Water technology in ancient Vienna
Vienna’s drinking water is of excellent quality since most of the water is piped directly from the Alpine source into the city. Some 1800 years before the construction of the first Vienna “Hochquelle” water line, spring water was piped from the Vienna Woods into what was to become the Roman legionary garrison “Vindobona”.

Parts of this water line were uncovered by Novalski, Proksch and Kubitschek at the end of the 19th, beginning of the 20th century. By entering further locations of finds on a map, a sketchy reconstruction of the route of this waterline was able to be established, whereby the points between the locations were interpolated. The water line followed the terrain for the most part, although it had to cross a few valleys, streams and rivers and lead to the military camp in today’s 1st district of Vienna.

Most of the Roman water line for Vindobona ran just under the surface of the ground. The levelling of the water line was carried out by the engineer who used a special instrument, the chorobates, to measure and calculate the gradient. Bridges (aqueducts) were used so that a sufficiently uniform gradient of the water line could be maintained. Tunnels and pressure pipes were also great engineering challenges of those times.

Other chapters in Vindobona II show the technology behind the utilization of water, for instance in Roman public baths, which were available both in military installations and in the civilian city, a Roman well house as well as mills driven by water wheels.

Because their water consumption was so high, Roman forts and settlements had an extremely efficient sewerage system. A relatively large number of finds, carefully worked coverings for the sewers, indicate a well-developed sewerage system in Vindobona. The building of sewers in military installations had high priority and was a tremendous engineering challenge. This subject completes the 2nd part of Vinbobona – Wasser technology in ancient Vienna.