Volcanic crater lakes (Bodies of Water)

Lakes that fill the craters and calderas of volcanoes, bodies of water whose setting in the burning mountain gave them a place in local sacred geography. Their color, depth and origin in eruption have made them sites of myth, offering and ritual. Local communities often tell of spirits of the dead or of ancestors resting in such waters, and some lakes are approached only with offerings and prescribed behavior, while a classical shrine of a woodland goddess stood beside another. Members placed here so far include Lake Toba, Lake Nemi.