Popular ideas about Greek places of worship are much influenced by the splendour of a few surviving temples, such as Athena’s Parthenon or Poseidon’s temple at Sounion. Yet these aesthetically pleasing but ruined and empty buildings give little insight into their former functions. So let us first look at sanctuaries proper (§ 1), then their locations (§ 2) and, finally, their secular and religious functions (§ 3).