Games and Oracular Practices Around the Hearth: The “Table of Offerings” from the so-called Temple 4 at Kition-Kathari (Cyprus)

Abstract

Abstract In the sanctuary of Kition-Kathari (Cyprus), a building with benches, identified as a temple (“Temple 4”), is characterized in its centre by a hearth pit next to a trapezoidal stone construction, constituting “Altar E”. The platform’s surface comprises a series of little cup-holes. Once labelled “table of offerings”, it has recently been interpreted as a gaming table. Besides clay gaming stones, this area has yielded knucklebones as well as several deposits of incised scapulae linked with divination practices. This Cypriot context gives us the opportunity to explore and also to put in light the influences and interactions between different regions of the Eastern Mediterranean at the turn of the 1st millennium BC.