Marble fountain attributed to Rudolf Weyr (1847-1914), a leading Viennese sculptor of the late nineteenth century,  the peak period for Viennese Neo-Baroque that began around 1870. Lavish with sculpture, this vogue revisited both the Baroque and Rococo styles. This work presents a synthesis typical of Vienna of the time: a mixture of Rococo and Baroque, of Italian and German motifs.

Here, the figure of the river-God belongs to the Roman Baroque, but the theme of the mermaid is more from the North. Romanticism in the Northern countries brought back to life old myths and characters from the past. It was in the 19th century in Denmark that Hans Christian Andersen wrote The Little Mermaid and that Richard Wagner in Germany honored the German myths in his operas, especially the famous Nixen (nymphs) of the Rhine.