The karst landscapes of southern Italy, even though showing lack or scarce
presence of water at the surface, host a variety of ancient hydraulic works realized to collect
and store water resources, at the advantage of the local settlements and for agricultural
purposes. Ancient populations were forced to gain a deep knowledge of the territory in order
to exploit the few available water resources, and developed at this aim several techniques,
until reaching a high level of capability to collect, transport, and distribute water, even at long
distances. Many areas in southern Italy still nowadays present hydraulic works of remarkable
interest and historical values, which are briefly described in the present paper, together with
other features used for water storage in karst