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III. Sanctuaries
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 February 2016
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Popular ideas about Greek places of worship are much influenced by the splendour of a few surviving temples, such as Athena’s Parthenon or Poseidon’s temple at Sounion. Yet these aesthetically pleasing but ruined and empty buildings give little insight into their former functions. So let us first look at sanctuaries proper (§ 1), then their locations (§ 2) and, finally, their secular and religious functions (§ 3).
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1. For a relatively short survey see Burkert, GR, pp. 84–98, to be supplemented now by his The Meaning and Function of the Temple’, in Fox, M. V. (ed), Temple in Society (Winona Lake, 1988), pp. 27–47 Google Scholar and ‘Greek Temple Builders: Who, Where, and Why?’, in Hägg, R. (ed), The Role of Religion in the Early Polis (Stockholm, 1995)Google Scholar. Two informative collections: Le sanctuaire grec = Entretiens Hardt 37 (Vandoeuvres and Geneva, 1992); Marinatos/Hägg, Greek Sanctuaries (good bibliography by E. Østby, 192–227).
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20. Gate: Paus. 2. 5. 4 (Corinth), 2. 18. 3 (Argos, cf. M. Piérart, Bull. Corr. Hell. 106, 1982, 141–9), 2. 35. 11 (Hermione); in general, Olmods, R., LIMC III. 1 (1986)Google Scholar, s.v. Contra Kearns, ‘Between God and Man’, p. 74, who neglects the abnormality of the goddess’s sacrificial victim (a dog: Ch. IV.2) and the regular location of birth-goddesses outside the city (Graf, NK, 421f).
21. Poseidon’s sanctuaries are often near the sea but also in the mountains, cf. Bremmer, ‘Poseidon’; R. Schumacher, ‘Three related sanctuaries of Poseidon: Geraistos, Kalaureia and Tainaron’, in Marinatos/Hägg, Greek Sanctuaries, pp. 62–87.
22. There were no temples of Dionysus in classical times, but the name of his sanctuary in Athens, en limnais, or ‘in the marshes’, suggests locations outside the city, as does thefact that on vases Dionysus’ sanctuary is often a cave, cf. Bérard, C., ‘Axie taure’, in Mélanges. . . Paul Collart (Lausanne, 1976), pp. 61–73 Google Scholar.
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27. For the hero-sanctuaries see Kearns, ‘Between God and Man’, although I differ from her interpretation on heroes at the gates (74), cf. Graf, NK, 173–6 (Apollo).
28. Cf. J. S. Rusten, ‘Geíton héros: Pindar’s Prayer to Heracles (N. 7.86-101) and Greek Popular Religion’, HSCP 87 (1983), 289–97, esp. 296 (quotation). Rusten has overlooked the onomastic evidence, which, curiously, was especially popular in the Megarid, cf. Robert, L., Opera minora selecta 5 (Amsterdam, 1989), p. 261 Google Scholar.
29. These aspects are under-researched, but see Ghinatti, F., ‘Manifestazioni votive, iscrizioni e vita economica nei santuari della Magna Grecia’, Studia Patavina 30 (1983), 241–322 Google Scholar.
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31. See most recently Letoublon, F., ‘Le vocabulaire de la supplication en grec’, Lingua 52 (1980), 325-36CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Parker, Miasma, pp. 181–6; Mikalson, Honor Thy Gods, pp. 69–77.
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36. It was not until the fourth century that these treasures, which the inviolability of sanctuaries had always protected, became the object of looting, cf. Parker, Miasma, pp. 170–6; Pritchett, W., The Greek State at War 5 (Berkeley etc., 1991), pp. 160-8Google Scholar.
37. Selinus: SEG 34.970. Temples as banks: Parker, Miasma, pp. 170–5; C. Ampolo, ‘Fra economia, religione e politica: tesori e offerte nei santuari greci’, Scienze dell’Antichità (henceforth SA) 3–4 (1989-90), 271–9; T. Linders, ‘Sacred Finances: Some Observations’, in Linders/Alroth, Economics of Cult, pp. 9–13.
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