On the eastern coast of Attica, the sanctuary of Artemis at Brauron occupies a fertile valley crossed by the Erasinos River. The setting is more than a scenic frame: water, reeds and low ground shaped how people used the area and help explain why weather can affect access today. The East Attica Ephorate says the valley was inhabited in prehistoric times, with settlement on Kommeno Lithari from the late Neolithic and especially the Early Bronze Age, roughly 3500–2000 BCE.
Archaeological evidence continues into the Middle Bronze Age, around 2000–1600 BCE, and a nearby chamber-tomb cemetery is associated with later settlement. The community on the hill was abandoned around 1200 BCE, according to the Ephorate. Centuries later the place became a major sanctuary. The earliest worship of Artemis at Brauron is dated to the ninth century BCE; the sanctuary first flourished in the seventh century and reached a major peak in the fifth and fourth centuries BCE.
