The Trevi Fountain: A Short Guide

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Rome’s Trevi Fountain is the world’s most famous fountain, a Baroque work of art, and one of the Italian capital’s most recognisable attractions. Built in the mid-18th century on the site of an ancient fountain, the Trevi Fountain is still fed by a Renaissance aqueduct: the Acqua Vergine (Virgin Aqueduct).

The Virgin Aqueduct has nothing to do with Richard Branson’s business conglomerate. Rather it draws its name from the legendary Virgin Springs to the east of Rome. And the story of these springs and their discovery in antiquity lies at the source of the fascinating history of the Trevi Fountain.

Ancient Origins: The Aqua Virgo

The story begins in the first century BCE, when the emperor Augustus’ right-hand man was scouring the area looking for a spring to feed the city.

Since the late 4th century BCE, Rome had been inundated with water carried up to 91km from outside the city. In fact, our word aqueduct comes from two Latin words: aqua (water) and ductus (carried or led), the latter of which also gives the Italians their word for leader (duce). But Rome was quickly expanding. By the Age of Augustus, the city had around one million mouths to feed and water, and there were concerns the existing four aqueducts would not be enough.

And so Marcus Agrippa set about constructing three more aqueducts, the Aqua Julia, the Aqua Virgo, and the Aqua Augusta. The source for the Aqua Augusta, which fed Augustus’ naumachia (naval Colosseum), was up by Lake Braciano, to the north of Rome. The source for the Aqua Julia was down by Tusculum, near modern-day Frascati in the Alban Hills. And the source for the Aqua Virgo was the Virgin Springs to the east of Rome, before Tivoli.

The Virgin Springs

According to Frontinus, a first-century Roman engineer whose book De Aquaeductu gives us much of our information about Roman aqueducts, the Aqua Virgo was built in 19 BCE. It was named the Virgo (the Maiden) after a young girl who guided the Roman legionaries to a nearby spring while they were searching for a water source.

Surely enough, when the legionaries started digging, they found a freshwater source, which became the spring that fed the Aqua Virgo aqueduct. This scene is depicted on the top right-hand panel of the Trevi Fountain, which shows the moment the digging legionaries first uncover the Virgin Spring.

Cast your eyes over to the panel on the top left, and you’ll see Marcus Agrippa standing triumphant, decked out in military regalia, examining plans for the aqueduct’s construction. In fact, if you look closely enough, you can see the construction of the aqueduct’s first arches in the background—suggesting Agrippa’s approval at this point might be surplus to requirement!

If you recognise the name Marcus Agrippa, that might be because he was also the man who first built the Pantheon, and whose name is spelled out on the inscription above.

Agrippa’s Aqua Virgo aqueduct was a masterpiece of Roman engineering.

It fed Rome with more than 100,000m³ of fresh drinking water per day, which sounds like it may or may not be impressive until you put it into context. Consider that 1m³ is equal to 1,000 litres. That means that just the Aqua Virgo supplied the city with more than 100 million litres of fresh water (or 100 litres per person). And that’s just over a tenth of the eventual 992,000m³ that flowed into the city by the end of the first century CE!

The aqueduct fed most monuments in Rome’s Campus Martius, including the Baths of Agrippa, its terminus. Today, its restored conduits still feed Rome’s most famous fountains.

The Aqua Virgo supplies:

• The Spanish Steps’ Barcaccia fountain
• The Pantheon’s fountain
• Piazza del Popolo’s fountains
• Piazza Venezia’s fountains (beneath the Altar of the Fatherland)
• Piazza Navona’s Moor Fountain and Neptune Fountain
• The Turtle Fountain in Piazza Mattei, near the Jewish Ghetto

Who built the Trevi Fountain?

The Italian architect Nicola Salvi submitted the design for the Trevi Fountain. But he did not live to see the fountain’s completion, dying 11 years before its completion in 1762. Salvi’s architectural legacy is more modest than the likes of Bernini and Borromini. However, he is credited with designing the world’s most expensive chapel, the Chapel to Saint John the Baptist in Lisbon’s Igreja de São Rocque.

