Drops of Water 5

A River of Civilisation:
Works and Symbols of Water
in Different World Cultures
The world’s major civilizations developed along rivers, cisterns, made water resistant by clay, were covered with
which have both united and divided human beings.Water gravel which served to filter the water, and eliminate
is life, our life and that of others too! Without water remnants of vegetation and other impurities. Water was
there would be no human civilization, indeed there made drinkable by filtering the mud through fabric.
would be no life. We use water to drink, navigate, fish, The dug out canals expand as they fill with water, but
wash, cool down, cook, travel, water plants, and ... gradually shrink the further away they get from the river.
The earliest farmers, more than 8000 years ago in Africa The strength of the current must initially be contained,
and Asia, needed water to irrigate their land. Great rivers but when more distant fields are to be irrigated, the flow
like the Nile, the Tigris and the Euphrates inundated the speed has to be increased. These irrigation canals have
land several times a year, but crops needed water almost to have a strong and constant enough current otherwise
every day. So men dug canals starting from the banks of the water would simply be absorbed by the dry earth.
the river so that water could be transported to where So the canals have to be constructed in a slightly sloping
it was most needed. Men dug these canals with their manner, and stones and mud, which hinder the flow of
bare hands using the simplest of tools: shovels, hoes, and water, must frequently be removed. However, in times
containers of wood and terracotta for removal of the of flooding, water washes even field boundaries clean
earth and sand from digging. away! That is why the ancient Egyptians, Sumerians and
Babylonians invented and perfected the art of geometry,
so they could re-establish the limits of their land as and
when required.

Illustration 1: © Focus, Gruner+Jahr/Mondadori

Egyptian farmers at work

Drinking water was obtained directly from rivers where

it flowed abundantly. In areas where droughts were Illustration 2: © Respira Network (Province of Parma, Italy)
frequent, prehistoric men soon learned to collect rain Pile dwelling habitations.
water. For storage purposes, they dug basins, known as
cisterns, in the earth and rock. The bottoms of these
 Drops of Water 5

the principles of which gave rise to civilization! Hydraulic

order is the equilibrium between land and water which is
obtained by regulating water, through a system of barriers,
through drainage and absorption of rainfall, and the
elimination of any stagnation that may prove harmful to
human activity.

Water is life and strength (or energy), sustenance for living

creatures and, for many thousands of years, was vital to
human activities, like grinding cereals, sawing wood, drilling
Illustration 3: © Venetoinfo.it stone, moving and lifting heavy loads, spinning, weaving,
Pile dwelling habitations. and even lighting lamps.
Thanks to human intelligence, water can be made to turn
As a measure against flooding, prehistoric men built the wheels of a mill or those of turbines
embankments along rivers and also raised their lake (the modern paddle wheel) employed in the production of
dwelling habitations by constructing them on top of high hydroelectric energy.The ancient Romans used watermills
piles. Others used embankments to surround their villages to grind their cereals and press olives.They were also used
for defense purposes. to raise water levels for irrigation or to reach the upper
Since time began, human beings have battled with water, levels of dwellings. By applying open recipients to the
because for it to be human friendly it has to be monitored wheel paddles, it was possible to raise large quantities of
and kept at bay.To protect land from flooding by building water which was then unloaded into higher level cisterns
earthen barriers along rivers that were hundreds or or ducts. These water mills, called norias, are still found
thousands miles long would surely have been strenuous today in some African and Asian countries. By listening
work and very time consuming, so humans learned to attentively to the sounds these norias made, the water
construct embankments around their villages . That way masters of Arabic countries in the past knew when it was
they could resist floods for weeks and even months on time to change damaged parts or when it was time for a
end, keeping themselves, cattle, and food safe inside the new wheel. These sounds are known as the singing of the
high barriers which sometimes reached a height of over norias. Do you know any water songs?
thirty metres.These were all built by hand without the aid The watermill become widespread in Europe only from
of any machinery, at the very most they made use of a the medieval period. This is because it was more costly
few animals. for the Romans to build and keep up these mills than it
Lake dwellings, built from earliest times throughout the was to have slaves and animals do the work of moving
world, gave humans all the advantages of a life on the water water. During medieval times, monks built many mills, thus
(communication, protection from enemies and wild animals, lightening the human workload. Water can move wheels
for washing, cooling, etc) without turning them into flood from above and below, but if the water level is too low the
victims. In more recent times, human beings have learned mill will stop working. So stone or wooden ducts, called
to separate seal-level (or even lower level) lands from “mill races” were constructed to redirect water which had
others, stopping them from turning into swamps by means already been used by the wheel back again to the main
of large, cleverly built pumps, embankments and canals. All riverbed for reuse.
of the foregoing are examples of what might be called the
“order of hydraulics”.
It was difficult to keep certain foodstuffs fresh living in such
close proximity to water, so they had to be eaten fresh,
dried or conserved in salt. Rain water in particular gets
everywhere and makes food go off really easily. Sometimes,
however, it did turn out to be quite useful.Water in contact
with cereals stored in holes dug in the ground, gave rise
to a drink we still commonly use today. In fact, from
prehistoric times, it was observed that water made barley
seeds ferment and turn into beer! Humans therefore
were vigilant to water and well aware of all its many faces,
both good and bad, and thus created a “hydraulic order”, Illustration 4: © Focus, Gruner+Jahr/Mondadori
A European medieval water mill.
 Drops of Water 5

