{"id":23118,"date":"2026-01-13T22:37:36","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T21:37:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/the-fountain-of-hercules\/"},"modified":"2026-07-12T15:14:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-12T13:14:07","slug":"the-fountain-of-hercules","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/explore-the-venaria-reale\/the-masterpieces\/the-fountain-of-hercules\/","title":{"rendered":"The Fountain of Hercules"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n\tThe complex of the\u00a0<strong>Fountain of the Hercules Colossus<\/strong>, built <strong>between 1669 and 1672<\/strong> for the Gardens, was the place for celebrations: an extraordinary \u201cBaroque scenic machine\u201d, the product of interaction between nature and architectures, unmissable attraction in the Gardens of the Reggia.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tIt was originally constituted by staircases and pavilions, nymphaeums and lavishly decorated grottos, water features and grand decorations, dominated by the\u00a0<strong>statue of the Hercules Colossus<\/strong>, the protagonist of the context, placed at the centre of the large pool.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tIcon of the late-mannerist garden, the imposing site had been conceived by\u00a0<strong>Amedeo di Castellamonte\u00a0<\/strong>to be one of the great wonders of the new Reggia. Designed and made for leisure, and based on a refined combination of allegorical references and mythological allusions, it added prestige to the Savoy dynasty, embodying their will to compete with Europe&#8217;s greatest royal courts.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tA change in taste and major war events led to its\u00a0<strong>dismantlement\u00a0<\/strong>as early as in the first years of the 1700s.\u00a0 The wealth of decorations and statues was split up and reallocated to other royal and aristocratic residences, the site demolished and buried.<\/p>\n<p>\n\tThe ambitious\u00a0<strong>restoration\u00a0and enhancement<\/strong> intervention on the 1600s masterpiece, completed in June 2022, stands as the finishing touch in the Recovery project of Venaria Reale, which took off in 1998.\u00a0\u00a0The restoration project was carried out thanks to the companies and authorities members of the <em>Consulta di Torino<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p>\n\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Fontana d'Ercole con vista sulla Reggia\" height=\"766\" src=\"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/fontana_ercole_con_sfondo_reggia_paolo-robino-1.webp\" width=\"1024\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\n\tThe complex of the\u00a0Fountain of the Hercules Colossus was the place for celebrations: an extraordinary \u201cBaroque scenic machine\u201d, the product of interaction between nature and architectures<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22248,"parent":23070,"menu_order":582,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"area-tematica-evento":[],"class_list":["post-23118","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/23118","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23118"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/23118\/revisions"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/23070"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23118"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"area-tematica-evento","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lavenaria.it\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/area-tematica-evento?post=23118"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}