Modern Description:
Work on the Central Greek Motorway (E-65, km 55+710 - 55+750) exposed but has now buried] the remains of an Archaic to Hellenistic rural sanctuary at Alonaki, ca. 2km southwest of modern Anavra, in the eastern foothills of Mount Katachloro (ADelt 67 [2012] Chr. 408–17). In its final phase (fourth to third century BC), the sanctuary incorporated at least three buildings. The southernmost, Building 1, was a modest, single-roomed structure (ca. 3m by 3m) of mudbrick on a stone foundation with a tiled roof, which probably served as the oikos of the deity. Noteworthy among the coroplastic and ceramic assemblages from the interior are a large female bust and a group of five large upturned kalathoi, of which one held a group of figurines and skyphidia. Several further terracotta fragments and a ceramic assemblage including small blackglazed drinking vessels, miniatures and a squat lekythos were recovered from the exterior, in an area apparently demarcated by a large, vertically set block. Building 2, a single-storey, four-roomed structure (ca. 14.5m2), lay ca. 30m to the northwest. Although heavily damaged by plant machinery, it too offered a coroplastic assemblage (including busts, figurines and a throne), as well as painted and unpainted pottery. Adjoining Building 2 at the west was a probable room (Area 1), which may have served as a storage space for offerings and ritual paraphernalia accumulated over the life of the sanctuary. A further room may have lain to the south, perhaps even a second oikos, although the structure is too heavily damaged to be certain. A pit excavated in the northwestern corner of Area 1 yielded terracotta, metal, glass and a silver obolos of Sikyon (fourth century BC). Two ‘pit-bothroi’ identified to the north of the building likely served for chthonic ritual. The northernmost, Pit A, yielded a modest bronze assemblage and had succeeded an earlier pit in the same location which offered bronzework and ironwork, glass beads and a handful of fine unpainted sherds. Pit B, in contrast, yielded busts, figurines, iron bracelets, bronze rings, amber and glass beads, and burnt and fragmented animal bones within a deposit of black, oily earth, suggestive of the practice of animal sacrifice. These pits, as well as Building 2/Area 1 were delimited at the west, south and perhaps also the east by a peribolos of unworked or roughly worked boulders and cobbles. A further series of offering pits located at a greater depth (2.5– 3.3m) in the area of Building 2 belongs to an earlier phase of the sanctuary, beginning in the seventh century BC. Pit C and the adjacent Pit C1 appear to have been used for non-sacrificial rites. Pit C yielded pottery, figurines, beads and bronzework; C1 yielded a burnt deposit of beads, horse figurines and a large group of bronze rings (Fig. 42). The deepest of the group, Pit D, however, was surrounded by traces of burning and burned and fragmentary animal bone; it yielded beads, bronzework and jewellery in the interior. A curved line of stones founded on bedrock and associated with an ashy deposit was identified in the same area; a small assemblage of Laconian tile fragments suggests the existence of a building in close proximity. Handmade and wheelthrown ceramics collected from across the site attest activity, although not necessarily ritual practice, during the Late Helladic and, to a lesser extent, during the Early Iron Age and Early Archaic period. The first phase of the sanctuary appears to have ended in destruction during the mid-fifth century BC, while the sanctuary fell out of use permanently towards the end of the first quarter of the third century BC. The substantial coroplastic assemblage (ca. 2,282 items) includes female types (seated, seated with deer, standing, standing with deer, hydriaphoroi), riders (also depicted on a number of terracotta plaques), horses (and other animals), thrones and seats. ... Archaeology in Greece 2016–2017 42.
Info: ArchInGreece 
Archaeology in Greece, in Archaeological Reports (BSA/Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies)
