Adriana van Zwieten discusses this in Chapter 4 of her dissertation, page 154-56 in the UMI copy. You can find the exact title on NNP.org by clicking on Education and Research, and then Bibliography. She notes that when she copied the quote below from her files (at my request), the footnote numbers did not match up, however #1 does correspond with #28, etc.] “The purpose of a small strip of land, seven inches wide, included in a conveyance on the Brouwers Straet in New Amsterdam is explained by a servitude called drop, which allowed a lot owner to pass his rainwater onto the land of his neighbor. Rainwater falling from the eaves of the house of Gillis Verbrugge and Company ran onto Isaack de Foreest’s lot, which by common law was illegal, for water had to be led over Verbrugge’s own land and thence, if necessary, out to the street. Verbrugge was granted the drop privilege that allowed the water from his eaves to fall as it may. However he could not build too near his neighbor, and in fact, had to break off his eaves, allowing seven inches for the drip from his roof, which could then run at will.[1] Aldert Coninck was granted “a free drop . . . of 8 ins.” on the east side facing the lot and house of Asser Levy on the Slyck Steegh in 1662.[2] The space between the houses of Jan Hendricksen Steelman and Evert Duyckingh on the East River was very small. Steelman’s deed of 1661 noted that the south side of Duyckingh’s lot was built on “to extreme line without any drop” and on north east there was a drop of four inches.[3] Henk J. Zantkuyl notes that early urban dwellings in the Netherlands could not take up the entire width of a property, for an open space, or oysen-drop, on both sides of the house was required for the flow of the rainwater falling from the eaves.[4] Local usage or by-laws varied concerning the width of the drop in the seventeenth century. In Holland, Grotius noted it was five inches or according to local statutes. New Amsterdam’s deeds recorded from four to eight inches. An ordinance of Amsterdam set the Husyen-drop at “seven duymen,” or about seven inches. Workmen were fined two guilders in Amsterdam if they made the space narrower than seven inches.[5] The shift from Dutch to English government in 1664 apparently did not affect the old Dutch customs. The confirmation of Aldert Coninck’s property on the Slyck Steegh in 1667 by Governor Richard Nicholls preserved the eight-inch space on the east side for a gutter. Laurens van der Spiegel’s lot on the canal included “a small slip on both sides of Seaven Inches.” In like manner, Governor Edmund Andros specifically allowed “Seven Inches of Ground for Droppings,” when he reissued a block of attached houses on Winckel Straet in 1680 that had formerly belonged to the West India Company.[6]” 28. Grotius, Jurisprudence of Holland, trans. Lee, 1:28-30, 226-227, 282-83; Lee, Roman-Dutch Law, 168. New York County, Deeds, Liber (1654-62, microfiche; translations from original Dutch), 29 (hereafter cited as NY County, Deeds (1654-62); Stokes, Iconography of Manhattan, 2:379. A servitude related to drop was drop-vang, which was the right to receive rainwater from another’s property. Grotius, Jurisprudence of Holland, trans. Lee, 1:226-27. 29. NY County, Deeds (1654-62), 282; NYSA, Patents, 2:119; Stokes, Iconography of Manhattan, 2:401. 30. NY County, Deeds (1654-62), 232-33; Stokes, Iconography of Manhattan, 2:405. 31. Henk J. Zantkuyl, “The Netherlands Town House: How and Why it Works,” in eds. Blackburn and Kelley, New World Dutch Studies. Dutch Arts and Culture in Colonial America, 1609-1776 (Albany, 1987), 144. 32. Grotius, Jurisprudence of Holland, trans. Lee, 1:226-27; Rooseboom, Recueil van Amsterdam, 233-34. 33. NYSA, Patents, 2:42, 119; 5:5, 9; Stokes, Iconography of Manhattan, 2:381, 383, 401. The attached houses were referred to in the records as “The Five Houses of the West India Company.” They were built prior to 1638.