Abstract
This paper explores the reciprocal relationship between landscape, human attention, and time. It presents two sacred landscapes: Epidaurus and Nemea, located in the northeastern Greek Peloponnese. In both landscapes, worshipers created sanctuaries on prominent mountains. Eventually, their attention shifted downhill where they built larger, monumental sanctuaries on the flat ground. I trace each mountains’ role as a sacred landmark; I question what other social functions they had – if at all – after the new sanctuaries were built. I consider a wide range of evidence: beginning with a comparative example from Mount Fuji in Japan, and moving onto the archaeological excavation and survey data, ancient testimonials, and modern tourist reviews about the Greek sanctuaries. I also use Geographic Information Systems to quantify each Greek sanctuaries’ visual impact in comparison to the surrounding topography. Woven together, these data reveal generations of sacral continuity. The Sanctuary of Asklepios and the Sanctuary of Zeus encircled new sacred temenoi, but worshipers’ collective memory guided their pathways and vision; the mountains remained sacred landmarks.