Cannonball Fountain
Rome Italy
2016

Located on Viale della Trinità dei Monti, in front of the French Academy of Villa Medici, in one of the most fascinating places in Rome from which you can enjoy one of the most evocative views of the city, there is this octagonal-based fountain, Built at the end of the sixteenth century (1589) by Annibale Lippi on behalf of Cardinal Ferdinando de' Medici, owner of the villa.

It is a fountain with a fairly simple design and dimensions, but the simplicity of the project, along with the panoramic position in which it is located, make it noteworthy.

It is an octagonal large pool at street level, at the center of which a pedestal supports a circular basin of red granite, in the center of which the water gushes out from a marble sphere.

On the history of the fountain, better known as the 'Cannonball Fountain', there are a couple of unusual legends both involving queen Christina of Sweden.

According to tradition, the sphere would be a cannonball that the former Queen Christina of Sweden in 1656, during a visit to Castel Sant'Angelo, would have fired at the door of Villa Medici.

It is said that one day, having an appointment at Villa Medici with the French painter Charles Errand, realizing that she would never have arrived in time, she decided to knock on the door in a very particular way: three cannon shots directed towards the door of Villa Medici. Two balls failed, but the third managed to cover the enormous distance between the castle and the Academy, managing to reach the bronze door.

Even today, the imprint of the cannonball, a dent, a depression at a certain height of the door of the Villa Medici.is visible.

The cannonball would have been collected and inserted, in memory of the fact, at the top of the fountain.

Certainly it deserves a look, especially for the extraordinary view of Rome.