Since the dawn of our species, being conscious of water has been vital to our survival, health, and social behavior.
Hundreds of thousands of years before the written word, humans thought and communicated about water. Besides being essential for survival, water remains a mysterious fluid that science continues to research and study.
Prior to the invention of writing, communication about water found expression in human sign language and the spoken word.
An important turning point in the correct human grasp of the hydrologic cycle came in 1580 with the publication of Bernard Palissy's book,
Discours admirables
. Palissy, a potter by trade, was a keen observer of nature and the workings of water. In
Discours admirables
, Palissy presented a concept of the hydrologic cycle that is accurate according to today's definition. Palissy's book also provided other new hydrologic concepts such as the origin of springs and rivers, how wells are recharged from nearby rivers, the hydrodynamics of artesian wells, the use of forestation for controlling erosion, and plans for constructing fountains for domestic water supply.
It was not until the late 1600s, however, that Edmund Halley, of Halley's Comet fame, actually proved that Palissy's theory was correct. Using his sense of observation and mathematical skills, Halley roughly figured the quantity of water draining from all the rivers of North Africa and Europe into the Mediterranean. From this, Halley determined that the combined flow was about equal to the water falling as rain or snow on the region's drainage area.
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