Narcissus Fountain Ljubljana
Of beauty and its risk
Only a stone's throw away from The Fountain of Three Carniolan Rivers (also known as Robba Fountain) there is another fountain. Minor in size but not in grace, it is assumed to have been made by the same Italian sculptor Francesco Robba, whom we, Slovenian art historians, treat as our own, since he not only took over the workshop of our stonemason Luka Mislej, but also swiped his daughter of her feet and married her.
Inside the City Hall's atrium, hidden in the furthest corner, lingers young Narcissus, admiring his own image in the water. Made of stone somewhere around the middle of the 18th century, he tells a story of a tragic metamorphosis. A boy so handsome, that all maidens would fall in love with him, was cursed to be enchanted by his own reflection. Never able to fulfill desires, he sadly withered away and turned into a flower – a daffodil otherwise named Narcis. So it doesn't pay off to like yourself too much, does it?
And another bit of historic candy while I'm at it: I myself find Robba's life quite mysterious, due to the lack of preserved information. Most tour or travel guides will state that he moved to Zagreb in the autumn of his life. Probably false. He most certainly died there, but the last art historian research proposes he never left Ljubljana and was working for Croatian contractors from a distance, only visiting when necessary.
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