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CategoriesSanctuaries
Ground set apart for a god or a spirit — walled, or simply marked and understood.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Megalith
Pre-Pottery Neolithic · Hunter-gatherer (PPN A/B)
Hilltop Pre-Pottery Neolithic sanctuary with 8+ circular enclosures defined by T-shaped limestone pillars up to 5.5 m, carved with foxes, vultures, aurochs.
🇬🇷 Greece · Temple complex
Archaic to Hellenistic (700–200 BCE) · Athenian (Ionic) — Artemis Brauronia
420 BCE Doric 6×11 with 44-m pi stoa where Athenian bear-girls (arktoi) danced initiation, Iphigenia myth.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Archaic to Byzantine (1100 BCE – 600 CE) · Ionian Greek (Erythraean)
Erythraean peninsula Athena cliff temple and Sibyl throne opposite Chios.
🇺🇦 Ukraine · Rock art
Late Palaeolithic to Medieval (20 ka BCE – 12th c. CE) · Epipalaeolithic, Sredny Stog, Yamna, Catacomb, Scythian, Sarmatian, Turkic steppe cultures
Azov steppe sandstone hill with 87 grottoes and 3,000 petroglyphs from Palaeolithic to Turkic.
🇷🇺 Russia · Rock art
Neolithic to Early Medieval (6000 BCE – 800 CE) · Neolithic Altai, Afanasievo, Okunev, Karasuk, Pazyryk, Kok-Pash, Turkic Khaganate
Chuysky gorge 5,000-image palimpsest 6 ka BCE to Turkic across Katun-Chuya confluence.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Archaic to Late Antiquity (1000 BCE – 600 CE) · Ionian Greek and Roman / Artists of Dionysus guild
Hermogenes' canonical Dionysus temple 208 BCE — largest Dionysac sanctuary and theatre guild capital.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Classical to Hellenistic (Iliadic tradition to 150 BCE) · Aeolian Greek and later Pergamene sphere
Iliad's Mouse-Apollo temple 150 BCE Ionic pseudodipteral with Homeric friezes, Homeric cult.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Classical to Hellenistic (350–100 BCE peak) · Dorian Greek (Knidian polis)
Peninsula-tip Demeter terrace Doric prostylos with thesmophoria pits and Knidos double harbour.
🇪🇬 Egypt · Buried city
Ptolemaic to Byzantine (c.300 BCE – 350 CE) · Ptolemaic Greek / Roman Egyptian
Crocodile-god island town on Lake Moeris — eastern mole harbour 400 m east of town 1–2 m under salt wash, with 320 m sphinx dromos.
🇷🇺 Russia · Submerged site
Archaic to Roman (c.580 BCE – 300 CE) · Milesian Greek
Taman 'Gardens' Aphrodite polis — eastern necropolis and lower quarter 1–3 m submerged 3 km east of Phanagoria.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Archaic to Byzantine (1100 BCE – 600 CE) · Aeolian/Ionian Greek and Roman (Pergamene)
Hermogenes' pseudodipteral Artemis temple 150 BCE — Vitruvian beautiful after Ephesus.
🇪🇬 Egypt · Buried city
Middle Kingdom to Byzantine (c.1800 BCE – 400 CE) · Egyptian / Ptolemaic / Roman
Fayum southern Tebtunis on Bahr canal mouth — quay and bridge harbour basin 1–2 m under field silt, cartonnage papyrus source.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic (Lysimachus to Attalid) · Ionian Hellenistic (Hermogenes architect) and Tean Technitai guild
110-m-north altar courtyard and Technitai guild hall of Teos Dionysus sanctuary.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Tell
Chalcolithic to Byzantine; Phrygian-Roman sanctuary peak · Phrygian → Galatian Tolistobogii → Roman Galatia
Mother-goddess sanctuary-city of Cybele — Phrygian terraces, Hellenistic temple and Roman acropolis buried under Ballıhisar mound on Sangarios.
🇪🇬 Egypt · Buried city
Middle Kingdom to Byzantine (c.1850 BCE – 600 CE) · Egyptian Middle Kingdom / Ptolemaic / Roman
Fayum southern temple town Medinet Madi — Middle Kingdom Renenutet temple with canal harbour quay 1–2 m under silt near Lake Moeris lagoon.
🇪🇸 Spain · Temple complex
Iron Age Orientalizing (Tartessian, c.600–400 BCE) · Tartessian–Phoenician Orientalizing (southwest Iberian)
Cancho Roano (Tartessian–Orientalizing c.600–400 BCE) on the La Serena plain is a unique mudbrick palace-sanctuary, three successive complexes (A–C) built over each other, the final 30 × 20 m…
🇷🇺 Russia · Submerged site
Archaic to Byzantine (c.580 BCE – 300 CE) · Greek / Bosporan
Bosporan grain port at Eltegen cape — lower harbour terrace 1–4 m submerged 200 m offshore in Kerch Strait.
🇰🇿 Kazakhstan · Rock art
Late Bronze to Dzungar · Wusun, Turkic, Mongol-Oirat, Tibetan Buddhist
Upper limestone cliff 35 m above the Ili left bank at Tamgaly-Tas (Kapchagai), 800 m upstream from the famous 17th-century Tibetan Buddhist panels.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic (350–150 BCE) with Roman annex · Milesian-Ionian Prieneans under Alexander patron
Council sanctuary with 640-seat Bouleuterion and Augustus calendar stoa 40 m from Athena temple.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic to Roman (220 BCE – 300 CE) · Ionian Magnesians under Hermogenes
190 m stadium and palaestra 500 m east of Leukophryene Artemis temple.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic to Roman (200 BCE – 250 CE) · Seleucid foundation to Rhodian to Roman Karian
Largest Hekate temple 8×11 with Gigantomachy frieze linked via 9 km Sacred Way to city.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hekatomnid to Roman (351 BCE – 300 CE) · Hekatomnid Karian to Roman Mylasa
Mountain Zeus sanctuary 680 m with Maussollian androns on sacred way from Milas.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic to Roman Hadrianic (200 BCE – 200 CE) · Karian to Roman Asia Euromian
Best-preserved Corinthian Zeus temple 6×11 with 17 standing columns at Milas plain.
🇹🇷 Turkey · Temple complex
Hellenistic to Roman (300 BCE – 300 CE) · Ionian Teian with Hellenistic king patronage
Upper terrace of Technitai Dionysus sanctuary above theatre and harbour.
