brings back the memory of a beautiful pagan youth who lived more
than eighteen hundred years ago, and of another story of Old Nile,
more pitiful, if less important, than the story of Moses. This is
the obelisk which the Emperor Hadrian and his Empress Sabina raised
to the memory of their beloved Antinous--the most beautiful youth
the world has record of--who drowned himself in the Egyptian river,
under the impression that his voluntary death would avert calamity
from his benefactor the Emperor. After all these eighteen hundred
years it is still possible to feel the passion of Hadrian’s grief.
His biographer calls it “feminine”! But the gifted Emperor, lover
of all things beautiful in art and nature, and a student of men and
character, understood the value of his treasure and knew full well
the irreparableness of his loss. He brought back to Rome all that
was left of that beauty--an urnful of ashes--and placed it in the
Emperor’s own tomb, now called the Castle of St. Angelo; and on the
_spina_ of the circus by the tomb, Hadrian and Sabina erected this
obelisk whose hieroglyphics, only quite recently deciphered, relate the
deification of their favorite and give the information concerning his
place of burial. The obelisk must have been removed by a later Emperor,
probably Heliogabalus, for it was found in 1570, near Santa Croce in
Gerusalemme, in the gardens of the Varian family, to which family that
Emperor belonged. Bernini, in the century following its discovery,
moved it to the Barberini Palace, which he was erecting and beautifying
for the Barberini Pope, Urban VIII. Later on, a Princess Barberini
presented it to Pope Pius VI, who set it up in the Giardino della Pigna
in the Vatican, that temporary resting-place for so many treasures, and
finally, in 1822, Pius VII and Valadier erected it where it now stands
in full view of Hadrian’s Tomb, they being quite unconscious, however,
that there was any connection between it and that great mausoleum.
Not far from the fountain of Moses stand two umbrella-pines, their
great boles shooting high up through all the foliage about. A hundred
years ago they marked the exit into a side lane from the vineyard where
they had been planted, for until that time these Gardens of the Pincio
had been for centuries the vineyard belonging to the Augustinian monks
of Santa Maria del Popolo, the same order from which, about 1494, young
Cardinal Farnese bought the property by the Tiber, on which he built
the Farnese Palace.
The Church of Santa Maria del Popolo had been built by the Roman
people in the twelfth century, and from that time on it and the
Augustinian convent beside it became the first hospice and sanctuary
to the pilgrims from beyond the Alps. This was because the church
and convent stand close to the Porta del Popolo, the gateway to the
Flaminian Road, which is the great highway leading to the north.
With these Augustinian monks stayed young Martin Luther when business
connected with that order had brought him to Rome. The German
seminarist who threads his way to-day among the Pincian alleys must
often cross those vanished paths in the vineyard once trodden by the
sandalled feet of his great fellow countryman, since Luther’s northern
feeling for nature would surely have carried him at dawn or sunset
to the convent’s vineyard. There the voices of the birds and the
well-trained vines could soothe a spirit dazed and disquieted by the
splendors and vices of Rome. The history of the German Reformation may
well have had its earliest beginnings in the thoughts which thronged
the mind of that young monk, as he leaned upon the vineyard wall and
gazed with eyes that saw and saw not at the papal city, where old
St. Peter’s--the church in which Charlemagne had been crowned--was
being made over by Bramante into its present form; and beside it the
huge pile of the Vatican housed the fighting Pope, Julius II, and a
hierarchy of utter worldliness.
