Barcelona has a long list of traveling monuments. Constructions that, in their day, were changed location, for various reasons. It is the case of the fountain of the Child, which currently presides over the gardens of Can Mantega. It is also about the the only statue that preserves a coat of arms of the old town of Santsadded to the capital in 1897.
The fountain owes its name to the figure that crowns it, a marble cherub holding pitchers. In the neighborhood it was traditionally known as the ninyuIt is said that due to the influence of immigrants from the south of Spain, who arrived at the beginning of the last century.
The sculpture, the work of Agapit Vallmitjana, stands on a column adorned with four shields. Three of them are easily recognizable: the one from Catalonia, with the four bars; that of Castilla, quartered, with two castles and two lions; and that of Barcelona. He fourth emblem, more difficult to identify, represents the image of the Virgin, elevated above the clouds. It is actually about the old parish seal of Santa Maria de Sants which, in the absence of an official coat of arms, was also adopted by the santsense municipal administration.
Beneath the stone shield, a very deteriorated marble plate is preserved -in its day there were three more-, where the name of Don José Escuder, mayor of Sants when the fountain was inaugurated. This was not its original location, but the Plaza d’Osca, then the seat of the market. It was part of a network of public fountains promoted by the Sants town hall, which granted the concession to the Sans Drinking Water Company [sic], a company that exploited the underground waters of the Llobregat. In May 1880 three fountains were blessed. One in Sagunt street corner with Jocs Florals, another in the church square and the third, already mentioned, in the market square.
In 1913, when the market moved to the current modernist building, the fountain was dismantled and relocated in the old Plaza de la Vila -officially, of the Constitution-, in front of the old town hall of Sants. This square, today disappeared, was located at the current intersection of Carrer de Sants with Rambla de Brasil. After the annexation to Barcelona, she was baptized in honor of Víctor Balaguer, a name that she never caught on. The majority always knew it as the Ninyu square, because of the sculpture of the fountain.
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space was razed in 1969 to open the first ring road. The source traveled again, this time to a municipal warehouse. From there it was rescued, a few years later, to adorn the gardens of Can Mantega, where it currently stands.
As far as is known, this is the only place on public roads where a Sants coat of arms from the time of municipal independence can be seen. There is a replica of the emblem, but more modernon the façade of the Sants-Montjuïc district headquarters, on Carrer de la creu coberta. Although it is a common confusion, this building, popularly known as the Mayor’s Office, never housed the old Sants town hall. It was actually built at the beginning of the last century as the seat of the Hostafrancs mayoralty.