CNN
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22 years old german man is being detained in florence The city authorities said in a statement that he was accused of damaging the statue at the 16th-century Fountain of Neptune in Piazza della Signoria.
The city estimates damage to the statue at about 5,000 euros ($5,400).
of fountain It features a statue of Neptune, the Roman god of the sea, sitting on a shell-shaped carriage pulled by horses.
The city said the unnamed tourist climbed the protective fence around the monument early Monday morning and posed on top of the statue, while two of his friends who remained on the other side of the fence took photos. It is said that This was reported by a police officer who witnessed the incident on surveillance footage.
“According to the reconstruction of the investigation, shortly after 1 o’clock this morning, the tourist, along with two other friends, climbed over the fence of the Neptune Fountain in Piazza della Signoria and climbed onto the edge of the pool,” the statement said.
“He then jumped up and climbed onto the horse’s legs, reached the bottom of the carriage, asked his friends to take a photo, and then climbed out of the carriage. On the way down he placed his foot on the hoof again and the hoof It was damaged. However, as soon as the alarm sounded, the young man had already escaped with two others,” he added.
The tourists will be prosecuted under the city’s criminal code, which prohibits “destroying, dispersing, degrading, disfiguring, defacing, or illegally using cultural or scenic assets.”
If found guilty, tourists could be fined and banned from entering the city.
The statue was damaged in 2005 when someone climbed on top of it and broke Neptune’s hand. In response, authorities decided to install surveillance cameras.
In August, a German tourist was accused of spray-painting soccer graffiti on a wall in the nearby historic Vasari Corridor.
The Fountain of Neptune was commissioned by Cosimo I de’ Medici, Duke of Florence, in 1559 to commemorate the marriage of his son Francesco to Archduchess Joanna of Austria.