Page 24 - Urban water supply handbook

URBAN WATER INFRASTRUCTURE: A HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

URBAN WATER INFRASTRUCTURE 1.23

1.2.3 Anatolia

Anatolia, also called Asia Minor, which is part of the present-day Republic of Turkey,
has been the crossroads of many civilizations during the last 10,000 years. During the
last 4000 years, going back to the Hittite period (2000–200 B.C.), there are many remains
of ancient urban water supply systems, including pipes, canals, tunnels, inverted
siphons, aqueducts, reservoirs, cisterns, and dams. The majority of the Anatolian water-
works belong to urban water supply systems, in contrast to the large irrigation projects
found in Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Indus. Ozis and Harmancioglu (1979) discussed the
systems located in Side, Aspendos, Hierapolis, and Ephesus. Ozis (1987, 1996) dis-
cussed the history of ancient waterworks in Anatolia starting with the Hittite period
(2000–700 B.C.), the Urartu period (900–600 B.C.) in eastern Anatolia, the Ionian to
Roman periods (1000 B.C.–A.D. 395) in western and central Anatolia, and continuing
through the Byzantine (395–1453), the Seljukian (1071–1308), and the Ottoman
(1281–1922) periods. Ephesus was founded during the tenth century B.C. as an Ionian
city out of the Artemis Temple. During the sixth century B.C. Ephesus was reestablished
at the present site where it further developed during the Roman period.
Baths were unique in ancient cities. One example, the Skolacctica baths in
Ephesus, had a salon and central heating. These baths had a hot bath (caldarium), a
warm bath (tepidarium), a cold bath (frigidarium), and a dressing room (apody-
terium). The first building, in the second century, that housed these baths had three
floors. A woman named Skolacticia modified the baths in the fourth century mak-
ing them amiable to hundreds of people. There were public rooms and private
rooms, and those who wished could stay for many days. A furnace and a large boiler
were used to provide hot water.
Perge, located in Anatolia, is another ancient city that had a unique urban water
infrastructure. Figure 1.19a illustrates the Majestic Fountain (nymphaion), which
consisted of a wide basin and a richly decorated architectural facade. Because of the
architecture and statues of this fountain, it was one of Perge’s most magnificent edi-
fices. A water channel (shown in Fig. 1.19a and b) ran along the middle, dividing
each street and bringing life and coolness to the city. A cover to the underground
drainage system for the water channel is shown in Fig. 1.20. The baths of Perge were
magnificent and of a rather large size as shown in Fig. 1.21. As in other ancient cities
in Anatolia, three separate baths existed (a caldarium, tepidarium, and frigidarium).

1.3 ROMAN WATER SUPPLY: AQUEDUCTS AND
AQUEDUCT BRIDGES

The early Romans devoted much of their time to useful public works projects, build-
ing boats, harbor works, aqueducts, temples, forums, town halls, arenas, baths, and
sewers. The prosperous early-Roman bourgeois typically had a dozen-room house,
with a square hole in the roof to let rain in, and a cistern beneath the roof to store the

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