ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on myriad concepts and perceptions associated with water in Italy from ancient times to the present day. Naturally, given the available space, only a partial and incomplete picture may be traced in the attempt to reconstruct the sense of awe and sacredness that water once invoked in specific cultural contexts. In prehistoric times, water had ritual and sacred connotations far beyond its economic and functional value. This is amply confirmed by numerous archaeological findings in various parts of the Italian peninsula. Exceptional among these remains are those found in Sardinia, an island located at the centre of important navigational routes in the Mediterranean since earliest times. The chapter outlines the Mediterranean Italy, over the last 100 years or so, water has been downgraded from a sacred symbol of life. In Italy, as in many developed countries, innumerable forms of free flowing water have been replaced nowadays by the urban and economic mechanisms of piped water.
