Food Sources: Earth, Water, and Air - Food Culture and Health in Pre-Modern Islamic Societies - page 56

anāt or other sources came. Their water
was used for household purposes but not
primarily for drinking. In districts where
water was short or brackish, drinking
water might be brought from a distance
on the backs of animals. Covered cisterns
( āb-anbār s) are common in towns and vil-
lages where water is short, especially on
the borders of the central desert. They
are also to be found along the roads,
sometimes associated with caravansarais.
Some have their own springs, but more
usually anāt water or rain water is stored
in them. Domed circular structures, some
50-70 ft. in diameter, reaching 15-20 ft.
or more below the surface of the ground,
they are a characteristic feature of local
architecture.
Many, perhaps most, towns on the pla-
teau, especially as they grew in size, were
supplied by anāt s. amd Allāh Mustawfī
records that the water of azwīn was
originally from wells. The first anāt was
made, he states, by amza b. Ilyasa,
who became governor of the town under
Mamūd b. Sebüktigin. The water of this
anāt reached most of the quarters of the
town. Subsequently, a number of other
anāt s were made to serve various quar-
ters of the town. amd Allāh lists eight
(all of which were waf ) and states that
according to the conditions laid down by
their founders ( wāifān ), their water was
to be used for drinking purposes and for
ammām s and was not to be let into gar-
dens or cultivated land. In some places,
notably Yazd, anāts flow through the
houses and the householders have the
right to use the water for drinking pur-
poses. Nāir-i ‡ usraw mentions that
some of the houses in Arra ¡ ān also had
a anāt running through them.
The provision of drinking water was
considered a meritorious action. Many
individuals made anāts and constituted
them into awāf for the drinking water of
a town or one of its quarters. For example,

a wafiyya , dated 941/1534, constitutes
part of the water of the river of Astarābād
into a waf . The founder ( wāif ) laid down
that the water, when it reached the town,
should be let into the houses and cisterns
( awhā ) and ammāms and that as soon as
one place had taken water, the remainder
should be let into the next place, and that
in times when water was scarce, no one
should use more than was necessary. The
founder also stipulated that rice should
not be cultivated with the water of the
waf , which was to flow into the town.
Many āb-anbār s were also constituted into
waf by those who built them. There are
also many drinking fountains ( saā- ¶ āna )
in the bazaars and streets of the towns
similarly constituted into waf .
A shortage of drinking water in many
villages and towns, especially in south-
ern Persia, was a common occurrence.
Bihbihān, for example, appears to have
been short of water in the middle of
the 17th century, the people relying on
rain-water for two months in winter and
spring. In Dihda ª t, snow was brought
from nearby mountains to supplement the
drinking water supply. In modern times,
with the increase in urbanisation, water
shortages have been a serious problem in
many towns. In the middle of the 19th cen-
tury, ā ¡¡ ī Mīrzā Āāsī, Muammad
· āh's first minister, wished to investigate
the possibility of sinking wells with a view
to assuring the water supply of Tehran,
which was then supplied almost entirely
by anāt s, but nothing came of this. In
recent years, the water supply of Tehran
has been supplemented by water stored
in reservoirs behind dams on rivers flow-
ing from the mountains to the north of
the city.
Drinking water in the towns came under
the general supervision of the mutasib. If
water conduits were in a state of disrepair,
it was his duty to repair them, or, if there
was no money in the public treasury, to