Thera eruption in 1613 BC

ANA ^ | 12/03/2008 | SIMELA PANTZARTZI

[Mike Fieschko]

Two olive branches buried by a Minoan-era eruption of the volcano on the island of Thera (modern-day Santorini) have enabled precise radiocarbon dating of the catastrophe to 1613 BC, with an error margin of plus or minus 10 years, according to two researchers who presented conclusions of their previously published research during an event on Tuesday at the Danish Archaeological Institute of Athens. Speaking at an event entitled "The Enigma of Dating the Minoan Eruption - Data from Santorini and Egypt", the study's authors, Dr. Walter Friedrich of the Danish University of Aarhus and Dr. Walter Kutschera of the Austrian University of Vienna, said data left by the branch of an olive tree with 72 annular growth rings was used for dating via the radiocarbon method, while a second olive branch -- found just nine metres away from the first -- was unearthed in July 2007 and has not yet been analysed.

The researchers said both olive tree branches were found near a Bronze Age man-made wall, giving the impression that they were part of an olive grove situated near a settlement very close to the edge of Santorini's current world-famous Caldera. The two trees were found standing when unearthed, and apparently had been covered by the Theran pumice immediately after the volcano's eruption.

According to the two scientists, other radiocarbon testing from archaeological locations on Santorini and the surrounding islands, as well as at Tel el-Dab'a in the Nile delta in Egypt, corroborate the dating based on the olive tree.

On the other hand, as the two researchers pointed out, archaeological evidence linked with the Historical Dating of Ancient Egypt indicate that the Thera eruption must have occurred after the start of the New Kingdom in Egypt in 1530 BC.

The two researchers said their find (olive tree) represents a serious contradiction between the results of the scientific method (radiocarbon dating) and scholarly work in the humanities (history-archaeology), with both sides holding strong arguments to support their conclusions.

The radiocarbon dating places the cataclysmic eruption, blamed for heralding the end to the Minoan civilisation, a century earlier than previous scientific finds.

The eruption and the subsequent devastation throughout the Aegean has long piqued researchers' interest, with many scholars pointing to Plato's reference of the "lost continent of Atlantis" on vague memories, passed down generation to generation in the ancient Greek world, of the catastrophe.

Caption: A view towards the west from the crescent-shaped Cyclades island of Santorini (ancient Thera) overlooks the Caldera and the rock isle in the middle, where the inactive volcano that erupted in early antiquity is located today.

[SunkenCiv]

The claims get ever-more inflated. Even the so-called end of the so-called Bronze Age has been attributed to the supposed Thera supereruption.

[SunkenCiv]

LOL!

[blam]

Where Was Atlantis? Sundaland Fits The Bill, Surely!

[Little Bill]

I used to correspond with Zanngger until he left Basil. His field is Geo-Archeology he has a different view on a lot of things ancient.

[SunkenCiv]

Thanks. From his writing, I have to agree, at least in a couple or three areas.

[SunkenCiv]

Sturt Manning site:freerepublic.com

Google

particularly ARCHAEOLOGY: New Carbon Dates Support Revised History of Ancient Mediterranean | Science Magazine | 4/28/2006 | Michael Balter | Posted on 04/27/2006 4:59:30 PM PDT by Lessismore | 68 posted on 04/29/2006 7:12:15 PM PDT by SunkenCiv, but also New Ice-Core Evidence Challenges the 1620s age for the Santorini (Minoan) Eruption | Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 25, Issue 3, March 1998, Pages 279-289 | 13 July 1997 | Gregory A. Zielinski, Mark S. Germani | Posted on 07/29/2004 12:25:45 AM PDT by SunkenCiv | 8 posted on 07/29/2004 10:53:47 AM PDT by SunkenCiv or the duplicate 50 Ancient Tombs Uncovered (1400BC, Crete) | The Australian | 7-18-2004 | Posted on 07/18/2004 1:17:56 PM PDT by blam | 20 posted on 07/18/2004 7:41:53 PM PDT by SunkenCiv

[Natural Law]

There is a similar redating required to align the Egyptian dynasties and physical history to the events of the Exodus too.

[Lucius Cornelius Sulla]

There is a similar redating required to align the Egyptian dynasties and physical history to the events of the Exodus too.

That is what I was thinking, but SunkenCiv sure doesn't go for this approach.

[SunkenCiv]

I agree with that assessment, pretty much. :') The Exodus was in circa 1450 BC; there is no connection between the Exodus and a supposed supereruption at Thera. Those interested in that idea though could do worse than to view Jacobovici's DVD. I consider his use of the conventional pseudochronology to be a fatal error, but the special effects are pretty dazzling. He tries (unsuccessfully, IMHO) to draw a connection between a Minoan carving and certain events pertaining to the Exodus.

[SunkenCiv]

jacobovici exodus site:freerepublic.com

Google

thera exodus site:freerepublic.com

Google

[Natural Law]

Given the choice between physics and “word of mouth” to validate events and dates I will side with hard science. There is absolutely nothing to assure me that those who painted hieroglyphics 4,000 years ago were any more honest than the lying bastards who live in the region today.

