When I go out for a walk in any city I usually bring a bottle of water with me, just in case I’m thirsty. When I walk in the streets of Rome I don’t really have to care about it, I can easily find a standpipe, a so called “nasone”.
The “nasoni” are a real institution in the city. These standpipes were built around 1870. The first version was designed with a dragon head as ornament. Now you can find just a few of these in the city: one of the oldest is in piazza della Rotonda (Pantheon). All the others are a simplified version, without the dragon head, and it’s actually these which gave the inspiration for the name. Nasone in Italian means big nose and if you look at these standpipes you can easily understand why they have this name.
Even if these standpipes use a lot of water, the Romans really love them. The society for the distribution of the public water in the city has decided to make an interactive online map with all the “nasoni” in the city. You can find it scrolling its homepage and you will find the link at the end of this page so you will always know where you can drink for free.