ABSTRACT
The Romans are famous for building majestic aqueducts, but the institutional infrastructure, especially law, is as significant as the aqueducts themselves since technology alone was not sufficient to resolve competition over the water supply. In fact, the English word “rival” derives from the Roman word rivalis, or “a person who shared a canal.” To manage this competition, the Romans developed water rights for both public water systems supplied by aqueducts and for shared water sources on private land. This paper evaluates Roman water rights in three case studies from the early Roman Empire (ca. 27 BC – AD 250): the private property regime of servitudes, a small public aqueduct in Venafrum, Italy, and an irrigation community on the Ebro River in Spain. Each case study analyzes ownership, access, community, and enforcement. The analysis shows that water rights were most socially adequate and most effective at minimizing the problems of free-riders and defection when they were integrated into local communities.
