Fountain of Neptune

When in 1559 Cosimo I de’ Medici organized a contest to design the first public fountain in Florence, he hoped to give the city splendor with a new David, hopefully this time without republican messages. Unfortunately, it didn’t quite go as planned.

An artist named Ammannati won the contest with the design for a fountain featuring a powerful Neptune surrounded by a group of sculptures, representing the city’s recent victories over the maritime territories of Pisa and Livorno which now fell under Florence’s rule.

The fountain was inaugurated in 1565, the wedding day between Francesco I and Giovanna d’Austria. Expectations were high, rumors spoke of an enormous block of the most immaculate Carrara marble.

Disappointment, however was even higher, when the eager Florentines saw the uncovered artwork. They responded with their renowned irony…

“Ammannato, Ammannato,quantomarmot’haisciupato!!” (Ammannato, Ammannato, how much marble have you ruined!) was the opening song.

The sad prologue only brought worse luck, followed by a series of unfortunate events.
Initially it was used merely as a place for washing, then in 1580 it was vandalized for the first time. In 1592 a railing was erected around the fountain to protect it. But much more than a railing was required to prevent further unfortunate events.

In 1830, during Carnevale (Mardi Gras) a group of street musicians performing around the fountain decided to “lighten it up” and masked a statue by Giambologna. Unfortunately, this statue was never found again and had to be replaced by a copy.

In 1848 the city was bombed by the Bourbons and it goes without saying that our fountain was damaged once again.

The curse persisted even into the new century, on August 4, 2005 a vandal climbed on the statue, clinging to one of Neptune’s hands, when the hand broke off, and both it, and the vandal plunged into the fountain.

Think that since 1720 there is a plaque on the Palazzo Vecchiothat prohibits “dirtying the fountain in any way, washing ink wells or doing laundry in the fountain, or throwing in pieces of wood or other junk.” Maybe they were too optimistic.

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