All the great civilizations of the past were capable of providing

millions of people with water and of transporting the dirty
water of cities and domestic use to places for “differentiated
refuse collection”.
The Sumerians, Hittites, Cretans, Greeks and Romans all
constructed aqueducts which benefited humans, animals
and plants alike. In the ancient cities, numerous fountains
guaranteed clean water to everyone. Not all homes had
water however, because normally only the rich could afford
this. Nevertheless, everyone had access to the public fountains
in Greece and Rome, where there was rarely a shortage of
Illustration 5: © Focus, Gruner+Jahr/Mondadori water. Aqueducts were many kilometers long, with slightly
Reconstruction of the Roman bridge-aqueduct sloping ducts so water flowed with the force of gravity. The
project on the river Gard (France). Romans, for instance, built imposing aqueducts with bridges
and arches, examples of which we can still admire today. A
few of them are still in working condition, including the one
whose bridge spans the River Gard in France, built more
than two thousand years ago. Once water had been supplied
to cities and homes, it became obvious that it was equally
important, for reasons of hygiene and health, to then take it
into underground chambers known as sewers.
From the 9th through the 16th centuries, Islamic societies
from Spain to Oman experienced a “golden age” of science
and technology. One of the most important of these
technologies is also today one of the least thoroughly studied:
hydrology, or the control of the movement of water.The rise
of cities like Córdoba, Damascus, Baghdad, Fez and Marrakech
all required increasingly sophisticated methods of water
management to supply rapidly growing populations. Muslim
water engineers, starting as early as the seventh century in
Arab countries and around the 10th century in Spain, built
Illustration 6: © El Faïz M. (2005), Les maîtres de l’eau, an agricultural revolution. As can be observed from recent
Actes Sud, see references discoveries in Pompei, Roman aqueducts used taps similar to
Arab water raising machine from an ancient manuscript. those we use today. Unfortunately, the lead used in the piping
polluted the water and so poisoned people over time. It was
only understood at a later date that pipes should be made of
steel, stone or plastic so as not to produce polluted water.
Today, the water of aqueducts is carefully controlled and is
often of a higher quality than that found in some bottles.

Illustration 7: © El Faïz M. (2005), Les maîtres de l’eau,Actes Sud, Illustration 8: © Unesco

see references - Arab mechanical crank from an ancient manuscript. Roman Aqueduct at Pont du Gard (France).
 Drops of Water 5

years ago a huge dam built on the river Nile, at Aswan

in Egypt, created an artificial lake which put a number of
ancient monuments at risk of submersion. International
intervention on a massive scale meant that it was possible
to dismantle these temples and then have them placed and
reconstructed on higher ground, safe from water.

Illustration 9: © Spain from an English perspective (Viva-

spain.com) - Alhambra’s Garden (Spain).

Illustration 11: © Siem Reap Tour Guide

Angkor City.

Illustration 10: © Aramco Services Company

Pool at Aqiq (Saudi Arabia).

