The Great Fountain, Enville, was a

fountain A fountain, from the Latin "fons" ( genitive "fontis"), meaning source or spring, is a decorative reservoir used for discharging water. It is also a structure that jets water into the air for a decorative or dramatic effect. Fountains were o ...

created in the mid-19th century by the

Earl of Stamford Earl of Stamford was a title in the Peerage of England. It was created in 1628 for Henry Grey, 2nd Baron Grey of Groby. This Grey family descended through Lord John Grey, of Pirgo, Essex, younger son of Thomas Grey, 2nd Marquess of Dor ...

in the middle of a lake on his

Enville Hall Enville Hall is an English Tudor country house in the village of Enville, Staffordshire. It is a Grade II listed building. The house has a 16th and 17th-century U-shaped core formed by the hall range and two flanking wings enclosing a south facin ...

estate, in

Enville, Staffordshire Enville is a village and civil parish in rural Staffordshire, England, on the A458 road between Stourbridge and Bridgnorth. Enville is in the South Staffordshire district. The largest village nearby is Kinver, with the smaller villages of Bobb ...

, England. The fountain was described by English artist, E. Adveno Brooke, who visited and made a chronolithograph of the fountain in 1857: "As we stood admiring the beauty and tranquility of the scene, a bubbling sound of water, at first gentle and gathering force by degrees, broke out and we beheld the commencement of one of the most beautiful aquatic displays it is possible to conceive. This, the large fountain, is on a level with the surface of the lake, and composed of five jets, the central one throwing a column of water 150 feet high; the supply being obtained from a large reservoir on the hill, to which it is first pumped by the united action of two engines, each of thirty horsepower."E. Adveno Brooke, ''The Gardens of England'', (London, 1857). Cited in Marilyn Symmes, ''Fountains, Spash and Spectacle - Water and Design from the Renaissance to the Present''. Pg. 11. The water continued to jet for several minutes, until the water in the reservoir was exhausted. The Great Fountain was the early ancestor of similar fountains located in lakes or bays, such as the

Jet d'Eau The Jet d'Eau (, ''Water-Jet'') is a large fountain in Geneva, Switzerland and is one of the city's most famous landmarks, being featured on the city's official tourism web site and on the official logo for Geneva's hosting of group stage match ...

in Geneva, Switzerland, which was first created in 1886, and more modern fountains, such as

King Fahd's Fountain ''King Fahd's Fountain'' (), also known as the ''Jeddah Fountain'', is in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. It is the tallest fountain of its type in the world. It is named after King Fahd bin Abdulaziz, the ruler of Saudi Arabia from 1982 until 2005. Over ...

Jeddah Jeddah ( ), alternatively transliterated as Jedda, Jiddah or Jidda ( ; , ), is a List of governorates of Saudi Arabia, governorate and the largest city in Mecca Province, Saudi Arabia, and the country's second largest city after Riyadh, located ...

Saudi Arabia Saudi Arabia, officially the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA), is a country in West Asia. Located in the centre of the Middle East, it covers the bulk of the Arabian Peninsula and has a land area of about , making it the List of Asian countries ...

, opened in 1985, which uses mechanical pumps to jet water upwards 312 metres (1,024 ft) above the surface of the

Red Sea The Red Sea is a sea inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. Its connection to the ocean is in the south, through the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait and the Gulf of Aden. To its north lie the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and th ...

. It is not known if the fountain still exists or operates today.

Bibliography

*Marilyn Symmes (editor), ''Fountains- Splash and Spectacle - Water and Design from the Renaissance to the Present''. Thames and Hudson, in association with the Cooper-Hewillt National Design Museum of the Smithsonian Institution. (1988). ().

Sources and Citations

{{coord , 52, 28, 25, N, 2, 15, 41, W, type:landmark_region:GB-STS, display=title Buildings and structures in Staffordshire Fountains in the United Kingdom