The monks retained possession of their Pincian vineyard during the
three following centuries, or until 1809, at which time Napoleon
annexed the Papal States to his Empire, banished the recalcitrant Pope,
Pius VII, and set about making Rome over to suit himself. He found
the architect who had worked for Pius VI and Pius VII equally ready
to serve him, and it was to this architect, Giuseppe Valadier, that
Napoleon intrusted the conversion of the old convent vineyard into the
Pincian Gardens of the present day. The work was not begun until 1812,
and before it was finished Pius VII was back in Rome, and Napoleon was
eating out his heart in St. Helena. In that long dying, when this last
of the world’s great conquerors had time to remember even all that he
himself had done, Napoleon must have often thought of Rome. The old
mother who had always believed in him, yet never looked up to him,
still lived there in her sombre palace under the shadow of the Austrian
Legation and the Austrian hate. His favorite sister, Pauline, was a
princess of one of the greatest of the Roman families; and the little
son, who was to grow up as the Austrian Duke of Reichstadt, was still,
to his father, the King of Rome. Did he ever think of the instructions
he had given to Valadier about a public garden for the Romans? There
was time to think of everything as the seasons came and went and the
remote seas washed the crags beneath his feet, while his English
jailers watched him from a distance with hard, uncomprehending eyes.
It is something of a shock to find Napoleon’s bust in that company of
great Italians which Mazzini placed here. In these Pincian Gardens,
as elsewhere in the world, he surely belongs in a niche by himself!
However, the Roman episode was of small importance in his life, and
he would not have grudged the honorable position to Valadier, whose
bust stands alone facing the principal promenade of the Pincian. That
architect lived to welcome back the exiled Pius VII and to finish for
him the gardens begun by order of Napoleon.
One explanation of Rome’s charm may be found in her power of
suggestion. Although the things to be seen in the Eternal City are of
transcendent interest, the things which are only apprehended have a
still stronger hold upon the imagination. The actual loveliness of the
Pincian Gardens is forgotten as the archæologists build up from buried
marbles and scattered inscriptions the life lived here in centuries
gone by. Where now is Valadier’s casino there stood in the second
century of our era a great Roman dwelling, the home of a patrician
family, Christian in faith, its members holding from generation to
generation high offices of state and called by historians “the noblest
of the noble.” The grounds about this house of the Acilii included not
only the present public gardens but also the precincts of the Villa
Medici, the garden and convent of the Sacred Heart, and a part of the
Villa Borghese. It would be impossible to find nowadays in any land
the exact counterpart of this Roman dwelling. Its comfort, splendor
and universal perfection of detail could not be surpassed, perhaps not
equalled. Its artificially heated bathrooms, the cool, dark recesses
of the wine-cellars, the courts and offices and state apartments, the
devices for garden and foundation building, everything which made
up this perfect specimen of the highest domestic civilization the
world has known, has been discovered on the Pincian Hill. The great
buttresses which this private family built to sustain the northwestern
boundaries of their terraced garden still support the public gardens
of to-day, and were incorporated by the Emperor Aurelian into the
great wall with which he surrounded the city. Surely no stories of
the Pincian can ever give so good an idea of the power, solidity, and
grandeur of Rome as do these archæological discoveries, which show
in fullest detail the domestic life of the Roman patrician under the
Antonines. Of all this the northwestern buttresses of the Pincian Hill
and the immortality of Nature alone remain.
Napoleon was only following in the footsteps of another Emperor,
when he created these gardens; for the Emperor Aurelian made the
grounds--which had been the estate of the Acilii--into a public park.
So whether owned by private individuals or by Emperor, church, or
municipality, the Pincian has always been known as the Hill of Gardens;
and the water which now feeds its public fountains is once more the
Acqua Marcia--the same water which supplied the fountains, baths, and
fish-ponds of the great Antonine villa.
