Kourion Complex (Apollo) post 1945 (1 of 2)

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site. These drains originate near Cistern 1. They look as though they were to bring water into the cistern but this, of course, was not the case. The drain of Street 1 runs into the main square drain south of the south end of the Street. The pipe which appears to have brought clean water from cistern 2 to cistern 3 passed through the drain over a supporting slab which is still extant. A stretch of the pipe line can still be seen just south of the Votive pit.

The Votive Deposits

The Votive pit is to our right as we enter street 1 from the square. It was usual in antiquity for a visitor to the sanctuary to make a gift to the god, possibly a juglet, but more often than not a small terracotta figurine. In the course of time the quantity of these must have presented a considerable storage problem to the priests of Apollo. Probably soon after the earthquake of 76-77 A.D. it was decided to dig a pit, line it with a rubble wall, and pile up inside a portion of the many votive offerings which had accumulated over a period of some 600 years. The innumerable objects from this pit date from the 5th century B.C. to the end of the 1st century A.D.

A more widely scattered votive deposit was found in the Archaic Precinct (fig. 1). The objects found there date from the 8th to the 5th century B.C. From both deposits the greater quantity of objects by far were figurines. As a result of the great number we now have, it has been possible to trace the history of terracotta figurine making from one workshop over a period of 1000 years.

Street 1

Street 1, like the square was, of course, only for pedestrians. Passing up the street we see on our right an elaborate building