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94 ChristianeZimmermann (Fig. 2), father of Kenchrias, and lord over life and death at sea, located on the forum’s west terrace.71 Despite the absence of water from cultic rituals in Corinth after the city’s re-founding by theRomans, the refreshing atmosphere of baths and themyths and stories linked to the foun- tains offered a local encyclopaedia connecting water with purification, renewal, and stories about life,death,andtransformation.72Thus,baptismmostprobablydovetailedwith thegener- al importanceandconnotationsofwater inCorinth.Christbelieversdiscussingdifferentmodels of baptismandpractising baptism interacted ‘with the complex cultural situation that typified life’ inCorinth.73 LateAntiquebaptisteries inCorinth Christianity inCorinthspreadduringthefirstcenturies:Clement, thebishopofRome,addressed a letter to theCorinthians at thebeginningof the 2nd centuryAD, exhorting the still-confronta- tional Corinthian Christians to be humble; a number ofmartyrs are known from the times of prosecution, includingSilas,Kyriakos,andLeonidas.74But therearenoarchaeological remains to help reconstruct baptismal rites, rooms, or churches from the 2nd to the 6thcenturies AD.75 After the Pauline letters that confirm the growing importance of baptism, there are nohints in the following centuries regarding thedevelopment of baptism inCorinth. In the6thcenturyADthesituationchanges.Variouschurcheswerebuilt (Lechaionbasilica, Quadratusbasilica,Kraneionbasilica;abasilicawithamartyrion;76basilica inSkutela),77possi- bly inconnectionwith thebuildingpolicy supportedbyEmperor Justinianandaresulting local competition.78 None of these basilicaswas built in the centre of Corinth79 (Fig.3), a phenom- enon thatmighthave its cause in theapparent connectionof thechurcheswithChristianceme- teries.80Theeffect of thisbuildingpolicy seems tohavebeenamost visible sacralisationof the landscapearoundCorinth,pointing toChristianityas themajor religionat this entrancegate to the Peloponnes.81 ‘The basilicas announce visually, aurally and olfactorily that Corinth was Christian […] thebasilicasproclaimed that thearistocracy,and theEmpirewere fully insupport of this Christianity’.82 71 Concannon 2016, 97; Robinson 2011, 201; Fouquet 2019, 60–62. Another prestigious central fountainwas built in theSouthStoaof the forum,Fouquet 2019, 79f. 72 Concannon 2016, 91–93, connects thePeirene fountainwith the tamingof Pegasus byBellerophon, but this is only one–certainly important– element of themyth. 73 DeMaris 2008, 50. 74 Pallas 1990, 748. 75 In the fountainofLamps,however, some4,000 lampswere found,many inscribedwithChristian invocations, whichmight be connectedwithbaptism, seeBrown2018, 131f. 76 Pallas 1990, 764, dates it to the timeof Justinian I. 77 Brown2018, 147, counts ‘at least eight large,newsixth-centuryADchurchesbuilt, all adjacent toearlierpagan sanctuaries’.As faras thebasilicasofLechaion,Quadratus, andKraneionare concerned,wecanassume that they were built on earlier Christian buildingswhichmost probably did not date to before the 4th centuryAD. Rothaus 2000,94f., discussesotherpossibleChristian remains.Anotherbasilicawasbuilt close to theTempleofAphrodite inAcrocorinth (4th /5th centuryAD?), seePeloschek 2010, 21f.; Brown2018, 146 f,mentions a secondone. 78 Vionis 2017, 152. On the economic prosperity of Corinth from the 5th to 7th centuryAD, allowing this building boom, see Jacobs 2014, 86f. 79 Nevertheless, remaining pieces of Christian buildings and sculpture found close to the agora hint at the exis- tenceof a church in this area, too, seePallas 1990, 760. 80 Brown2018, 147. 81 Rothaus 2000, 102. 82 Rothaus 2000, 103.