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Document Details :

Title: Water Cisterns in Idumea, Judaea and Nabatea in the Hellenistic and Roman Periods
Author(s): KLONER, Amos
Journal: ARAM Periodical
Volume: 14    Date: 2001-2002   
Pages: 461-485
DOI: 10.2143/ARAM.14.0.504513

Abstract :
The article shows how the problems of reliable water supply were solved in Judaea and Nabatea during the Hellenistic and early Roman periods when new types of water cisterns and reservoirs were cut into the rock, in large and small settlements as well as in unsettled areas. The appearance of cisterns in which the openings were cut in the higher half of their sides, close to the rock dome of their ceiling, is found since the third century BCE in Idumean Maresha. The city relied on run off water diverted from roofs, streets and public open spaces to the many cisterns cut in the local soft limestone. It seems quite probable that the same idea of having openings in the upper half of one of the sides, generally in the side facing the steep slope, is found in the cisterns of the other groups dealt with in the article. The adoption of the side slope cistern principle began in Judaea in the 2nd half of the second century BCE and was practiced widely in the consecutive century and a half. In the Negev and Edom this peculiar type of cistern was introduced in the first century BCE and was practiced widely in the first century CE.

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