Minoan
Akrotiri
Excavations starting in 1967 at the site called Akrotiri
under the late Professor Spyridon Marinatos have made
Thira the best-known "Minoan" site outside of Crete, the
homeland of the culture. The island was not known as
Thira at this time. Only the southern tip of a large
town has been uncovered, yet it has revealed complexes
of multi-level buildings, streets, and squares with
remains of walls standing as high as eight meters, all
entombed in the solidified ash of the famous eruption of
Thira. The site was not a palace-complex such as are
found in Crete, but its excellent masonry and fine
wall-paintings show that this was certainly no
conglomeration of merchants' warehousing either. A
loom-workshop suggests organized textile weaving for
export. This Bronze Age civilization throve between 3000
to 2000 BC, and reached its peak in the period 2000 to
1580 BC.
Some of
the houses in Akrotiri are major structures, some
amongst them three stories high. Its streets, squares,
and walls were preserved in the layers of ejecta,
sometimes as tall as eight meters, and indicating this
was a major town. In many houses stone staircases are
still intact, and they contain huge ceramic storage jars
, mills, and pottery. Noted archaeological remains found
in Akrotiri are wall paintings or frescoes, which have
kept their original color well, as they were preserved
under many meters of volcanic ash. The town also had a
highly developed drainage system and, judging from the
fine artwork, its citizens were clearly sophisticated
and relatively wealthy people.
Pipes
with running water and water closets found at Akrotiri
are the oldest such utilities discovered. The pipes run
in twin systems, indicating that the Therans used both
hot and cold water supplies; the origin of the hot water
probably was geothermic, given the volcano's proximity.
The dual pipe system suggesting hot and cold running
water, the advanced architecture, and the apparent
layout of the Akrotiri find resemble Plato's description
of the legendary lost city of Atlantis, further
indicating the Minoans as the culture which primarily
inspired the Atlantis legend.
Fragmentary wall-paintings at Akrotiri lack the
insistent religious or mythological content familiar in
Classical Greek decor. Instead, the Minoan frescoes
depict "Saffron-Gatherers", who offer their
crocus-stamens to a seated lady, perhaps a goddess.
Crocus has been discovered to have many medicinal values
including the relief of menstrual pain. This has led
many archaeologists to believe that the
fresco of the saffron/crocus gatherers is a coming of
age fresco dealing with female pubescence. In another
house are two antelopes, painted with a kind of
confident, flowing, decorative, calligraphic line, the
famous fresco of a fisherman with his double strings of
fish strung by their gills, and the flotilla of pleasure
boats, accompanied by leaping dolphins, where ladies
take their ease in the shade of light canopies, among
other frescoes.
The
well preserved ruins of the ancient town often are
compared to the spectacular ruins at Pompeii in Italy.
The canopy covering the ruins collapsed in an accident
in September 2005, killing one tourist and injuring
seven more. The site remains closed while a new canopy
is built.
The
oldest signs of human settlement are Late Neolithic (4th
millennium BC or earlier), but ca. 2000–1650 BC
Akrotiri developed into one of the Aegean's major Bronze
Age ports, with recovered objects that had come, not
just from Crete, but also from Anatolia, Cyprus, Syria,
and Egypt as well as from the Dodecanese and the Greek
mainland.
Dating of the Bronze Age eruption
The
Minoan eruption provides a fixed point for the
chronology of the second millennium BC in the Aegean,
because evidence of the eruption occurs throughout the
region and the site itself contains material culture
from outside. The eruption occurred during the "Late
Minoan IA" period at Crete and the "Late Cycladic I"
period in the surrounding islands.
Radiocarbon dating indicates that the eruption occurred
about 1645—1600 BC. These dates, however, conflict with
the more accurate date range from archaeological
evidence, which is around 1500 BC. For more discussion,
see the article on the Minoan eruption.
More
precise dating can be obtained due the Climatic changes
in tree rings. Around the time of the
radiocarbon-indicated date of the eruption, there is
evidence for a significant climatic event in the
Northern Hemisphere. The evidence includes failure of
crops in China , as well as evidence from tree rings,
cited above: bristlecone pines of California; bog oaks
of Ireland, England, and Germany; and other trees in
Sweden. The tree rings precisely date the event to 1628
BCE. |
