Fontana del Moro in Piazza Navona

Piazza Navona is a complex and harmonic composition of several architectural, urban and sculptural masterpieces. Counterbalancing the beauty of the Fountain of the Four Rivers in the centre of the square, stand two basins at both theends.

On the south side, the Fountana del Moro fed by the Acqua Virgo aqueduct, is the most eye-catching of the two, and once again Gian Lorenzo Bernini is involved in its realisation.
The project of the fountain was first assigned to another famous Renaissance artist, Giacomo della Porta, in 1575 by Pope Gregory XIII.

The project of Della Porta was realised using Carrara marble and pink marbles for the mixtilinear basin, and it was decorated with four tritons, originally intended to be placed in the fountain in Piazza del Popolo, but never used.
In 1655, Pope Innocenzo X Pamphilj decided to add a central sculptural element that was commissioned to Bernini and realised after his design by its disciple Giovanni Antonio Mari.

The central character (perhaps Neptune) resembles a Moor/African/Ethiopian according to the source; that’s why the name “Fonatan del Moro”. This human-fish being, standing on a shell, is strangling a dolphin spouting the water from its mouth.

Other changes in the fountain were accomplished, including the creation of a second bigger basin and the removal of the metallic fence.