The naked gentleman on the top of this impressive fountains is called Silvius Brabo.
He’s not any Flemish ancient forerunner of streakers, actually he was a not Flemish at all, he was a Roman soldier.
I don’t know why sculptors very often like representing mythological and not mythological heroes all undressed, maybe it’s to show they can sculpt perfectly human body, not only overcoats and shoes….
Anyway many, many centuries ago there was around the place that is now called Antwerpen a very naughty and evil giant, called Druon Antigoon ( an excellent name for a bad giant).
Druon had the bad habit to tax heavily all the boats which sailed over the river Schelde, if the sailors had not coins enough or simply dared to challenge the giant, cruel Druon didn’t hesitate a single second and cut their hand off.
Silvius Brabo, a valiant Roman legionary, decided to give up with that and incredibly could win the enormous Druon and killed him, then cut off his hand and , logically, unable to do anything with that ( who could keep a giant’s hand as knickknack in a living room?), decided to throw it away into the river Schelde.
But it also seem that in Flemish “Throwing away a hand” sounds more or less like “ Hand Werpen”.
The name for the town was found…Antwerpen.
Until there the legend,
You can bet that the name of this town came from something else, nevertheless legends are legends and they deserve respect.
So Silvius Brabo stands all naked on the top of his memorial fountain, frozen during centuries in the gesture to throw away the giant’s cut hand.
Ah, by the way in the background there is the City Hall of Antwerpen with all the flags on, I had told you I would have posted it…