Antiquity Vol 79:305, 2005 pp 564-572 - Alun Salt and Efrosyni Boutsikas - Knowing when to consult the oracle at Delphi

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Volume: 79 Number: 305 Page: 564–572

Knowing when to consult the oracle at Delphi

Alun Salt^¹ and Efrosyni Boutsikas^²

¹School of Archaeology and Ancient History, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK. (Email: ams22@leicester.ac.uk) ²School of Archaeology and Ancient History, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK. (Email: eb42@le.ac.uk)

The cities of Greece had their own calendars, so how did they all know when the god Apollo had returned from the northern realms and it was time to consult the oracle at Delphi? The authors show that the heliacal rising of the constellation Delphinus probably provided the annual marker, and that because of the mountains it appeared to rise a month later at Delphi than elsewhere, giving would-be visitors time to travel. The landscape of Delphi was itself instrumental in creating or enhancing the cosmology of Apollo.

Keywords: Archaic and Classical period, Greece, Delphi, calendars, time, archaeo-astronomy, landscape archaeology