Passing through the monumental Dipylon or Thriasiai Pylai of the Themistoclean wall in the area of Kerameikos, the Dromos or Kerameikos Street transversed the city, connecting the asty (the city) with the Academy, the Thriasio Plain and the Peloponnese. Moreover, this road connected the city with other thoroughfares in the northwestern regions outside its limits. The section within the walls was called Panathenaic Way and led through the Ancient Agora to the Acropolis. This road was followed by the procession of worshipers carrying the sacred peplos of goddess Athena during the Great Panathenaea.

In the southern embankment of the road in Outer Kerameikos, a sanctuary was founded over pre-existing burials. Its remains were discovered during 19th-century archaeological excavations. Initially, the first researchers identified it as the sanctuary of Hekate based on the inscriptions and a three-sided statue base believed to belong to the goddess, dating it to the Roman era. Within the sanctuary, enclosed by walls, a small built altar is preserved on the northern side. It features a votive relief in second use built in its facade and a marble ceremonial table (trapeza) cover on its back. Aligned with the altar is the aforementioned statue base, set in a wall niche. Between it and the altar, an omphalos – a cultic structure consisting of an inverted marble lekythos covering the opening of an underlying marble slab – was located. The cover in front of the altar, dating from the 2nd century BCE, bears a votive inscription of a man named Maron to Artemis Soteira. Additional inscriptions with this invocation to the goddess led recent research to the hypothesis that Artemis Soteira was worshipped here from the 2nd century BCE to the 2nd century CE.

A few years ago, additional excavations were conducted at the sanctuary. Upon removing the lekythos and the slab that constituted the omphalos, an 8-metre-deep well lined with clay inscribed rings was revealed. The inscriptions, from the early Roman period, contain invocations to the god Apollo, from whom devotees sought oracles about the future. These findings have led many researchers to believe that Artemis Soteira, alongside her brother Apollo, were worshipped at this sanctuary, and that hydromancy rituals related to the sacred well took place. In essence, the sanctuary functioned as an oracle, representing the only oracle of Apollo identified so far in Athens.