The six-meter-long Marforio represents an ancient deity – but which one? He was believed to be the god of the Tiber or the god of Nera (Nera is the longest of the Tiber’s tributaries), or even Mars or Neptune. The sculpture, from the turn of the II and III centuries of our era, was initially found near the triumphal arch of Septimius Severus, in the area between the Forum of Augustus, Forum of Caesar and Forum Romanum, which in the Middle Ages was known as Foro di Marte (Martis Forum), and that is where the fountain gets its name. Another hypothesis assumes that the name comes from the Marfuolio family – the tenants of this area in modern times. However, before the statue became part of the fountain, it belonged to the group of the so-called, talking statues, characteristic for Rome, ancient figures (Madame Lucretia, Abate Luigi, Facchino, Babunio), which in the XVI century became a sort of message boards for texts of satirical content. The most famous of these, Pasquino, often received responses to its snide remarks on the subject of popes and Roman aristocrats from Marforio. The statue itself laid for centuries in its place until the times of Sixtus V. It must be added that, this pope was the favorite subject of the derogatory remarks of the “talking statues” and he despised them in a special way. The figure was first transported near the Church of San Marco, then in 1592 to Capitoline Hill, while its missing parts were restored (hand and leg). It was to constitute the main part of a fountain designed by Giacomo della Porta, which found its place in a niche near the wall separating the square from the complex of the Church of Santa Maria in Aracoeli. This was the last fountain designed by this architect, who not only modernized the whole square (according to the plans of Michelangelo), but also erected the building of the Palace of Conservators (Palazzo di Conservatori) However, at the time, when the New Palace (Palazzo Nuovo) was built across from it, the fountain was taken apart (during the pontificate of Pope Innocent X) and moved to its courtyard where it can still be seen today. The attributes which were added at that time, turned Marforio, from a river god, into an ocean god (Oceanus).

Interestingly enough, in its original location Marforio was accompanied by a gigantic ancient bowl, which – when the statue was transported – was left in its place and used as a watering hole for the cattle and horses sold there. It was for this bowl that Giacomo della Porta completed a mascaron, from whose maw water spouted. It was not until the beginning of the XIX century that the bowl was taken from the square and used as decoration for one of the greatest Roman fountains – the Fontana dei Dioscuri found on Quirinale Hill. The mascaron, on the other hand, moved from place to place and finally ended up in warehouses, but in the thirties of the XX century it was transported to Aventine Hill, where along with an ancient sarcophagus it created a picturesque fountain on Piazza Pietro d’Illiria (Fontana del Mascherone di Santa Sabina).

However, let us return to the fountain found on the courtyard of the present-day Capitoline Museums. The bearded, half-nude man, sculpted in marble, in a semi-lying position, initially held an oar in his hand; today it is a conch. He rests at the shore of a small water reservoir, which is additionally decorated with a maw of a water creature, from which water flows into it. In a broad exedra, which makes up the background of the fountain, there is an inscription and a bust commemorating Pope Clement XII. It was he, who in the thirties of the XVIII century initialized the transformation of the Capitoline complex into a museum – the first public museum in the world.  The whole is flanked by immense columns with Corinthian capitals, and further on, rectangular niches with figures of satyrs placed inside. It is worth taking a look at them. They were found in the area of the former Theatre of Pompey and they are the Roman copies of Hellenic sculptures. All of these arrangements are the work of Filippo Barigioni, the very same one who created the beautiful funerary monument of Maria Clementina Sobieska and the design of the new della Rotonda fountain on a square in front of the Pantheon.