Medici Fountain Paris: History, Sculptures, and Hidden Beauty

Recently Renovated. Put This On Your List!

Hidden to one side of the Jardin du Luxembourg, the Medici fountain has been inaccessible for years due to renovations.

How To Find It

If you are facing the stunning Senate house building, the fountain is easily accessible to the right. You can also find it on Google Maps here.

Closest Metro stop

The Luxembourg metro stop is the closest. Plan to spend one to three hours exploring the gardens. I love to bring a snack & book with me.

Stunning Monuments Of Paris

The "Grotto of Luxembourg" originally had architectural ornaments imitating stalactites and icicles.

The fountain construction, around 1630, was commissioned by Queen Marie de' Medici, widow of Henry IV, from the Florentine engineer Thomas Francine. As I mentioned in my movie recommendations, I have been watching the Starz series on Catherine de Medici. So, it's endlessly fascinating to watch the show and then visit the renovated fountain.

Nymphs and water games

All around the Luxembourg Palace that she had built, Marie de Médicis wanted to install many caves, fountains, pools and terraces with water games, in order to rediscover the architectural atmosphere of the nymphaeums of her childhood, such as the Buontalenti grotto. But this fountain is all that remains of her intricate plans.

I also found it interesting that the fluted columns and pediment with the arms of France and the Medici was supported by allegorical figures of two rivers: the Rhône and the Seine.

Medici Fountain – The Sculptures

The side niches are decorated with two statues: on the left a faun, on the right a huntress. But it is the central niche that is of greatest interest.

Polyphemus, a jealous cyclops

At the base, you'll find the all-white sculpture of a couple entwined, the nymph Galatea and the young shepherd Acis. Above them is the massive and dark bronze statue of the Cyclops Polyphemus.

In love with Galatea, he is leaning on a rock to spy on the couple, preparing to strike and kill Acis by throwing a stone.

The theme of water continues. Polyphemus is a Cyclops, son of Poseidon (Neptune), god of the sea. He was a giant cannibal that lived in Sicily at the foot of Etna.

The "white Galatea" is a sea nymph, daughter of Nereus. She was for a time the lover of the Cyclops whom she abandoned for Acis, the son of the god Pan, protector of shepherds and herds.

The basics about Medici

Queen of France and Navarre as the second wife of King Henry IV of France of the House of Bourbon, and Regent of the Kingdom of France officially between 1610 and 1617 during the minority of her son, Louis XIII of France. Her mandate as regent legally expired in 1614, when her son reached the age of majority, but she refused to resign and continued as regent until she was removed by a coup in 1617.

Family conflict

At the age of 43, Medici provoked an uprising against her son the King,

create the so-called "war of mother and son." A treaty negotiated by Richelieu helped calm the situation but Medici wasn't satisfied.

Realizing that he couldn't move forward with his plans, the King allowed her to return to Paris, where she worked on the construction of the Luxembourg Palace.

During the 1620s, the Luxembourg Palace became one of the most active decorative projects in Europe

The Medici fountain is moved

In the early 1860s, the fountain was moved, following the opening of the rue de Médicis, carried out as part of the urban planning work of the prefect Haussmann.

Reassembled stone by stone in it's current spot, the fountain has remained unchanged for over 150 years.