Historical Reference

Karez or Qanat System

This is from inside the Karez looking up through a well. I shot this in Kish Iran

Karez is a Pashto Word it is Qanat in Arabic. The karez is a system of underground channeling which usually taps a sub-surface water supply at the foot of some of the many rugged and apparently waterless hills which cover the face of the country. The water is not brought to the surface, but is carried over long distances by an underground channel or drain, which is constructed by sinking shafts at intervals along the required course and connecting the shafts by tunneling.

Some of these are very old. The one in Kish Iran is said to be over 2000 years old. To maintain these it takes work evry year to keep the channel clear. One problem in some areas is that deep wells are lowering the water table which leaves the Karez dry.

From: Life in the Moslem East

The most universal means of obtaining water is a very ingenious one. In some fold of the mountain where the presence of water is indicated a well is dug of about a yard in diameter and sometimes as deep as 150 to 200 feet. If water is found, another well is dug, some 70 or 90 feet from the first, and then a third, and so on in a straight line, and these wells are all connected underground by a tunnel, 2 or 3 feet high. Such a line of wells of ten extends for miles, the wells of course decreasing in depth as lower ground is reached, until the last one may not be over four feet deep, and then the water in one united stream is carried off by the irrigating canals. Such streams are called Rud Khaneh. Rud means river, but as rivers are so scarce in most parts of Persia, these artificial canals are all that the people can understand by the term. The quantity of water in their canals is measured by the seng—stone. They will tell you that "this river has four stones of water." A stone is a quantity of water capable of turning a small millstone—that is, a stream of water of from four to five inches in diameter. Anyone owning a " stone " of water may be considered to be in opulent circumstances.

The quantity of water given to each cultivator is estimated by so many hours a week. A gardener will tell you he has two hours of water," meaning that for two hours every week throughout the season the water is turned into his plot of ground. The owners of the wells, or "qanats," sell water by the hour, or one can obtain a partnership in a qanat. It is impossible to state the average price of water by the hour, for it varies in different parts and depends upon the quantity of water in the qanat, the situation of the village and the number of qanats it may possess. Near Teheran ten years ago, a "seng" of water once a week cost about one hundred dollars for the year. According to this estimate, a Qanat that is sold for every hour of the twenty-four will give an annual income of two thousand four hundred and eighty dollars.

The digging and preservation of these Qanats is a very costly undertaking. The men making it their profession are called "muganni," and are wonderfully clever in discovering water and in choosing the direction for their wells. They are very secretive and jealously guard the principles that guide them. There is always a risk of making a mistake, and then the owner of the kanat loses large sums, but this seldom happens. Oftener a rich source of water is found, bringing a large premium on the capital expended.

The work of digging the wells is laborious and slow. Small spades are used, and a wheel is rigged up at the mouth of the well by means of which the earth is brought up in leather buckets and emptied around the well, so that in the end each well is surrounded by a circular pile of earth and is as in a crater. So long as the earth thus piled up keeps its shape, the position of the wells is well defined, and long lines of such mounds running in all directions and often many lines parallel is one of the most characteristic features of the landscape. But when with time and the action of rains these guarding ramparts become obliterated, the kanats form a serious danger to the belated or unwary traveller, and many are the accidents caused by them.

The actual digging of the well is the easiest part of the work. The most painful is the connecting gallery or tunnel, where, owing to its lowness, the work has to be done kneeling and bent nearly double, often in a considerable depth of cold water.
Life in the Moslem East By Pierre Ponafidine, Emma (Cochran) Ponafidine Copyright, 1911, By Dodd, Mead And Company