Panhellenic sanctuaries
Were the great meeting-places, -where one could swagger before an audience from all Greece. Perhaps the most important was Delphi, perched above a majestic valley on the slopes of Mount Parnassus in central Greece; it owed its original fame to the oracular shrine of Apollo, already mentioned by Homer, but also became the site of a great athletic festival. (Boardman, 1986)