Underground Rivers - University of New Mexico

Siphoning
Chapter 10 -- Geophysical, Pnuematic and Electromagnetic Engines
Da Vinci liked the idea of siphoned underground waters. It's his artwork in the graphic.
The water of the ocean cannot make its way from the bases to the tops of the mountains which
bound it, but only so much rises as the dryness of the mountain attracts. And if, on the
contrary, the rain, which penetrates from the summit of the mountain to the base, which is the
boundary of the sea, descends and softens the slope opposite to the said mountain and
constantly draws the water, like a siphon which pours through its longest side, it must be this
which draws up the water of the sea.
"Which pours through its longest side" indicates that da Vinci understood the principle.
Thus if s-n were the surface of the sea, and the rain descends from the top of the mountain a to
n on one side, and on the other sides it descends from a to m, without a doubt this would occur
after the manner of distilling through felt, or as happens through the tubes called siphons.
“Distilling through felt” would seem to refer to capillary action, a mechanism discussed shortly, but
da Vinci was one to cover all bases.
Much more has been speculated regarding siphoned springflow, but for that we'll wait until
Chapter 44. Needles to say, of course, is that it doesn't trump gravity.
Sloshing
Springs
Ocean
Springs
Ocean
Of Kircher's several -- and sometimes conflicting -- geologic explanations for springflow, one
involves seawater drawn into the earth's interior at the North Pole and expressed at the South
Pole. (We've a map of the route in Chapter 15, The Maelstrom, and will thrill to tales of
adventurous descents into such passages in Chapters 16-25) Subterranean sloshing causes the
tides which in turn surge seawater through hidden channels to upland springs. High winds
hasten the process
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