Early plumbing engineers took advantage of the steep grade of the land to devise a drainage system with lavatories, sinks and manholes. A main sewer was constructed of masonry, which linked four large stone shafts. The shafts acted as ventilators and chutes for household refuse.

Crete engineers designed drainage systems that were made from terra cotta pipes. The rain water from the roofs and the courts, and the overflows from the cisterns carried the water down into buried drains of pottery pipe. The pipes had perfect socket joints, so tapered that the narrow end of one pipe fixed tightly into the next. the tapering sections allowed a jetting action to prevent accumulation of sediment.