A fine example of indigenous folk architecture and rare example of water-permeable corbelling are the shepherds’ cisterns of the village of Draga Bašćanska. A dozen or so of them are scattered over the common pastures (komunada) on the barren northeastern plateau above Baška. They have been built, maintained and used by the local shepherds who graze their sheep in the common pastures during the summer half of the year.

These cisterns are exceptional for having an above-ground dry stone shelter with a water-permeable roof, usually corbelled or partly corbelled, built above the underground storage tank. The flat outside surface of the roof is the (only) rainwater catchment area, while the false dome lets the harvested water permeat down into the reservoir. The shelter protects drinking water from pollution and ensures natural cooling due to constant streaming of air through the dry walling, driven by sunshine which heats one side of the building at a time. Since the water inside is only for people, the building usually has a narrow entrance, a sqeeze stile, impassable by sheep. A small vestibule follows, from which a stone staircase leads down and inside to the water.