Named in the 13th-century Code of Statutes, the fountain of Gurusele or Gurusello has been the object of special care and attention by the city of Sassari over the centuries. It is not known what shape it must have had in the sixteenth century, except that water flowed out through twelve bronze cantaros. Between 1605 and 1606 he took on the face that he largely still retains today and which can be seen depicted in the painting by Flemish painter Johan Bilevelt kept in St. Catherine’s Church. The fountain is configured as an allegory of the flow of time expressed through a symbology that recalls, with its four statues, the seasons, while the twelve mouths from which the water flows represent the months. Following the damage inflicted on the monument during the anti-feudal riots of 1795, three of the four original statues were destroyed. The only surviving statue, representing the Bathing Venus, is kept in the City Palace, home of the City Museum. In 1828 they had the statues of the seasons that can be seen today made by Carrarese marble worker Giuseppe Perugi. In the 19th century, the two arches supporting a copy of the original statue, which was lost during the 1940s, were built in place of the metal structure that supported the statue of St. Gavino.
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