The Lowest Interest Rates in 5,000 Years…
A Dangerous Spot
SANTORINI, Greece – “Gods were gods. Men were men,” explained our tour guide, Spiros.
“The ancient Greeks thought there was a difference. Men had to realize they weren’t gods. They couldn’t do the things gods could do. If they tried, it provoked a disaster. The gods got jealous and punished them.”
What has changed? There are still things humans can and can’t do. When men get too big for their britches, the gods still punish them. The disaster we were looking at had nothing to do with the hubris of mankind. The problem was geological.
Santorini – world improvers from Hollywood have apparently found housing there.
Photo via kiklamino.com
Having built their city over the fault line between the African and European tectonic plates, the ancient Cycladians were in a dangerous spot. Every few thousand years there were bound to be fireworks. As it turned out, trouble came – big time – in about 1650 B.C. The earth trembled. A huge volcano rose from the sea near Akrotiri and blew up.
The remains of Akrotiri, which was buried in a massive volcanic surprise eruption in 1640 BC.
Photo credit: Klearchos Kapoutsis
“The people had plenty of warning,” Spiros went on. “There are no human bones in the town. No one was killed by the eruption. They were a seafaring people. They were fishermen. They probably got in their boats and headed for Crete, which you can see from here on a clear day.
“These people were not Minoans, like the people of Crete. But they traded with one another and knew one another.”
More Akrotiri leftovers. Archaeologists love sites that have been buried in volcanic ash – usually a lot of stuff turns out to be preserved quite well.
Photo credit: Klearchos Kapoutsis
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