Who's That Monk?!?!?! Any or all of these details might be wrong, but it's all I've got: oddball 17th century monk (maybe Jesuit) who developed the water system for Bernini's Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi (Fountain of the Four Rivers, in Rome's Piazza Navona) and made strange mechanical devices like a mechanical Jesus that walked on water. I know I heard a story about him on an evening NPR show, I think there was a meme floating around the web around the same time. I want to say his name was Chirac, but I only remember hearing that, so I may be spelling it wrong, or even confusing it with a certain foreign president. Any takers?
posted by cosmonaught on Nov 30, 2004 - 7 answers