1950 eruption
Posted on 03/22/2014 4:46:14 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
According to a recent international study, the volcano of the island Santorini, Greece, erupted in the 16th century BC and not earlier. The survey characterized a number of research studies that took place in the past and have indicated that Santorini's volcano may have erupted a century earlier, as unreliable because the method based on tree-ring measurements that they used, could not provide them with accurate results.
An international team of researchers led by Paolo Cherubini from the Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) has demonstrated in the scientific journal Antiquity, that this method cannot provide reliable results. The scientists show that the [Carbon 14] dating of individual pieces of olive wood enveloped by volcanic ash is too unreliable for precise dating...
The question whether this natural disaster occurred 3,500 or 3,600 years ago is of great historiographical importance and has indeed at times been the subject of heated discussion among experts. The traditional belief that the volcano erupted during the 16th century BC, seems to be confirmed by this new study.
(Excerpt) Read more at greece.greekreporter.com ...
1950 eruption
Archaeology in the 21st Century
by Eberhard Zangger"Even when, during the respective Thera Conferences, individual scientists had pointed out that the magnitude and significance of the Thera eruption must be estimated as less than previously thought, the conferences acted to strengthen the original hypothesis. The individual experts believed that the arguments advanced by their colleagues were sound, and that the facts of a natural catastrophe were not in doubt... All three factors reflect a fantasy world rather than cool detachment, which is why it so difficult to refute the theory with rational arguments." -- pp 49-50.
That is really a long time ago. Several centuries before the Trojan War but I guess the Egyptians were making history a long time before that.
Have they ever really determined how close Santorini was to the Minoans?
The eruption that formed the caldera dates to 22,000 years ago (that’s not 2,200, but ten times that); there was no tsunami, no “super-eruption” in the 2nd M BC, IMHO it’s a persistent delusional system, and actually originated in the 19th century, but has been periodically revived since then. There’s literally no connection to the super-eruption, which is imaginary; historically the only known eruption from literate antiquity is circa 200 BC.
Even this more conventional date of 1500 or so BC would, if true, have zero connection to the fall of the Minoans, which was nearly a century later, and sudden, and all signs point to a sacking, burning invader. Not by coincidence, the Mycenaean Greeks took over the former Minoan areas and trade routes.
Forcing this supposed eruption to 1620s BC means that the sudden end to the Minoans happened something like two centuries later, which actually helps illustrate the nonsensical claim that there’s any connection whatsoever.
Thanks, that is actually very interesting. I have seen programs on “The History Channel” stating that the tsunami was what ended the Minoan Civilization tho also admitting that it also coincided with the rise of Mycenae and Tyrins.
Oops I think that city is spelled Tiryns probably to keep it from being confused with Tyre.
> programs on “The History Channel” ...also admitting that it also coincided with the rise of Mycenae and Tyrins.
Yeah, isn’t that peculiar? There’s literally no credible evidence for the tsunami in the Aegean; the collapsed side of the caldera points toward the Greek mainland, where the Mycenaeans were; there’s no evidence of a tsunami there, either, but if any such tsunami had happened — as the supereruption advocates claim — the Mycenaeans would have taken the brunt of it; and since there’s no sign of a decline among the Minoan towns for another 80 or so years, wouldn’t it make much more sense to have the Minoans take over the tsunami’d remains of mainland Greece instead? :’)
Homer’s “mighty-walled Tiryns”... the Mycenaean-era city states appear to have behaved much like the more familiar classical Greek states, having specific territories in the immediate vicinity, and slowly changing sets of alliances (and in some places conquests).
Gla was an island in Lake Copais, but at some point the city-state Orchomenos undertook a large civil engineering project to levee the inflowing river around one edge of the lake to deprive it of a water supply, then drain the lake to create a large chunk of farmland (which is hard to find in Greece). Gla was fortified and garrisoned. Later, an rival state or other invader breached the levee and reflooded the plain. Apparently this was repaired at least once in antiquity, and again in modern times.
> Pliny described the changes in land and sea distribution. “Land is sometimes formed . . . rising suddenly out of the sea. Delos and Rhodes, islands which have now been long famous, are recorded to have risen up in this way. More lately there have been some smaller islands formed,” and he names them: Anapha, Nea, Halone, Thera, Therasia, Hiera, and Thia, the last of which appeared in his own time.
The Dark Age of Greece, “Changes in Land and Sea”
http://www.varchive.org/dag/cilas.htm
from your link:
Minor changes they were not: the Bosporus tearing Asia apart from Europe, like the breaking of the Mediterranean into the Ocean at Gibraltar were major changes. Smaller changes where single cities were engulfed or isles born could have been the after-effects of the cataclysms, which for hundreds of years still agitated the distorted strata of the earth; even today they have not completely subsided. Some of these changes occurred earlier and some later, but for the most part they occurred in historical times; the memory of them survived, and the same testimony comes from all quarters of the globe.
