By Giulio D'Ercole
Rome's is made out of thousands amazing details.
Most tourists, and even lots of Romans lose themselves admiring the big, monumental and iconic beauties of the Eternal City, and so they go from place to place to visit St. Peter's Church, the Trevi Fountain, the Spanish Steps, the Pantheon, Piazza Navona and, obviously, last but not least at all, the Colosseum.
Though Rome is also made by thousands details, especially considering that great part of its art comes from Renaissance and Baroque times. So, as you walk through the convoluted labyrinth of Roman streets to go from pa famous square to an even more iconic building, you should focus your attention, especially if you are a photographer, on small or relatively small details, and you will find outstanding beauty also in those. That is even more true, when you think that these "small things" in reality often hide great concepts, ideas and even historical meanings.
The Neptune's Fountain, a beauty with a long and interesting past.
La Fontana del Nettuno (The Neptune's fountain), one of the three fountains in Piazza Navona, was designed by Giacomo Della Porta, a very famous Italian artist that worked before Bernini.
The fountain is located at the northern end of Piazza Navona in Rome, but it is interesting to note that when it was built, between 1575 and 1576, it was actually known as the Calderai fountain. This name was due to the proximity of the fountain with the ancient alley of the Calderai (or Calderari), a narrow street occupied by the workshops of blacksmiths and sellers of pans, pots and metal dishes in general.
Bernini's art revolutionized the art of sculpting and influenced the next generations
So, why this fountain is now called the Neptune's Fountain? Because, as a matter of fact, the statue in the middle, representing The God of the seas in the act of killing a giant octopus, was made not by Della Porta, but by Antonio Della Bitta in 1878. The shape, the dynamism, the turning, revolving movement of Neptune, though, are clearly influenced by Bernini's art and it rhymes perfectly with the four statues of the main fountain standing in the middle of the square: Bernini's Fountain of the Four Rivers-
