Contemporary Garden Decoration: Garden Fountains and their Beginnings
Contemporary Garden Decoration: Garden Fountains and their Beginnings A fountain, an amazing piece of engineering, not only supplies drinking water as it pours into a basin, it can also propel water high into the air for an extraordinary effect.The central purpose of a fountain was originally strictly functional. Inhabitants of cities, townships and small towns used them as a source of drinking water and a place to wash up, which meant that fountains had to be linked to nearby aqueduct or spring. Up until the nineteenth, fountains had to be higher and closer to a water supply, such as aqueducts and reservoirs, in order to take advantage of gravity which fed the fountains. Fountains were not only utilized as a water source for drinking water, but also to decorate homes and celebrate the artist who created it. Animals or heroes made of bronze or stone masks were often times used by Romans to decorate their fountains. Throughout the Middle Ages, Muslim and Moorish garden planners incorporated fountains to create mini depictions of the gardens of paradise. To demonstrate his dominance over nature, French King Louis XIV included fountains in the Garden of Versailles. The Romans of the 17th and 18th centuries manufactured baroque decorative fountains to exalt the Popes who commissioned them as well as to mark the spot where the restored Roman aqueducts entered the city.
Urban fountains made at the end of the nineteenth functioned only as decorative and celebratory adornments since indoor plumbing provided the necessary drinking water. The creation of unique water effects and the recycling of water were 2 things made possible by swapping gravity with mechanical pumps.
Nowadays, fountains decorate public areas and are used to honor individuals or events and fill recreational and entertainment needs.
The Distribution of Outdoor Garden Fountain Engineering Knowledge in Europe
The Distribution of Outdoor Garden Fountain Engineering Knowledge in Europe The published documents and illustrated books of the day contributed to the advancements of scientific innovation, and were the primary means of dissiminating useful hydraulic facts and water feature ideas throughout Europe. In the late 1500's, a French water fountain developer (whose name has been lost) was the internationally renowned hydraulics pioneer. By developing landscapes and grottoes with integrated and ingenious water attributes, he started off his career in Italy by earning imperial commissions in Brussels, London and Germany. “The Principles of Moving Forces”, a publication which became the fundamental book on hydraulic technology and engineering, was composed by him toward the end of his lifetime in France. Explaining modern hydraulic systems, the book also modified critical hydraulic advancements of classical antiquity. As a mechanized method to move water, Archimedes invented the water screw, fundamental among crucial hydraulic discoveries. Natural light warmed the water in two hidden vessels adjoining to the decorative fountain were displayed in an illustration.