[SunkenCiv]

Then you’ll be pleased to know that there’s no “hard science” to support A) tsunamis in the Aegean in the 2nd m BC, or B) a supereruption of Thera in 2nd m BC (or the 1st m BC for that matter).

[Natural Law]

I have been to both Santorini and Pompeii and have seen the similarity of effect of the two volcanic events. When the material immediately below the volcanic material is carbon dated to a point in time, plus or minus a reasonable measurement error, I am pretty comfortable that the dating is correct. Pompeii happened in 79 AD and Thera about 1628 BC.

[Redcitizen]

I lava that statement!

[SunkenCiv]

Here ya go:

http://www.therafoundation.org/articles/chronololy/radiocarbondatesfromthesiteofakrotirithera19671977

[snip] ...carbonized “fava” beans from a mining installation between the villages of Akrotiri and Meghalochori. The latter sample was found in a large jug buried beneath a layer of pumice at the edge of the preciptous side of the caldera. It dated to 1420 - 1400 ± 60 B.C. [end]

[SunkenCiv]

from a year 2000 file, emphasis added:

Santorini, Greece

Santorini is complex of overlapping shield volcanoes. Basalt and andesite lava flows that make the shield are exposed in the cliff below the town of Phira. Some of the cliff is thought to be a caldera wall associated with an eruption 21,000 year ago. Druitt and Francaviglia (1992) found evidence of at least 12 large explosive eruptions in the last 200,000 years at Santorini...

Akroteri, a Minoan city on the south part of Thera, is being excavated. About 3-6 feet (1-2 m) of ash fell on the city which had a population of about 30,000. The residents appear to have been successfully evacuated prior to the eruption. No bodies have been found in the ash like those at Vesuvius. Archeologists also reported that movable objects had been taken from the city...

The Kameni Islands formed after the caldera. Eleven eruptions since 197 B.C. have made the two islands. The most recent eruption at Santorini was in 1950 on Nea Kameni, the northern island. The eruption was phreatic and lasted less than a month. It constructed a dome and produced lava flows.

Pompeii, by contrast, was covered by thirty feet of ash.

[SunkenCiv]

Identification of Aniakchak (Alaska) tephra
in Greenland ice core
challenges the 1645 BC date
for Minoan eruption of Santorini
Nicholas J. G. Pearce
John A. Westgate and Shari J. Preece
Warren J. Eastwood
William T. Perkins

Minute shards of volcanic glass recovered from the 1645 ± 4 BC layer in the Greenland GRIP ice core have recently been claimed to originate from the Minoan eruption of Santorini [Hammer et al., 2003]. This is a significant claim because a precise age for the Minoan eruption provides an important time constraint on the evolution of civilizations in the Eastern Mediterranean. There are however significant differences between the concentrations of SiO2, TiO2, MgO, Ba, Sr, Nb and LREE between the ice core glass and the Minoan eruption, such that they cannot be correlatives. New chemical analyses of tephra from the Late Holocene eruption of the Aniakchak Volcano in Alaska, however, show a remarkable similarity to the ice core glass for all elements, and this eruption is proposed as the most likely source of the glass in the GRIP ice core. This provides a precise date of 1645 BC for the eruption of Aniakchak and is the first firm identification of Alaskan tephra in the Greenland ice cores. The age of the Minoan eruption of Santorini, however, remains unresolved.

[Natural Law]

"It dated to 1420 - 1400 ± 60 B.C."

The studies you cited were conducted in 1967 and 1977. By today's standards the accuracy or precision of the test methods used was primative. (What kind of computer did you use in 1977? I thought so.) Aside from significant improvements in the supporting analytical equipment there have been improvements in methodology. A breakthrough has emerged from recent research into the fluctuation patterns of the original 14C content of the Earth’s atmosphere over the past 50,000 years.

Science is not relying on radiocarbon dating and tree ring analysis alone. Since the studies you cited were conducted there have been dramatic developments in a range of other specialist dating methods. Some of these are more suited to dating rocks, ash and ejecta adjacent to your "fava" beans. Methods include potassium-argon dating, uranium series dating, fission-track dating, amino acid racemization, and archaeomagnetic dating. Of far more value with prehistoric archaeological remains are thermoluminescence (TL), optical stimulation luminescence dating (OSL), and obsidian hydration. The last of these is restricted to obsidian finds associated with volcanic activity, which form a surface hydration layer when exposed to air, the thickness of this layer corresponding with the length of exposure.

[SunkenCiv]

The RC dates were all conducted by the same lab. The fava beans (or as you put it “the ‘fava’ beans”, for no apparent reason) are a better example, because they had an origin obviously closer to the date of burial than, say, a tree. The main problem with RC dates on Thera has been that the soil is poor in C14 due to past volcanism (imagine that), such that stuff grown today will test hundreds of years too old.

All the rest of your reply is irrelevant to the dating of the *very small ash layer* that buried the town — supposedly during a super-eruption. And that’s what I thought we were discussing, apparently you were not. Goodbye.

[Natural Law]

I think your problem is that you do not observe scientific process. Rather than see where the data leads you have started with a conclusion and are seeking data to support it. Sounds like agenda driven junk science to me.