The present contribution aims to provide an overview of the known aqueducts in Cyrenaica, trying to highlight their technical characteristics and common features. The individual structures have already been discussed by scholars and a first collection of all the bibliographic material was gathered by the author as part of his Ph.D. dissertation*. I found it appropriate to divide the text into paragraphs: Introduction, Cyrenaica, Cyrene (Greek and Roman), Conclusive Remarks. The first paragraph offers a very brief historical and hydrological contextualization of the territory; the second one summarizes the technical characteristics of the four aqueducts known at the time in Cyrenaica, except for Cyrene (I provide a summary of the data disclosed by the Archaeological Missions operating for years on the Libyan soil, leaving to the reader the references for individual insights); in the third paragraph I bring in evidence of the water management in Cyrene; in the fourth I propose a summary of the preceding themes. Most of the data concerning Cyrene are the result of first-person surveys and I attempt to offer a concise and exhaustive picture about its water management throughout history. Some passages will, therefore, be deliberately quick to avoid repeating questions already debated, but rather provide a flowing reading, open to any further study and at the same time sufficiently exhaustive for an assessment of the topic. Finally, I would like to point out that, because it was interesting to show the structures that are part of a Roman context, it was necessary to go over what was known for the most ancient phases, trying not to weigh down the speech by citing all the monuments.
Aqueducts in Cyrenaica (Libya) and the water supply of Cyrene in the roman age
Lorenzo Cariddi
2019
Abstract
The present contribution aims to provide an overview of the known aqueducts in Cyrenaica, trying to highlight their technical characteristics and common features. The individual structures have already been discussed by scholars and a first collection of all the bibliographic material was gathered by the author as part of his Ph.D. dissertation*. I found it appropriate to divide the text into paragraphs: Introduction, Cyrenaica, Cyrene (Greek and Roman), Conclusive Remarks. The first paragraph offers a very brief historical and hydrological contextualization of the territory; the second one summarizes the technical characteristics of the four aqueducts known at the time in Cyrenaica, except for Cyrene (I provide a summary of the data disclosed by the Archaeological Missions operating for years on the Libyan soil, leaving to the reader the references for individual insights); in the third paragraph I bring in evidence of the water management in Cyrene; in the fourth I propose a summary of the preceding themes. Most of the data concerning Cyrene are the result of first-person surveys and I attempt to offer a concise and exhaustive picture about its water management throughout history. Some passages will, therefore, be deliberately quick to avoid repeating questions already debated, but rather provide a flowing reading, open to any further study and at the same time sufficiently exhaustive for an assessment of the topic. Finally, I would like to point out that, because it was interesting to show the structures that are part of a Roman context, it was necessary to go over what was known for the most ancient phases, trying not to weigh down the speech by citing all the monuments.I documenti in IRIS sono protetti da copyright e tutti i diritti sono riservati, salvo diversa indicazione.