Ancient Egypt

Around 2000 BC there were four major civilisations: the Egyptian in the Nile Valley, the Sumerian in Mesopotamia (now Iraq), the Harappans in the Indus valley in India, while in China a civilisation grew up on the banks of the Huanghe (Yellow River). None of these people, as far as we know, measured rain or thought about where it came from.

The Egyptians and Sumerians did, however, undertake considerable hydrologic engineering works between 3200 and 600 BC for water supplies, through the construction of dams and irrigation channels (Fig. 1.1). They also undertook the construction of elaborate underground tunnels (qanāt systems) for the transport of water over great distances (Biswas 1970).

The ancient Hebrews

The Hebrews in Palestine collected together old stories told verbally for generations, and from them the Old Testament of the Bible grew. While there are numerous references to rain, there is little to suggest that there was any understanding of its cause. Middleton (1965) remarks that most of the Old Testament references to rain merely stressed how welcome it was, and adds that the Hebrews were satisfied simply to marvel at Nature.

The Greeks

On the other hand, the Greeks, close neighbours of the Hebrews, began around 600 BC to question the processes of the natural world and to pursue knowledge for its own sake, rather than for purely practical purposes.