Doesn’t that remind you of:
http://darwin-online.org.uk/content/frameset?viewtype=text&itemID=F59&pageseq=1
page 182
Everything in this southern continent has been effected on a grand scale: the land, from the Rio Plata to Tierra del Fuego, a distance of 1200 miles, has been raised in mass (and in Patagonia to a height of between 300 and 400 feet), within the period of the now existing sea-shells. The old and weathered shells left on the surface of the upraised plain still partially retain their colours. The uprising movement has been interrupted by at least eight long periods of rest, during which the sea ate deeply back into the land, forming at successive levels the long lines of cliffs or escarpments, which separate the different plains as they rise like steps one behind the other. The elevatory movement, and the eating-back power of the sea during the periods of rest, have been equable over long lines of coast; for I was astonished to find that the step-like plains stand at nearly corresponding heights at far distant points. The lowest plain is 90 feet high; and the highest, which I ascended near the coast, is 950 feet; and of this only relics are left in the form of flat gravel-capped hills. The upper plain of S. Cruz slopes up to a height of 3000 feet at the foot of the Cordillera. I have said that within the period of existing sea-shells Patagonia has been upraised 300 to 400 feet: I may add, that within the period when icebergs transported boulders over the upper plain of Santa Cruz, the elevation has been at least 1500 feet. Nor has Patagonia been
[page] 182 GEOLOGY OF PATAGONIA CHAP.
affected only by upward movements: the extinct tertiary shells from Port St. Julian and Santa Cruz cannot have lived, according to Professor E. Forbes, in a greater depth of water than from 40 to 250 feet; but they are now covered with sea-deposited strata from 800 to 1000 feet in thickness: hence the bed of the sea, on which these shells once lived, must have sunk downwards several hundred feet, to allow of the accumulation of the superincumbent strata. What a history of geological changes does the simply-constructed coast of Patagonia reveal!
Doesn’t it though! :’) I’ve been re-reading “Noah’s Flood” these past few days, and found another interesting reference from Pliny on p 103:
“Pliny the Elder described the Black Sea as ‘having swallowed up a large area of land which retreated before it.’” That’s an interesting folkloric survival.
And wellll, I tried a search on “Black Sea”, one hit only, then tried “swallowed”, lots and lots, including an interesting bit on both the Black Sea and on the flooding the Mediterranean through the straits of Gibraltar.
https://archive.org/stream/plinysnaturalhis00plinrich/plinysnaturalhis00plinrich_djvu.txt
Oooooh...
THE PILLARS OF HERACLES
[4.18.4] But since we have mentioned the pillars of Heracles, we deem it to be appropriate to set forth the facts concerning them. When Heracles arrived at the farthest points of the continents of Libya and Europe which lie upon the ocean, he decided to set up these pillars to commemorate his campaign.
[4.18.5] And since he wished to leave upon the ocean a monument which would be had in everlasting remembrance, he built out both the promontories, they say, to a great distance; consequently, whereas before that time a great space had stood between them, he now narrowed the passage, in order that by making it shallow and narrow52 he might prevent the great sea-monsters from passing out of the ocean into the inner sea, and that at the same time the fame of their builder might be held in everlasting remembrance by reason of the magnitude of the structures.
[bold] Some authorities, however, say just the opposite, namely, that the two continents were originally joined and that he cut a passage between them, and that by opening the passage he brought it about that the ocean was mingled with our sea. On this question, however, it will be possible for everyman to think as he may please. [/bold]
http://www.theoi.com/Text/DiodorusSiculus4A.html#30
CHAPTER XCII. (BooK II)
What Cities have been swallowed up by the Sea.
THE Sea of Pontus hath overwhelmed Pyrrha and Antyssa,
about Maeotis ; and Elice, and Bura in the Gulf of Corinth : whereof the Marks are to be seen in the deep Water. Out
of the Island Cea more than 30,000 Paces of Ground were
lost suddenly, with very many Men. In Sicily, also, the Sea
came in and took away half the City Thindaris, and all
between Italy and Sicily. The like it did in Bosotia and
Eleusina.
https://archive.org/stream/plinysnaturalhis00plinrich/plinysnaturalhis00plinrich_djvu.txt
Let not thine eyes deceive thee...something snapped and the remains are still there The shallowest section in the Strait of Gibraltar is at the Camarinal Sill where the maxium water depth is 290 m.
You just gave me goosebumps.
It's just another little crack in the crust...
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