The fountain from her final year

At the foot of the slope sits the largest fountain in the park, with a sea god at its centre lowering his trident to the water while nymphs and sea horses churn around him.

 

The scene comes from classical mythology, in which the mother of Achilles asks the sea god for safe passage for her son as he heads off to war. It is no accident that Maria Theresia chose this particular image, because she ruled for forty years and fought more wars in that time than she would have liked, with sixteen children she married off across half of Europe.

 

The fountain was finished in 1780, the year she died. With it her garden was complete, and she barely saw it in this form.

 

From the edge of the basin you get the view the whole park was designed around: the axis runs from the palace behind you, across this fountain, straight up to the colonnade on the hill.

 

The path up begins to the left of the fountain and climbs to the Gloriette in a few minutes.