Well construction and underground fluids in pre-industrial ages: Scientific observations, ethical speculation and medical contributions of Bernardino Ramazzini on the health and safety of Putearii (water well diggers)

The Italian scientist and physician Bernardino Ramazzini (1633-1714) is well known in the field of geosciences for his observations concerning the occurrence of underground water and the interpretation of the origin of artesian pressure (1691, De fontium mutinensium admiranda scaturigine, On the admirable water springs of Modena). He did not coined nor used the expression “artesian”, a term that prevailed only in the beginning of the XIX century in France, where many “artesian” wells were being drilled in the region of Artois. Ramazzini constructed a physical model of this phenomenon, which he attributes to the principle of communicating vessels, using it to repeat the pressure measurements with a Torricelli barometer. Ramazzini extended his scientific interests also to several geologic and stratigraphic issues, and published the first hydrogeological cross-section known in the literature, which highlights the relationship between the different hydrogeological complexes. He also anticipated the studies on atmospheric electricity, the nature of oxygen and ozone, and investigated the natural history of the well-known seepages of crude oil in the province of Modena (Montegibbio and Montefestino). At the time, this valuable olio di sasso (oleum petrae, i.e., petroleum) was actively produced from hand-dug wells or skimmed from natural seepages. Ramazzini also tried to measure water temperature and air pressure in water wells with the barometer and the thermometer used in medicine, and he published, first in the world, many charts of water temperatures up to a depth of 20 m (Ephemerides barometricae, 1695, Barometric ephemeris). In 1690, G.W. von Leibniz visited Modena and spent many days with Ramazzini, appreciating his works and his scientific methodology. In 1700 Ramazzini published his masterpiece De morbis artificum diatriba (On the diseases of workers), which remained, for more than two centuries, the main reference for the epidemiological study of occupational diseases, and which was translated into many languages. Following the teaching of Hippocrates, he coined the motto longe praestantius est praeservare quam curare (prevention is better than cure). Of great interest, also from the technological standpoint, is the chapter on the health of water well diggers (Putearii). Ramazzini is interested in observing his patients on the job, convinced that he could better identify the etiology and pathogenesis of their diseases. Ever more convinced that his patients’ conditions are attributed to environmental situations, he addresses observation to the characteristics and conditions of the environment in which they operate. The study review the technology of well construction up to the mid-XVIII Century, explore the contribution of Ramazzini in the field of hydrogeology and his descriptions of the drilling techniques developed by the water well diggers of Modena, together with their occupational diseases.