Vienna - Donner Fountain

In 1737-39 Georg Raphael Donner was commissioned by the city to construct the Providentia Fountain, which is better known in Vienna as the Donner Fountain (Donner-Brunnen). The city fathers desired that the central figure of Providentia should reflect the concept of the caring and wise government of the city. Donner decorated its plinth with four graceful naked cherubs. The figures on the edge of the fountain's basin symbolize the Rivers Enns (an old man), Traun (a youth), Ybbs and March (both in female form). Empress Maria Theresa objected to so much nakedness and had the figures removed, and it was 1801, during the reign of Francis II, before they were replaced. In 1873 the lead figures were so decayed that they had to be replaced by bronze replicas. Donner's originals are now on show in the Baroque Museum at the Belvedere Palaces.