At Qasr el-Leja, a cistern in the courtyard and two outside of it were supplied with rainwater. However, there is at least one obvious and fundamental difference between the water system at Qumran and those found at the other sites. At Qumran, there are no clearly identifiable bath houses or built bathtubs; only cisterns and pools, many of which were used as miqva’ot (see Chapter 7). The existence of an extensive water system at Qumran is significant because it indicates that the inhabitants possessed