Excerpt from The Design and Construction of Dams: Including Masonry, Earth, Rock-Fill, Timber, and Steel Structures, Also the Principal Types of Movable Dams

The remains of ancient works still existing in India and Ceylon bear evidence that the construction of reservoirs for storing water dates from a very remote period of his tory. The ordinary manner of forming these basins, some of which were of vast extent, consisted in closing a valley by dams of earth; and it was not until comparatively recent times that walls of masonry were employed for such purposes. This method of con' struction seems to have been first adopted in the southern part of Spain, where, about the sixteenth century, large reservoirs for irrigation were constructed. Much as these early masonry dams excite our admiration by their great dimensions and massiveness, their pro. Portions demonstrate that their designers had no correct conception of the forces to be resisted. By a faulty distribution the great mass of material in some of these walls pro. Duces undue strains in the masonry or on the foundation, becoming thus a source of weakness rather than of strength. Prior to the middle of the last century most ma sonry dams were built according to defective plans. It has been shown, indeed, that some of these walls would have been stronger had their positions been reversed, the down-stream face being turned up-stream.

The French engineers advanced the first rational theory of masonry dams, and proved its correctness by applying it in the construction of some of the highest and boldest reservoir walls of the present time. By means of the great storage basins thus obtained, they control the flow of rivers, retaining the excess of water during the period of flood for the time of drought. The havoc due to inundations may thus be largely prevented, and replaced by all the benefits resulting from irrigation, domestic water supply, and the furnishing of a cheap motive power.

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