ABSTRACT

The epithet delos, which assumes the force of a substantive in the name of the island, translates as “visible” or “clear.” The clarity of vision directly related to the cult of Apollo on a cosmological level came home to Delos upon the birth of the god, the single event that the island was most famed for in antiquity; most importantly, its name was not invented after the fact, as the Homeric Hymn tells. But there are other more pragmatic, if less poetic, reasons to consider Delos an early precursor for the global concepts embodied on the list. The pivotal position of the island for trade and commerce in the Mediterranean gave it the most international and cosmopolitan of reputations during the Hellenistic Roman period, perhaps its most impressive moment in terms of world archaeology. This is the period of the famous houses constituting a variety of recognizable neighborhoods still preserved on the island-evidence for a domestic architecture easily on par with that of Pompeii. Certainly Delos could have qualified for World Heritage status on this architecture alone. But Delos was ultimately host to many religions besides that of the Greek pantheon and to cults besides those of Apollo, Artemis, and their mother, Leto; and the sanctuaries built for these gods, ranging from Poseidon of Berytos, the Great Gods of Samothrace, the Egyptian Isis, the Roman Lares Compitales, the Jewish Yahweh, and the Palaeochristian St. Cyricus, make Delos the World Heritage site of antiquity, not just of our time. Out of the plethora of examples proving this phenomenon, this chapter focuses on a special location on the slopes of Mt. Kynthos, the highest geographical feature on the island, where the concept of interchange crystallizes. It is called the Terrace of the Foreign Gods.