The water tower in its present form was built in 1658. It supplied water from the Vltava River to the lower part of the New Town of Prague. Water from the river was first mechanically pumped into a holding tanks at the top of the tower, then fed through wooden pipes down the tower shaft to the ground floor, from where it was fed by other pipe to the city’s fountains and houses. The tower served its original purpose until 1877.
