Mermaid statues at Fonte Luminosa in Lisbon

The fountain is beautifully lit at night. It runs intermittently — dormant at times, at others sending large volumes of water down its cascades — and when the lights come on the whole structure appears to glow.

While the fountain was built by architects Carlos and Guilherme Rebelo de Andrade, the five main fountain figures were sculpted by Diogo de Macedo, and the caryatids (columns in the shape of standing women) in the background were sculpted by Maximiano Alves.

The rider on the horse represents the Tagus, Portugal's largest river, and the four nymphs are the Tágides, said to inhabit its waters.

The Tágides

The Tágides are the nymphs of the Tagus. The name was coined by the Renaissance humanist André de Resende and made famous by Luís Vaz de Camões, who opened Os Lusíadas (1572) by invoking these river-nymphs rather than the classical Muses — a deliberately Portuguese source of inspiration for a Portuguese epic. The Lusiads, often regarded as the most important work of Portuguese literature, tells of the voyage of Vasco da Gama, the Portuguese explorer and first European to reach India by sea.

Water, Light and Restoration

The water-and-light effects were designed in 1943 by the Spanish engineer Carlos Buigas, creator of Barcelona's Montjuïc fountain. After falling silent in 2007, the fountain was restored for roughly €1.3 million and reopened on 27 December 2012, with 292 projectors driving its nightly displays.