Editing Grotto (section)

==Antiquity==
[[File:طاق بستان 1.jpg|thumb|Two vaulted grottoes called [[Taq-e Bostan]], located in Iran, [[Sassanian Empire|Sassanian]] era]]
Grottoes were very popular in [[Ancient Greece|Greek]] and [[Ancient Rome|Roman]] culture. Spring-fed grottoes were a feature of Apollo's oracles at [[Delphi]], [[Corinth]], and [[Clarus]].<ref>G. W. Elderkin, "The Natural and the Artificial Grotto", ''Hesperia'' '''10'''.2 (April – June 1941), pp. 125–137, gives numerous well-known ancient Greek examples, natural and architectural, with some details of their sites.</ref> The [[Hellenistic period|Hellenistic]] city of [[Rhodes]] was designed with rock-cut artificial grottoes incorporated into the city, made to look natural.<ref>E. E. Rice, "Grottoes on the Acropolis of Hellenistic Rhodes", ''The Annual of the British School at Athens'' '''90''' (1995), pp. 383–404.</ref> At the great Roman sanctuary of [[Palestrina|Praeneste]] south of Rome, the oldest portion of the primitive sanctuary was situated on the second lowest terrace, in a grotto in the natural rock where a spring developed into a well. According to tradition, Praeneste's sacred spring had a native [[nymph]], who was honored in a grotto-like watery [[nymphaeum]].<ref>A.R.A. van Aken, "Some Aspects of Nymphaea in Pompeii, Herculaneum and Ostia" ''[[Mnemosyne (journal)|Mnemosyne]]'', Fourth Series, '''4'''.3/4 (1951), pp. 272–284</ref>