FONTANA PAOLA
[Illustration]
FONTANA PAOLA
Throughout Roman history the Janiculum has suffered many alternations
of peace idyllic and of sanguinary strife, for it is a natural garden,
and it is also the key to Rome. Whoever can hold the terraces of San
Pietro in Montorio and the heights to the north and south has the
city at his mercy. At the present day the Villa Pamphili-Doria and
the Villa Garibaldi crown its summit, and stretch downward toward
the west, and its southeastern slope, leading toward the Tiber, once
contained the gardens of Julius Cæsar--those gardens where he received
Cleopatra and which he left by his will to the Roman people. One of the
earliest chapters in Roman history tells how Lars Porsena came over
the Janiculum to reinstate the Tarquins, and one of the latest recounts
the struggle carried on across its heights and terraces in Garibaldi’s
defense of the Mazzinian Roman Republic. Like the gardens of Ischia and
the vineyards on Vesuvius, which are forever threatened by earthquake
or eruption, the Janiculum villas will have, so long as war lasts, a
precarious existence; but with villas, gardens, and vineyards, so great
is the fertility of the soil and so enchanting the prospect, while the
world endures men will take the risk.
The water for this part of the city was brought to Rome by the Emperors
Augustus and Trajan. Trajan built the aqueduct bearing his name;
and this aqueduct, like that of the Virgo, has, in spite of many
vicissitudes continued to supply Rome with a varying quantity of water
from that time until the present day. The Emperor brought the water
thirty-five miles from Lake Bracciano to the Janiculum. It was almost
the last water brought to Rome and entered the city at the level of
two hundred and three feet above the sea. The first water (the Appian)
had entered Rome fifty feet under ground. Trajan used the water from
the springs about Lake Bracciano, not from the lake itself, because
the spring-water was much purer and the ancient Romans were fastidious
in the water they used. Alsietina water, for instance, brought to Rome
by Augustus, was considered fit only for baths and the _naumachiæ_;
and Frontinus says that, as a matter of fact, the water was intended
for that purpose only and for the irrigation of the gardens across
the Tiber. Christian Rome was far from being so particular, and its
inhabitants drank Tiber water as late as Michelangelo’s time. During
the “Golden days of the Renaissance in Rome” Virgo water, which was to
be had intermittently from the Trevi fountain, and a remnant of this
Acqua Traiana still flowing in the fountain of Innocent VIII were the
only pure waters. Meantime many Romans of that period preferred the
Tiber water; and Petrarch coming to Rome gave special instructions
to a friend to have a quantity of Tiber water which had stood for a
day or two, to settle, ready for his use. Paul III took with him, on
his journey to Nice to meet the Emperor Charles V and King Francis
I of France, a supply of Tiber water, so that he might not miss his
customary beverage! When, therefore, Pope Paul V bethought him of
reconstructing the Trajan Aqueduct he had nothing to hinder him from
collecting the water from every available source. He used Trajan water
from the springs, water from Lake Bracciano, and water from Lake
Alsietina as well. By this means the united water now called the Acqua
Paola, although not so pure as the former Acqua Traiana, is yet good
enough, and it forms a supply of magnificent quantity and force. Paul
V’s intention was to surpass the Acqua Felice, brought to Rome some
twenty years previously by Sixtus V. No one could forget Sixtus V and
the Acqua Felice. Was not the water always before men’s eyes as it
gushed out of the great fountain of Moses on the side of the Viminal
Hill; and did not every Roman know that Cavaliere Domenico Fontana had
brought it there by order of Sixtus V? The Borghese pontiff determined
to erect another fountain, across the Tiber, on the Janiculum, which
was a still more commanding position, and to build another aqueduct
for Rome, so that there should be an Acqua Paola as well as an Acqua
Felice, and men should remember Paul V even as they remembered Sixtus V.
Domenico Fontana had just died in Naples, rich and honored by the
Neapolitans, but there were others at hand of that renowned family of
architects. Fontana’s elder brother Giovanni was still alive, and had
great skill in hydraulics; and Carlo Maderno, his nephew, was also
to be had. So in 1611 Paul V employed these two to build his great
fountain on the Janiculum. This fountain is made of travertine, adorned
with six Ionic columns of red granite taken from the Temple of Minerva
in the Forum Transitorium. Other portions of the same beautiful ruin
were sawed into slabs and used in the decoration of the fountain.
