Originate from?
Where did Large Outdoor Fountains Originate from? A fountain, an amazing piece of engineering, not only supplies drinking water as it pours into a basin, it can also launch water high into the air for an extraordinary effect.From the onset, outdoor fountains were soley there to serve as functional elements.
Water fountains were connected to a spring or aqueduct to supply potable water as well as bathing water for cities, townships and villages. Until the late nineteenth, century most water fountains functioned using the force of gravity to allow water to flow or jet into the air, therefore, they needed a source of water such as a reservoir or aqueduct located higher than the fountain. Serving as an element of decoration and celebration, fountains also provided clean, fresh drinking water. Bronze or stone masks of wildlife and heroes were frequently seen on Roman fountains. To replicate the gardens of paradise, Muslim and Moorish garden planners of the Middle Ages added fountains to their designs. To show his prominence over nature, French King Louis XIV included fountains in the Garden of Versailles. The Romans of the 17th and 18th centuries created baroque decorative fountains to glorify the Popes who commissioned them as well as to mark the location where the restored Roman aqueducts entered the city.
Indoor plumbing became the main source of water by the end of the 19th century thereby restricting urban fountains to mere decorative elements. Fountains using mechanical pumps instead of gravity helped fountains to provide recycled water into living spaces as well as create special water effects.
Embellishing city parks, honoring people or events and entertaining, are some of the uses of modern-day fountains.
Acqua Vergine: The Remedy to Rome's Water Troubles
Acqua Vergine: The Remedy to Rome's Water Troubles With the development of the first elevated aqueduct in Rome, the Aqua Anio Vetus in 273 BC, people who lived on the city’s hills no longer had to depend exclusively on naturally-occurring spring water for their needs. Over this time period, there were only two other systems capable of providing water to high areas, subterranean wells and cisterns, which amassed rainwater.
In the very early sixteenth century, the city began to utilize the water that flowed below ground through Acqua Vergine to deliver water to Pincian Hill. Pozzi, or manholes, were made at standard intervals along the aqueduct’s channel. Though they were primarily manufactured to make it possible to support the aqueduct, Cardinal Marcello Crescenzi started out using the manholes to gather water from the channel, commencing when he purchased the property in 1543. He didn’t get adequate water from the cistern that he had constructed on his residential property to collect rainwater. To provide himself with a much more practical means to obtain water, he had one of the manholes opened, providing him access to the aqueduct below his property.