Fontana di Ponte Sisto, Rome

The Fontana di Ponte Sisto is the monumental fountain rising in Piazza Trilussa, beside the Trastevere end of Ponte Sisto. Notice the carved animal faces, the deep arching recess, and the basins gathered beneath it. Completed in 1613, it was made to celebrate a new water supply reaching this part of Rome.

Pope Paul the Fifth’s administration brought water from the Acqua Paola across the river by pipes carried over Ponte Sisto. Giovanni Vasanzio created the work with Giovanni Fontana responsible for its water system. The dragons at the column bases carry the Borghese family emblem, while lion masks once added their own streams to the basin.

The upper bowl and lion mouths no longer run, and the dragon jets have dwindled to slender flows. This fountain began across the river, attached to the Collegio Ecclesiastico, then vanished during embankment works. In 1898, architect Angelo Vescovali rebuilt it here from a little more than half of its surviving original material. What you see is a rescued civic monument, remade as the bridge’s theatrical threshold.