The design is that of a church façade in the style of the florid and
debased Renaissance. It consists of five arches, three colossal ones in
the middle, directly under the great inscription which they support,
and on each side smaller arches. The three centre cascades fall into
a huge semicircular basin, which is sunk into the ground, while the
arches on the side have small individual basins in which to receive the
water. The inscription, which is a magnificent example of Renaissance
caligraphy, gives the history of the Paola Aqueduct and the pontifical
dates. A smaller inscription describes the final completion of the
fountain under Alexander VIII.
PAVLVS · QVINTVS · PONTIFEX · MAXIMVS
AQVAM · IN · AGRO · BRACCIANENSI
SALVBERRIMIS · E · FONTIBVS · COLLECTAM
VETERIBVS · AQVAE · ALSIETINAE · DVCTIBVS · RESTITVTIS
NOVISQVE · ADDITIS
XXXV · AB · MILLIARIO · DVXIT
ANNO · DOMINI · MDCXII · PONTIFICATVS · SVI · SEPTIMO
ALEXANDER · VIII · OTTHOBONVS · VENETVS · P · M
PAVLI · V · P · PROVIDENTISSIMI · PONT · BENEFICIVM
TVTATVS
REPVRGATO · SPECV · NOVISQVE · FONTIBVS · INDVCTIS
RIVOS · SVIS · QVEMQVE · LABRIS · OLIM · ANGVSTE
CONTENTOS
VNICO · EODEMQVE · PERAMPIO · LACV · EXCITATO · RECEPIT
AREAM · ADVERSVS · LABEM · MONTIS · SVBSTRVXIT
ET · LAPIDEO · MARGINE · TERMINAVIT · ORNAVITQVE
ANNO · SALVTIS · MDCLXXXX · PONTIFICATVS · SVI
SECVND...
_This water, drawn from the purest of springs, in the neighborhood of
Bracciano, was conducted by Pope Paul the fifth, thirty-five miles from
its source, over ancient channels of the Alsietine aqueduct, which he
restored, and new ones, which he added._
_In the year of the Lord 1612, and of Paul’s Pontificate the seventh._
_Pope Alexander the eighth, Ottoboni, of Venice, in protection of
the beneficent work of that most far-sighted pontiff, Paul the
fifth, recleaned the channel, admitted water from new sources, and
constructed a single capacious reservoir for the common reception of
the several streams which had formerly been strictly confined each to
its own channel. To prevent the wearing away of the hill, he paved the
surrounding area, surrounding and beautifying it with a marble coping.
In the year of Salvation 1690, and of Alexander’s pontificate the
second._
* * * * *
The Borghese griffins and eagles compose the decoration of the mostra,
and the whole structure is surmounted by the papal insignia and the
arms of Paul V, the escutcheon being guarded by two angels.
In Maggi’s book on the fountains of Rome, printed in 1618, there
is an engraving of this fountain. It is represented as having four
griffins and two eagles spouting water into the basins as do the lions
in Sixtus V’s Fountain of the Moses. This device is not shown in
Falda’s engraving a generation later, nor does Piranesi show it. It
is probable that this feature existed only on paper in the original
design for the fountain. Under the two side niches of the actual
fountain the water spouts from lions’ mouths. From the three centre
niches it simply pours in three cascades, equal in size, and of really
magnificent force and volume. The effect of this water in full sunshine
is dazzling in the extreme, and both in sight and sound the fountain
must have been as conspicuous as Paul V could have wished it to be.
Paul V never saw it completed, for he died in 1621, ten years after
the fountain was begun. It was finished by Alexander VIII in 1690,
eight pontificates later. It was, therefore, seventy-eight years in
building, whereas Domenico Fontana built and unveiled the Fountain
of the Moses for Sixtus V within that Pope’s own pontificate, which
lasted only five years! The Fontana Paola is--to translate sight into
sound--an echo of the Fountain of the Moses. It has the characteristics
of an echo--it is magnified and meaningless. Giovanni Fontana and
Maderno could not free themselves from the taste and traditions of the
greater and more forceful Domenico. They did not mar the effect of
their great fountain by an absurd colossus, like the Moses, but they
made a mistake of another kind; they left the central niche above the
cascade absolutely empty, yet failed to secure an adequate background
for the eye to rest upon, so that the structure, for all its size and
magnificence, gives a disagreeable sense of vacancy and incompleteness.
