AbundanceThe fountain was designed by the artist Nicola Salvi, who Pope Clement XII commissioned in 1732. Salvi based his design on one that Bernini started one century earlier, but he was halted after Pope Urban VIII's death. It took about thirty years to build the fountain, and it was finally completed in 1762.
The Aqua Virgo, an aqueduct constructed two thousand years ago, still supplies water to the famous fountain. General Agrippa built the aqueduct under Augustus around 19 B.C., and it brought water from the Salone springs 19 kilometers away into Rome. The Aqua Virgo, or 'Vergine', is the only aqueduct that has never interrupted to provide the city with water since the ancient Romans.