Greece, Santorini

Santorini is a small, circular archipelago of volcanic islands located in the southern Aegean Sea, about 200 km south-east from Greece's mainland. It is also known as Thera, forming the southernmost member of the Cyclades group of islands, with an area of approximately 73 km² (28 mi²) and a 2001 census population of 13,670.

Santorini is essentially what remains of an enormous volcanic explosion, destroying the earliest settlements on what was formerly a single island, and leading to the creation of the current geological caldera.Its spectacular physical beauty, along with a dynamic nightlife, have made the island one of Europe's tourist hot spots.

It is the most active volcanic centre in the South Aegean Volcanic Arc, though what remains today is chiefly a water-filled caldera. The name Santorini was given it by the Latin empire in the thirteenth century, and is a reference to Saint Irene.

The island is the site of one of the largest volcanic eruptions the planet has ever seen: the Minoan eruption (sometimes called the Thera eruption), which occurred some 3,500 years ago at the height of the Minoan civilization.

History

Excavations starting in 1967 at the site called Akrotiri ("Upper Thira") under the late Professor Spyridon Marinatos have made Thera the best-known "Minoan" site outside of Crete, the homeland of the culture. The island was not called Thera at the 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 Thera.

Santorini was united with Greece in 1912. Its major settlements include Fira (Phira), Oia,Emporio, Kamari, Imerovigli, Pyrgos, and Therasia, and Akrotiri is a major archaeological site with ruins from the Minoan era.

Geography

The devastating volcanic eruption of Thera has become the most famous single event in the Aegean before the fall of Troy. The eruption would have been likely to have caused a significant climate upset for the eastern Mediterranean region; this may have been one of the biggest volcanic eruptions on Earth in the last few thousand years.

On Santorini, there is to be found a deposit of white tephra thrown from the eruption, lying up to 60 metres thick overlying the soil marking the ground level before the eruption and, forming a layer divided into three fairly distinct bands indicating different phases of the eruption.