Page - 19 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

2 FromNature to Topography 19 Ultimately only onemonumental decorative fountain fromnorthern Italy is better known in its design and urban context, if not in dating. The installation was documented in Rimini during excavations in the area of the cardomaximus leading to the city’s forum square.20 It consists of a raised three-quarter circular basin sevenmeterswidewith an– again elevated – apse (with thewater inlet), and, in front of the large basin andona lower level, a rectangular basinofonly threemeterswidthandthereforeofconsiderablysmallersize.With itsoverall size, the fountainwas aprominent later addition to theurban centre of Rimini and itsmonumental topography.Remains of amarble revetment (Cipollino) of the larger basin andofwhitemarble for the smaller one bearwitness to an– at least in the regional context – ambitious initiative. However, the setting of thismonumental fountain is in a strikingwayunusual, indeed almost counterproductive,considering itspotential tocontribute to thisareaof theurbanspaceborder- ing the forum: it was not placed as an ornamental installation at a prominent location for a wider area, e.g. the forum square proper, but set back considerably from the square into the cardo. There, the nymphaeum appears to be squeezed into the cardomaximus, and even to have largelyblocked it: thepassage leftbetween the installationand thewestwall of the forum basilicawasnowonly 1.7mwide. Reviewing the epigraphical and archaeological evidence, it is obvious that monumental fountainarchitecture like therichlydecoratednymphaeaknownasprominent ‘urbanfurniture’, e.g. from theRomanEast, were rather exceptional in the cities of Romannorthern Italy. They were never as omnipresent as e.g. in the cities of AsiaMinor and the Levant, and they never played a comparable role as decorative architecture enriching prominent spaces of local city- scapesaesthetically.21 Yet the existenceofmonumentaldecorative fountains inat least someof the cities of northern Italy, and their architectural designs, attest their appeal as an adorning ‘urbanmotif’ for the regional cities, too. Morecommon,and in thevarietyof installationsmorediverse,was, incontrast, the integra- tion ofwater as an accessory element ofmonumental architecture or built spaces bymeans of subordinate decorative fountains. Twodislocated inscriptions fromVeronapoint to a valorisa- tionandenrichment of adistinct urban spaceby establishing such fountains–as the result of a testamentary donation, i.e. a private initiative.22 The initiative included, among others, an unknownnumber of fountains (salientes23), that were possibly located in the surroundings of the city’s most dominant suburban building, the famous amphitheatre. Unfortunately, these decorative fountainsare attestedonlyby the inscriptions.Although they let usassume theam- phitheatreandits immediatesurroundings, i.e.aperiodically frequentedlocation, tobeupgrad- edasanurbanspacebydecorative settingsofwater, their exact location,designandespecially impact on this distinct (sub-)urban space remainunknown tous. Abetterunderstandingofwaterembedded inamonumentalarchitectural settingbymeans of decorative fountains can again be provided only by a limited number of archaeologically known contexts. Thus, in the Flavian-period Capitolium in Brescia, themajor local sanctuary towering above the forum of the city, the remains of a pedestal on the left side of the wide staircase leading from the already elevated forecourt to the temple proper and its main cella 20 Ortalli 2011, 139f. figs. 2. 7. 11. 21 Onmonumental fountains in the cities of the Roman East, see e.g. Richard 2012. The reasons for the only limited impactof this typeofurbanmonumental architecturenotonly innorthern Italy,but in thewesternprovin- ces ingeneral (with theexceptionofnorthAfrica)aredifficult toassess.Probablydecisive factorsmighthavebeen a differently rooted elite culture of urban engagement, aiming also at contributing to the splendour of a city, as well as thewell-documented rivalry among cities that encouraged also the striving for an aesthetic enhancement of local cityscapes. 22 CILV, 3222; Ricci 1893, 12no. 26;Alföldy 1985, 217; Letzner 1990, 78. 23 On the Latin term salientes, defining a category of decorative fountains embedded in architectural contexts, seeLetzner 1990, 75‒82.