Page - 165 - in The Power of Urban Water - Studies in premodern urbanism

10 SyracusanWaterNetworks inAntiquity 165 Several catchments in theHyblaeanHills TheGalermi’s source is in several parts of theHyblaeanMountains, located in the hinterland (Fig.3). This vast limestonemassif serves as a reservoir for the entire region, giving rise to a river system that feeds the coastal plain fromSyracuse toCapePassero and the southern coast toCamarina,westof theheadland. Inourcase, theAnaporiver is fedbyseveral tributaries that the ancients exploited by installing at least two catchments, installed in two tributaries of the river, theCalcinara andCiccio, over 25km from theancient city. TheCiccio catchment In a bend of the Ciccio or Torrente Santa Sofia, the ancient designers opened a first gallery of 2.35mhighand0.60mwide (Fig.5). The topographyof the catchment hadboth the advantage of receiving the entire flowof the river and the disadvantage of being directly accessible to the wastecarriedby the river in thecaseof flooding: so theyprotected it fromthe intrusionofbodies likely toclog thepipelinebyusinggratings,ofwhichonly thecentreplatesof thehinges remain. A trapezoidalnichepediment, ofparamount importance fordatingand the interest that the designersor theaqueductusersgave it,wasdugat the topof thecatchment (Fig.6): it is similar to the oneswe can observe in theArchaeological Park ofNeapolis in Syracuse. An inscription was incised on it, but it is barely legible today. Perhapswe candecipher some letters: ι (iota), ε (epsilon),ω (omega) andmaybe an isolated endof the line δ (delta). Their place on the line encourages a readingof ‘hiero’which could refer to the sponsor:Hieron, either a dedication ‘I amdevoted to’or ‘with’.Thenameofwho it isdedicated to isunfortunatelyunreadable,unless thedelta is oneof themarks. Thegallery’shorizontal inspectionshaftspunctuate thecliffatmoreor less regular intervals (every 15mapproximately) (Fig. 5, F1, F3, F5). Theyareof virtually identicaldimensionswitha height varying from 1.85 to 2.05m, with awidth varying from 1.15 to 1.40m, and an average depth of 2.30 to 2.90m. At a later, or evenmodern, period, new inspection shafts were built with far less care (F2, F4, F7). Fig. 4:Syracuse, mapof theGalermi aqueduct.