The only oracle of the dead (nekromanteion) so far discovered lies just outside the village of Mesopótamos, near the west coast of Epirus. The village can be reached on the new road which runs south from Igoumenítsa (51km/32mi) or from the port of Párga (24km/14mi).
The road to the Nekromanteion branches off on the left just before the entrance to the village. The land now occupied by rice-fields was formerly Lake Akherousia, which has been drained and taken into cultivation. Through the lake flowed Acheron, the river of the dead, which rises in the Tomaris hills and flows into the sea to the west.
The Acheron and the Kokytos, flowing down from the north, formed a right angle, in which the ancients saw the entrance to the underworld; and the existence of an oracle of the dead here is referred to as early as Homer.
This cult site, situated on a conical hill under a chapel of St John, was excavated by Sotir Dakaris between 1958 and 1964. It belonged to the city of Ephyra, a short distance away to the north. According to Herodotus this was the setting of the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice. Material found here and at Ephyra dates back to the Mycenaean period (14th-13th century B.C.), but nothing is known of the early period of the oracular cult: the buildings excavated date only from about 300 B.C., and were destroyed in 198 B.C. They do, however, agree with the description given by Homer much earlier (eighth century B.C.) of Odysseus consulting the dead ("Odyssey", 10,516 ff., and 1,124 ff.). The excavator stresses the accuracy of Homer's topographical information (though his reference to the Cimmerians is an error for the Cheimerioi, a local Thesprotian people).
A late satirical description of the consultation of the dead is given by Lucian in his "Menippos".
Approaching the site from the west, we enter a courtyard surrounded by the remains of later (third century B.C.) buildings, at the south end of which, near a medieval tower house, is a Mycenaean cist tomb. The way into the inner shrine, which was probably windowless, leads along a succession of corridors (originally roofed) at right angles to one another. To the left of the north corridor are a number of rooms in which those who wanted to consult the oracle prepared themselves by a period of meditation and the use of some kind of stimulant. Beyond this are the east corridor and the south corridor, which is broken up by internal walls into a kind of labyrinth or maze. Turning right again, we come into the inmost shrine, which measures 21.8m/71.5ft by 21.65m/71ft. Its polygonal walls, fitted together with great accuracy, are 3.3m/11ft thick and still stand 3.25m/10- 1/2ft high. It consists of a central aisle and two lateral aisles, each divided into three parts, which contained pithoi (storage jars) for corn and honey and clay figures of Persephone. Through an opening in the floor of the central aisle offerings of food for the shades were deposited in the vaulted crypt below, which was held to be the uppermost part of the underground palace of Hades and Persephone. Wheels found here by the excavators pointed to some kind of mechanism by which the priest could cause figures of the dead to appear before worshippers consulting the oracle.
By climbing up on to the walls of the sanctuary it is possible to look into the chapel of St John, which is supported on concrete piers inserted by the excavators, and to enjoy an extensive view over the Acherousian plain and the sea, with the Paxí group of islands lying offshore.
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