However, as one studies the Fontanone, as this fountain is commonly
called, it becomes apparent that its mostra must be regarded not as a
façade, nor as a screen, but as a great water-gate. It is a triumphal
arch through which the water of the Pauline Aqueduct makes its formal
entry on the Janiculum in the sight of all Rome. It is also built to
hold before the eyes of all Rome the inscription which sets forth
the history of Pope Paul V and the construction of the aqueduct. The
inscription is certainly the most successful part of the mostra. It is
adequately supported, its dimensions are noble, and the lettering is
remarkably beautiful. The entrance of the water, on the other hand,
is not sufficiently imposing. The three streams are not great enough
in themselves to justify their right to so pretentious a setting, and
they require a background which would augment their importance. Through
the huge arches, which were certainly never intended to hold statuary,
the eye should see the approach of the water either in a series of
cascades or in one broad flood like the serried ranks of a great army.
But to produce this effect it would be necessary for the channel of
the aqueduct to approach the fountain directly from the rear and to
have the castellum or receiving tank immediately behind the mostra.
It is noticeable that neither in this fountain nor in the other two
great fountains of Rome--the Moses and the Trevi--is this done. In all
three the castellum is at the side of the mostra, and the water falls
into the basins at a right angle to the direction in which it enters
the fountain from the castellum. This position of the castellum was
obligatory in the case of Trevi, as that fountain backs against the
Poli Palace, but when the Moses and Paola fountains were constructed
they stood free from all other buildings on open hillsides, and the
castellum in either instance could be located at will. In the Paola
fountain the castellum lies to the left of the mostra, as it faces the
city, and the aqueduct comes underground down the hill forming the
boundary between the gardens now belonging to the Villa Chiaraviglio,
which is a part of the American Academy, and a small villa owned by
the Torlonia family, so that the stream approaches the fountain
obliquely. The ground directly back of the Paola fountain is occupied
by a modern villa with a small garden, and the entrance to the house as
well as the trees in the garden are clearly seen through the arches of
the mostra, which thus has more or less the appearance from the front
of a huge screen before a shrine of no signification, while the view
of it in profile is too thin. The entire fountain seems to require
a solid background such as Giovanni Fontana gave to his truly noble
and beautiful fountain of the Ponte Sisto. There the immense niche is
placed against a massive wall, and the gloom of the vaulted space is
lighted by a gleaming cascade which issues not at the base of the niche
but high up in the very spring of the arch. This cascade falls into
a projecting vase, also near the roof, and thence descends in heavy
spray to the black pool beneath. On either side this pool jets of water
spouting from the Borghese griffins cross like flashing rapiers--a
natural enough fancy to an artist living in an age when the thrust and
parry of the rapier were known to all men. This most artistic of all
the Fontana fountains was also erected for Paul V. It used to stand on
the other side of the Tiber, opposite the Strada Giulia, but in recent
years, when the Tiber embankment was constructed, the fountain was
taken down and set up in its present position at the head of the Ponte
Sisto. If the waters of the Fontanone had received some such treatment
as this, Paul V’s greatest fountain might have indeed rivalled those of
ancient Rome.
Paul V (Borghese), surnamed by the friends of the Aldobrandini “the
Grand Ingrate,” succeeded to the papacy in 1605. His immediate
predecessor had been the Medici pontiff, Leo XI, but Leo died
twenty-six days after his election, so that Paul V’s real forerunner
was Clement VIII (Aldobrandini).
[Illustration: Mostra of the “Fontanone.”]