Nabataean hydraulics of Petra (cisterns, channels and dams)
Hidráulica nabatea de Petra (cisternas, canales y presas)
- Date
- c. century I a.C. - I d.C. · confidence medium
- Place
- Petra, Ma'an, Jordan
- Credited to
- Nabataeans
- Field
- Tools
What it is
A network of dams, rock-cut channels, ceramic pipes and cisterns that collected torrential rain and spring water and supplied a city of several thousand inhabitants in the desert. Control of water sustained the caravan trade.
The chronology of the systems is complex and overlapping, with works from the 2nd century BC to late Roman times (the Siq dam, after a flood in the late 1st century AD). Petra has been a World Heritage Site since 1985.
What it led to
- a commercial capital in an arid environment on the incense route
- Nabataean cisterns and farming in the Negev and northern Arabia
- a reference for water management in arid regions