The Arabs, Chinese, Indians, Khmer, Venetians and the

Illustration 12: © Centro Civiltà dell’Acqua
Dutch were all very vigilant to the hydraulic order of their
Sukotai temples,Thailand.
lands.They were able to redirect the course of rivers, build
high dams, create artificial lakes and pools which became
places for leisure and recreation; they built galleries below
rivers and flooded lands to defend their cities and villages.
From the earliest times, humans built dams to contain
water which could be used when needed, and also to
produce energy. More than one thousand years ago
in Cambodia, the Khmer people built a huge city called
Angkor whose remains can still be seen to the present
day. They cultivated and irrigated a vast plantation of
rice which fed more than a million inhabitants. In fact, rice
is perfectly suited to swampy fields. To produce the right
environment, they use basins for storage of any excess
Illustration 13: © Wordpress.com
water which could be used as a reserve in times of low
The dismantlement of the temples of Abu Simbel (Aswan).
rainfall. The populations of the ancient cities along India’s
great river, the Indo, used the natural river banks to protect
Over two thousand years ago the Romans dug a canal to
themselves against flooding. A highly sophisticated secret
take the stagnant and unsanitary waters of the river Velino
gallery which ran below the River Arno was built by the
to the underlying river Nera by way of the Marmore falls
city of Florence, Italy, around 500 years ago. About forty
in Umbria, the highest cascades in Europe (165 metres).
 Drops of Water 5

The Venetians built a great number of luxury villas then now. Today, this water is extracted by wells in Libya,
between the 15th and 18th century. Take, for example, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the United States. However fossil
Villa Contarini di Piazzola on the river Brenta. Here the waters will eventually dry up because they are located
so called “peschiere”, fisheries or fishponds, large water below arid places where hardly any new rainfall is being
basins which were used to regulate the many surrounding absorbed from the surface.
irrigation canals, were occasionally also used for fishing
and simulated warship battles to entertain the nobles.The
Marmore falls and Villa Contarini are examples of how
humans can devise and carry out works in a rational way,
safeguarding both the environment and the landscape.

Illustration 15: © Laureano P. (2001),

Water Atlas, UNESCO, see references
Water extracted from the air.The humidity in the night air
which gathered on the rock walls, was collected in special
Illustration 14: © Teatri & Musei, Ovest Viaggi S.r.l - Villa underlying basins for use in the ancient city of Petra (Jordan).
Contarini at Piazzola sul Brenta (Padua, Italy). A precious traditional technique now sadly in disuse..

To obtain water, humans melted ice, dug deep wells,

underground passages, canals and cisterns, they built
bridges and aqueducts, They recycled sewage water, used
water fertilized by nature, procured drinking water from
sea water … and even from the air!
Ancient civilizations built step cisterns of circular and
elliptical form which resembled small amphitheatres to
extract water from the air. This system was also used in
medieval castles where it was often necessary to resist Illustration 16: © Focus, Gruner+Jahr/Mondadori
lengthy sieges with very few resources. From earliest The Yellow River in China.
times, the Yellow River, which flows through the fertile
regions of western China, drags löss, a yellow dust Today our most precious resource, water, must be managed
formed by the action of the wind, down to the valley. “rationally” by modern technology without losing sight of
Löss is porous and only one rainfall is needed for the the traditional knowledge and teachings of ancient peoples.
water, deeply penetrated, to rise up again fertilized by Here are some examples of this dual approach:
the precious minerals which are then deposited on • Using new irrigation techniques in agriculture to reduce
the land. Particularly heavy and prolonged rainfall in consumption (drip irrigation for example)
the mountainous and hilly zones, however, lead to an • Recycling water used by industry and crafts.
increase of pressure and softening of the watery pores of • Reducing activities which cause pollution near water
the ground. This caused erosion of the banks which was sources.
partly countered by the creation of powerful terracing so • Substituting the pipes of aqueducts that leak , devising
typical of the Chinese landscape. new structures which avoid wastage and make sure water
Throughout history, all civilizations have dug wells. Today, of a sufficiently high quality is put back into circulation.
in the industrial age, modern water supplies come from
increasingly deep in the earth, because continued usage
drains water sources rapidly or because they have Dossier compiled by:
become polluted due to human activity (industry, dumps,
mines, pesticides, acid rain). In some desert zones there
is water underground, mainly “ancient” or “fossil” water,
that seeped into the ground hundreds or thousands Water Civilization International Centre,Venice:
of years ago when the climate there was more humid www.civiltacqua.org
 Drops of Water 5

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Water and Civilisations (Sound of Our Water - UNESCO

project)

Venice Office
Regional Bureau for Science
and Culture in Europe
United Nations
Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization