The Catena d'acqua.
The water chain. a waterfall which tumbles down, feeding the channel all the way down to the Moorish Fountain at the bottom of the garden. From this third terrace, we can admire the second, the stone banquet table; and we can see that of the water theater, down to the bottom and the Moorish Fountain.
This is the water chain that Vignola created and, since then, given its
success, recreated in all gardens.
The water swirls in all sorts of stone meanders in such a disordered manner
that one can no longer tell if the stone has started flowing or the water
stratifying. There is always the suggestion of trompe l'oeil, of tricking the
mind, in these eddies of water and stone which make up the "Catena d'acqua".
This fountain music, this splashing, is particularly miraculous at the Villa Lante.
The high fountain terrace.
What could be higher than the gods?
The unknown.
The unknown is this extravagant fountain which has lost nearly everything that
it had at the time. This was the fountain of all creatures, of all possible
creations.
Before the gods and beyond the gods, there existed an original
entity which one could call the Mother Goddess who caused the birth of all of
Nature's aberrations.
This pyramidal fountain is peopled by the strangest, most demoniacal and loathsome beasts
- There are bats, chimeras and snakes. This is the complete delirium of a dream.
- Larvae tumble everywhere, monsters twitch their ears.
This is the flux of creation, the overflow of creation which the Earth Goddess let loose and freed, and which the gods later put in order.
We find ourselves going back in time. We were with humans, we went to the gods and we now stand before the gods, in that time when everything was still possible.
This fountain serves as the junction point of two avenues. Each of these two avenues lead to a temple. Here are the Villa Lante's real gods.