Halfway around Skopelos Bay is the site of an ancient city. Digging has exposed a hospital/spa which was famous in classical time, the Asclepion.
The healing temples of Asclepios originated about the sixth century B.C. By the fourth century B.C. temples were in many places on the mainland and one had been built on Skopelos.
The Asclepieian temples were extremely popular among both rich and poor. Rather than forerunners of hospitals, they seem to have been in modern terms a mixture of religious shrine and health spa.
Each Asclepieian temple was a conglomeration of buildings and areas, depending in size and opulence on its wealth and influence. The dominant structure was usually the main temple, in which a statue of the god was given a prominent place. A round building, the tholos, contained water for purification, sometimes in a pool or, as here on Skopelos, bubbling from a sacred spring. Here, paintings and decorations were frequent.
Statues of various members of the family of Asclepios were often to be seen either in the temple or within its compounds. Somewhere in the precincts, on the entrance gates or before the portals, were tablets describing earlier miraculous cures and votive offerings which expressed gratitude for successful results.
The most important structure to the ailing suppliant was the incubation site, the abaton, This is what the dig has uncovered on Skopelos. All the preparations and anticipations were prelude to what happened within the abaton, where the patient went to sleep until he was visited by the god. The actual cure took place in the worshiper's dreams.
The dig on Skopelos has also uncovered an important ancient well where many valuable offerings were found, as well as the remains of the worship place of a female deity, probably Artemis.
Within the past two years the archaeologists have brought to light most of the southern portico of the temple, which surrounds the shrine from three (and perhaps four) sides, and apparently was very well constructed and impressive in its appearance.
Furthermore, the excavations revealed marble statues mainly of young children, many fragments of Athenian pottery and 5th century coins, as well as roof tiles that are bearing seals naming Asclepius, and confirm that the monument was Asclepieion.
New findings of the excavation in the Asclepieion of Peparithou has been presented by the head of the XIII Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities, Mr Intzesiloglou during the 3rd Conference of the Archaeological Project in Thessaly and Central Greece 2006-2008.
The most important structure to the ailing suppliant was the incubation site, the abaton, This is what the dig has uncovered on Skopelos. All the preparations and anticipations were prelude to what happened within the abaton, where the patient went to sleep until he was visited by the god. The actual cure took place in the worshiper's dreams.
The intention is to build a small museum on the archaeological site in order to display finds discovered during the dig., which has uncovered only a very small part of the original area. Unfortunately, most of this important classical site has disappeared under the sea.