Claros

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Claros is a prophecy center of Colophon, one of the twelve Ionic cities. Claros is built between two cities; it is 13 kilometers south of Colophon and two kilometers north of Notion. The Temple of Apollo here was a very important center of prophecy as in Delphi and Didyma. The oldest information about this sacred site goes back to the sixth and seventh centuries B.C. through the Homeric Hymns. A sacred cave near the Claros Temple of Apollo, which was an important place both in the Hellenistic and Roman eras, points to the existence of a Cybele cult in earlier periods here.

The oldest piece of information about the function of the Temple of Apollo in Claros dates back to the time of Alexander the Great. According to the Greek historian Pausanias, in his dream Alexander was told that he would set up a large new city at the base of Mt. Pagos (Kadifekale). After this dream the, king consulted the Apollo oracle at Claros and asked him to interpret the dream for him. He set up the new Smyrna after the oracle gave him the go-ahead to proceed.

Many monuments were erected in the Roman period (Pompey, Lucullus, Quintus Cicero); several took place above hellenistic foundations

[edit] Recent Excavations

The excavations made since 1988 at Claros, the sanctuary of Apollo depending on Colophon, have demonstrated that there has been there a religious area around a spring of good water since the Xth century B.C. The first known construction is a round altar of the second half of the VIIth century. Il has been covered around the middle of the VIth century by a large rectangular altar (14,85 x 6,05 m); in the same time a temple of marble was built for Apollo around the spring while Apollo’s sister, Artemis, had her own precinct and a smaller altar (3,50 x150 m): next to it were found the bases of two korai, one of which is preserved (the head is lacking). There were at least four statues of kouroi dedicated to Apollo; three of them, incomplete, have been found.

Very small changes occurred in the sanctuary between the VIth and the end of the IVth century. A new planning of the sacred area was conceived then, with monuments on a larger scale; most probably, the execution started only after the terrible events of the beginning of the IIIrd century B.C. Later in the IIIrd century the new altar and the new temple of Apollo were in construction; the adyton is well preserved and allows some understanding of the importance of the spring for inspiring the oracle.

After the first times of the Roman Province of Asia (end of IInd century B.C.), prominent citizens of Colophon helped in increasing the authority of the sanctuary, the importance of the religious competitions and the fame of the oracle. For celebrating the big sacrifices in front of a Greek and non-Greek crowd, four rows of iron rings fixed on heavy blocks allowed to kill hundred victims at the same time. Claros is the only sanctuary in the Greek world which offers a clear lecture of the way the priests could perform the hecatomb.