SHORETHING · Sanctuaries, Harbors, and Religion along the Edges of Territory in the Greek Peloponnese

Coastlines were a type of frontier by which ancient Greek territories were accessed, and sanctuaries at harbors or landing places may have served similar functions for those entering or passing through a region as their counterparts along inland borders. Research on the permeability of borders and problems of access has resonance today, especially the importance of the coast for refugees or disputes over maritime boundaries. Yet the presumed correlation between the location of border sanctuaries and their functions has largely been approached through top-down political models of city-state (polis) development or tangential to studies on particular deities or regions, while coastal sanctuaries have largely been studied within the themes of maritime religion and long-distance trade networks. SHORETHING combines these two categories of sacred space and adopts a holistic, long-duree approach to investigate coastal sanctuaries across the southern Peloponnese. Datasets will be developed for the study area integrating archaeological material, textual sources, and geospatial information on movement and access, including ancient roads and harbor installations, and traditional footpaths. The researcher will be trained in geomatics technologies and digital heritage approaches which will increase her expertise as an archaeologist of Greek religion and in digital humanities. Results of the study will illuminate relationships between cult practices, the landscape, and political and ethnic organization, and provide insight into the lived experience in coastal and border locations. Project dissemination and outreach will include the publication of data, conferences and workshops to spark dialogue about coastal communities, religious practices, and border issues, and an interactive GIS-based website that promotes the study of this topic and introduces users to some of the more liminal landscapes of the Peloponnese and the perspectives of local residents living alongside them.