Page - 39 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

3 Fountains and theAncient City 39 Fig. 8:Sabratha, so-called ‘Fountain of Flavius Tullus’ on theesplanade in front of the Antonine temple, theaccess stairs of whichare visible on the right. thepipeswere laidout:48 literarysourcesclearlyshowthatperceptionsweredifferentaccording to context.49 Finally,unlike forums,marketsor theatres,whichare ‘closed’monuments thatpresent their decoration only when one enters their interior space, fountains are among the buildings that display their figurativeornamentationalong thestreets, also includingarches, tetrapylons,and gates.However, twospecific featuresdistinguishthemfromthelatter types.First,asmentioned, fountainswereplacedalongorat the intersectionsof roadsandnotacross them.Their situation generally left a sufficient distance to highlight their façade and the sculpted decoration that wasused.50 The fountains ofAlthiburos andVolubilis, but also of theHerculesnymphaeumof LepcisMagna,with their right-angledbasins that occupiedbothsidesof the intersectionwhere theywere located, exemplify thebuildings’ integration into theurban landscape.A study from this perspective has been carried out on African triumphal arches, in which the author was interested in themechanics of vision, theobject and its connectionwith space, trying todeter- mine if theyrepresentedafocalpointof theurbanlandscape.51Thesecondpoint is thedynamic aspect that characterizes fountains. Cecelia FeldmanWeiss adopted a phenomenological ap- proach to theurban landscape to investigate theNymphaeumTraianiatEphesus.52Water flow- ing through the nymphaeum and into the city, from the centralmouth to the basin, from the overflow over the parapet to the sewer, produced visual, auditory, and sensory effects. These effects, the result of a human creation, were sought and accentuated by the location of the fountain, clearly visible along the Curetes Street, highlighted by the interruption of the colon- nadeat itsheight.Awhole ‘archaeologyof thesenses’ is thusdevelopingaround fountainsand water gamesmoregenerally, asDylanRogershas shown,particularly from literary sources.53 48 Richard 2012, 161 considers thatmost of themonumental fountains had a reduced flow and that the noise of the eddies shouldnot be exaggerated. Thediscussion is extended inRichard 2016. 49 SeeRogers 2018, 81–85 for anoverviewof sources evoking thenoise ofwater games.Aldrete 2014, 50 restores toRomea soundenvironmentmarkedby themurmurof thewater from the fountains. 50 Lamare 2019, 145–170. 51 Youcef Chennaoui presented his study entitled ‘Les arcs de triomphe en Algérie antique: histoire, forme et structures’during theconference ‘L’AfricaRomanaXIX’ (Sassari, 16–19. 12. 2010).Thepaperhasnotbeenpublished in the conferenceproceedings. 52 FeldmanWeiss 2010, 66–69. 53 Rogers 2018, 81–85andmethodological overview4–10. See alsoDylanRogers, this volume.