The mystery of the vanished waters of Italy's 'Versailles'

The fountains of the Palace of Caserta near Naples suddenly ran almost completely dry and no one knew why.

Let's start with some context: also called the “Versailles of Italy”, the palace of Caserta has 1,200 rooms, 1,742 windows and 123 hectares of gardens. Construction started in 1752 by order of King Charles of Bourbon, a great-grandson of Louis XIV, and was designed by architect Luigi Vanvitelli.

However, the 18th-century palace, which is also on the Unesco World Heritage list, began to look a bit sad in recent weeks, so devoid of majestic water jets and with yellowed lawn. The culprit? A farmer!

A 58-year-old farmer was arrested on Wednesday for illegally tapping water from the fountains. The man allegedly connected a 145-metre-long illegal pipe to the palace water network in Caserta. The clandestine pipe ran through a hole in the palace wall and fed both a citerne and irrigation systems for farmland. Water is extra precious in the Naples region due to frequent droughts.

Mystery unravelled!

(SR - Bron: La Repubblica - Picture: ©Unsplash)