Delos, the small Cycladic island at the centre of the Aegean, traditional birthplace of Apollo and Artemis and home of the most ancient inviolable sanctuary in the Greek world. From 167 BC it was a Roman free port and the great clearing-house of Aegean trade — until sacked by Mithridates in 88 and by the pirate Athenodorus in 69 BC. Verres stripped its temple by night (Verr. 2.1.46-47).