Description
Book SynopsisCave and Worship in Ancient Greece brings together a series of stimulating chapters contributing to the archaeology and our modern understanding of the character and importance of cave sanctuaries in the fi rst millennium BCE Mediterranean.
Written by emerging and established archaeologists and researchers, the book employs a fascinating and wide range of approaches and methodologies to investigate, and interpret material assemblages from cave shrines, many of which are introduced here for the fi rst time. An introductory section explores the emergence and growth of caves as centres of cult and religion. The chapters then probe some of the meanings attached to cave spaces and votive materials such as terracotta fi gurines, and ceramics, and those who created and used them. The authors use sensory and gender approaches, discuss the identity of the worshippers, and the contribution of statistical analysis to the role of votive materials. At the heart of the volume is the
Trade Review
The volume serves as a sturdy base for future cave explorations across the Mediterranean that will encourage fresh avenues of interpretation, but readers should be prepared for varying terms across chapters (“sacred caves,” “ritual caves,” etc.) that may or may not indicate the same ancient reality. While the study of Greek caves is not new, this book proposes the ongoing need for systematic cave studies, proves the continuing influence of survey and landscape archaeology, and reminds us that caves, their finds, and their diachronic human use, are a fundamental part of both the archaeological and religious heritage.
Tyler Jo Smith, University of Virginia, Religious Studies Review
The volume offers substantive contribution to the study of cultic cave sites and provides interesting avenues for future scholarship on the topic of Greek cave sites as places of cult practice.
Alexandra Creola, ARYS: Antiquity, Religions and Societies
Table of Contents1. Introduction: On Reading Caves and Ancient Greek Cult; 2.The Dawn of Ancient Greek Cave Cult: Prehistoric Cave Sanctuaries; 3. Caves as Sites of Sensory and Cognitive Enhancement: The Idaean Cave on Crete; 4. Caves and Consumption: The Case of Polis Bay, Ithaca; 5. Communities, Consumption, and a Cave: The Profile of Cult at Drakaina Cave on Kephallonia; 6. A River Ran Through It: Circulating Images of Ritual and Engaging Communities in a Cave in Aitoloakarnania; 7.The Cave of Pan at Marathon, Attica: New Evidence for the Performance of Cult in the Historic Era; 8. The Face of Cave Rituals: Terracotta Figurines in Greek Sacred Caves; 9. Cult and Ritual in Cycladic Caves; 10. Grottoes and the Construction of Cult in Southern Italy
