Modern Description:
Vrontados ends, to the north, at the mouth of a ravine: at this site, between mountain and torrent and sea, a Sanctuary to Cybele was established perhaps as early as the 6th century BC. Its remains are known as the Daskalópetra, or ‘Teacher's Stone', sometimes just referred to as ‘Homer's Rock' because it was long considered to be the spot where Homer taught his pupils the poet's art. The predominantly Ionic nature of the mixed dialect of Homer's epics, has always been taken to suggest the poet's origins in this part of the Greek world, and Chios and Smyrna (modern Izmir) on the mainland opposite have traditionally had the strongest claims to have been his birthplace. What the visitor sees here is an outcrop of limestone whose upper surfaces have been fashioned by hand into a terrace; in the middle of this is a roughly cuboid protrusion of the bedrock – originally a throne – on whose sides the very eroded reliefs of lions and (at the four lower corners) lions' claws can just be perceived. The throne faced due east; the knob of stone in the middle of the east face probably corresponds to the knees of the seated divinity. To one side, a raised lip of rock has been fashioned into the form of a long stone bench. The wild setting of the gorge, the overhanging mountains, the torrent and the shore, all combine to make a site typical of such ancient sanctuaries; the rock protrusion was the altar, and the bench, a defining part of the ritual area frequented by celebrants. The lion reliefs help to identify the cult as that of Cybele, the great mother-goddess of Anatolia – mistress of wild nature, which was symbolised by her ever-present, attendant lions. Cybele, who was later associated with and integrated into the Hellenic pantheon as Demeter, was widely honoured on Chios, and this may have been one of her principal sanctuaries. Archaeological finds from this area (now in the Museum in Chios) of votive offerings and inscriptions confirm the identity of the cult: it took place in the open air, and often involved ecstatic states, inducing prophetic rapture and insensibility to pain. Cybele's strong presence on the island is witness to the rich cross-fertilization of different cults between east and west in the early historic period in this part of the Aegean.
Wikidata ID: Q38281165
Info: McGilchrist's Greek Islands 
(From McGilchrist’s Greek Islands, © Nigel McGilchrist 2010, excerpted with his gracious permission. Click for the books)
