Hear the Curator (y1971-43-44)

As you walk along the driveway leading to Prospect House, on your right you will see two Venetian wellheads that were gifts from collector and benefactor Dan Fellows Platt, Class of 1895. One wellhead is next to the driveway; the other is beside the path next to the Museum.

For centuries, Venice relied on wells for part of its water supply, so there were numerous wellheads in the city and surrounding Veneto region. Wellheads can still be seen on communal wells in piazzas and in private courtyards in Venice, but when water management was modernized many wellheads were sold. They were popular with collectors in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and could be purchased from art dealers. For those of us who love Venice and its art, encountering a Venetian wellhead on the University campus evokes the mystique of the Serenissima, the Most Serene, as the Republic of Venice was called.