The Mermaid Statues, Mermaid Fountain, Mermaid Plaza, Belém

Each mermaid statue holds a cornucopia-like horn, which used to spout water when the fountain was installed around 1904.  The upper level has four herons.

The fountain is considered a monument to the Belle Époque in Belém, but slowly fell into disrepair and neglect with no water flowing.

Restored in 2024

After many years of neglect, the Praça da Sereia and its fountain were restored and handed back to the city on 20 September 2024, at a cost of about R$1 million — part of a roughly R$5 million restoration of the wider Praça da República complex.

The fountain is made in cast iron, and was installed in its present location in 1904 as part of a redevelopment project championed by Antonio Lemos, Belém's mayor from 1897 to 1912.

The Belle Époque behind the fountain

The fountain arrived at the height of Belém's Belle Époque, when Amazon rubber made the port city one of the richest in Brazil and earned it the name 'the Paris of the Americas.' Mayor Antônio Lemos (1897–1912) spent that wealth remaking Belém in a Parisian image — boulevards, tramways, electric light and imported European monuments — and the mermaids in cast iron were part of that programme.

The mermaid fountain was imported from Europe, and was originally installed in the nearby Batista Campos Plaza.

Iara, the Amazon's own mermaid

Brazil has its own mermaid, and she belongs to these waters. Iara — the mãe-d'água, or 'mother of the waters' — took shape in the 19th century from three streams at once: the indigenous water-serpent, the African orixá Iemanjá, and the European siren. In the story she was once an indigenous warrior, cast into the river and remade as a mermaid, who sings men down into the current, from which they do not come back.