History

History

The sizable Roman Harbaqa Dam in Syria is 21 m (69 ft) high and 365 m (1,198 ft) long.

The Roman dam at Cornalvo in Spain has been in use for almost two millennia.

Grand Anicut dam on river Kaveri in Tamil Nadu, South India (19th century on 1st-2nd century foundation)

The word dam can be traced back to Middle English,^[1] and before that, from Middle Dutch, as seen in the names of many old cities.^[2] Early dam building took place in Mesopotamia and the Middle East. Dams were used to control the water level, for Mesopotamia's weather affected the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, and could be quite unpredictable.
The earliest known dam is the Jawa Dam in Jordan, 100 kilometres (62 mi) northeast of the capital Amman. This gravity dam featured a 4.5 m (15 ft) high and 1 m (3 ft 3 in) wide stone wall, supported by a 50 m (160 ft) wide earth rampart. The structure is dated to 3000 BCThe Ancient Egyptian Sadd-el-Kafara Dam at Wadi Al-Garawi, located about 25 km (16 mi) south of Cairo, was 102 m (335 ft) long at its base and 87 m (285 ft) wide. The structure was built around 2800^[5] or 2600 B.C.^[6] as a diversion dam for flood control, but was destroyed by heavy rain during construction or shortly afterwards. By the mid-late third century BC, an intricate water-management system within Dholavira in modern day India, was built. The system included 16 reservoirs, dams and various channels for collecting water and storing it.^[7]