Why is it called the Trevi Fountain?

The Trevi Fountain stands where the Aqua Virgo aqueduct converged at the end of three roads. The Italian for three is tre while the word for roads is vie, which abbreviated becomes trevie or trevi. And so the literal meaning of Trevi Fountain is the Three Streets Fountain.

What does the Trevi Fountain symbolize?

‘The Taming of the Waters’ is the Trevi Fountain’s theme. The fountain’s centrepiece is the god Oceanus, who is shown standing on a chariot, pulled by sea horses as the water gushes below. On the left of Oceanus is the statue of Abundance and on the right is the personification of Health. Each holds its own respective symbols: Abundance holds fruit; Health holds a snake.

Why Abundance and Health? Because of the benefits water brings to Earth.

The Trevi Fountain is not the only place where a snake was used as a sign of healing. On Tiber Island, there is a temple devoted to Aesculapius, the Greek god of healing. In 293 B.C., when there was a plague in Rome, the island was seen as a place of protection from the plague. The symbol for Aesculapius is a snake, which is depicted on the temple.

As this project was commissioned by the Vatican, the Papal Coat of Arms is also included at the top of the fountain, surrounded by angels. The Trevi Fountain has recently been restored due to the contribution of the fashion house, Fendi, in 2013. (It has “been restored to its former splendour and cleaned illuminated with lights that enhance its beauty.”)

The Coin Toss legend

Today the Trevi Fountain is best known as where you toss a coin in the hope of returning to Rome, (or falling in love, as today’s Romans might say). You stand with your back to the fountain and using your right hand, throw a coin over your left shoulder. 

This practice became popular with the 1954 film Three Coins in the Fountain starring the all-star cast of… *Googles* … Clifton Web, Dorothy McGuire and Jean Peters. According to the legend, any visitor who throws one coin over their shoulder into the fountain will return to Rome in the future.

In truth, the idea of throwing money into fountains for luck predates this film by thousands of years. Humans have always assigned a divine aspect to springs and fountains and made offerings to them for reasons of health and welfare.

Suetonius tells us that each year people would throw coins into the Lacus Curtius fountain in the Roman Forum as thanks for the emperor Augustus’ wellbeing. Another of the forum’s fountains, the Lacus Iuturnae, was named after the water nymph Juturna, and frequented by the sick and elderly who believed in the water’s restorative qualities.

The Trevi Fountain in popular culture

The Trevi Fountain was the backdrop to one of Italian cinema’s most iconic scenes in Federico Fellini’s La Dolce Vita (1960). In the film, Sylvia, an American-Swedish actress played by Anita Ekberg, wades into the fountain’s waters after wandering around Rome late at night, having left her husband behind at a raucous party at the Baths of Caracalla. Following her into the fountain is the enamoured tabloid journalist Marcelo (played by Marcelo Mastroianni) who has been assigned to follow her during her time in Rome and who she teasingly pours water over, thereby ‘anointing’ him.

Fun fact: Fellini shot this scene in the winter – when the Trevi’s normally chilly water was barely above freezing. Marcelo Mastroianni was wary about wading into icy waters. So after downing a stiff drink of brandy, he demanded a pair of thigh-high rubber boots beneath his trousers before climbing in. Anita Ekberg, on the other hand, waded in clothed in nothing more than Scandinavian courage.

In an infinitely less iconic moment of cinematic history, Lizzie McGuire tossed a coin into the fountain to wish for luck in her future high school career in The Lizzie McGuire Movie (2003). So there’s also that…

Alexander Meddings

Alexander Meddings is a professional copywriter and postgraduate in Roman history from the University of Oxford. After graduating with his MPhil, he moved to Florence and then Rome to carry out his research on the ground and pursue his passion at the source. He now works in travel, as a writer and content consultant, and in education as a university lecturer and translator.