Detail InformationEdit
The Fontane delle Tartarughe (The Turtle Fountain) is a fountain of the late Italian Renaissance, located in the Piazza Mattei, in the Sant’Angelo district of Rome, Italy. It was built between 1580 and 1588 by the architect Giacomo della Porta and the sculptor Taddeo Landini. The bronzes turtles around the upper basin, usually attributed either to Gian Lorenzo Bernini or Andrea Sacchi, were added in either 1658 and 1659, when the fountain was restored.
The fountain was designed by the architect Giacomo della Porta (1533-1602) in 1581. He used a design which he repeated in several fountains, which he adapted from earlier ancient Roman fountains. It had a single vasque, or bowl, on a pedestal, from which water spouted upwards and then poured down into polygonal basin.What made the fountain in Piazza Mattei different was the decoration; Mattei commissioned the young sculptor Taddeo Landini, (1550-1596) for his First sculptural commission in Rome, to create statues of four ephebes, or young adolescent men, and eight dolphins.
They were originally intended to be of marble but were finally made of bronze, which was more expensive. The Ephebes, in the mannerist Style, may have been inspired by eight bronze figures made in 1563-1565 by Bartolomeo Ammannati for the Fountain Of Neptune, or du Biancone, in Florence.The fountain is composed of square basin with a circular vasque of African marble mounted on a pedestal in the center.
Around the edge of the vasque are the four heads of putti which spout water into the basin below. There are four marble conch shells surrounding the base of the fountain. The four bronze ephebes are placed around the vasque of fountain, each resting one foot on the head of a bronze dolphin, reachng down to hold the tail of the dolphin, and raising up one hand toward the edge of the vasque. Water pours out of the mouths of the dolphins into the conch shells, then into the basin below.
The fountain, which then was called simply the Fontana delli Mattei or Fons Mattheiorum, was a popular and critical success. In 1588, the writer Girolamo Ferrucci called it “the most beautiful and perfect fountain in Rome.” The fountain was the subject of engravings and drawings by such artists as Giovanni Battista Falda, which spread its fame. In 1642, the artist and critic Giovannin Baglione also praised the fountain’s beauty, calling it a tribute to the virtue of its patron.In the seventeenth century the fountain was often misattributed to either Raphael or to Michelangelo, which added to its popularity and reputation.
The original fountain design called for four bronze dolphins on the upper vasque, supported by the upraised hands of the four young men. With the removal of the four dolphins because of the low water pressure, the upraised hands of the statues seemed to have no purpose.Probably to correct this problem and balance the composition, the four turtles around the edge of the vasque were added during a restoration of the fountain between 1658 and 1659 ordered by Pope Alexander VII. They are usually attributed either to Gian Lorenzo Bernini or Andrea Sacchi. The date of the restoration is recorded on four scrolls of marble around the fountain.The turtles are very realistic; If their creator was Bernini, he may have used casts of a Real turtle, as he did with sculptures he made of other living creatures.
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