Texts, storms, and the thera eruption

Journal of Near Eastern Studies

Volumn 55, Issue 1, 1996, Pages 1-14

  Foster, Karen Polinger ^a   Ritner, Robert K ^b  

^a The Holleran Center for Community Action and Public Policy

^b YALE UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EID: 0347452528     PISSN: 00222968     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1086/373781     Document Type: Article

References (90)

1. For primary publication of the material, see S. Marinatos, Excavations at Thera, vols. 1-7 (Athens, 1968-76);
2. Doumas, Thera: Pompeii of the Ancient Aegean (London, 1983);
3. idem, The Wall-Paintings of Thera (London, 1992).
4. S. W. Manning, "The Thera Eruption: The Third Congress and the Problem of the Date," Archaeometry 32 (1990): 91-100;
5. M. J. Aitken, H. N. Michael, P. P. Betancourt, and P. M. Warren, "The Thera Eruption: Continuing Discussion of the Dating," Archaeometry 30 (1988): 165-82;
6. J. D. Muhly, "Egypt, the Aegean and Late Bronze Age Chronology in the Eastern Mediterranean," Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 4 (1991): 235-47;
7. and Manning, "Response to J. D. Muhly on Problems of Chronology in the Aegean Bronze Age," Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 4 (1991): 249-62.
8. For absolute and relative chronology in the rest of the Aegean, see P. Warren and V. Hankey, Aegean Bronze Age Chronology (Bristol, 1989).
9. U. Eriksen, W. L. Friedrich, B. Buchardt, H. Tauber, and M. S. Thomsen, "The Stronghyle Caldera: Geological, Palaeontological and Stable Isotope Evidence from Radiocarbon Dated Stromatolites from Santorin?," TAW III: 2, pp. 139-50.
10. See J. Keller's summary of the evidence presented at the Third Congress, TAW III: 2, p. 486, especially his remarks on remaining areas of disagreement.
11. For detailed descriptions of the main Thera eruption phases (Plinian, base surge, and ash flow), see H. Pichler and W. L. Friedrich, "Mechanism of the Minoan Eruption of Santorini," TAW II, pp. 15-35;
12. F. W. McCoy, "The Upper Thera (Minoan) Ash in Deep-sea Sediments: Distribution and Comparison with Other Ash Layers" TAW II, pp. 57-78;
13. D. M. Pyle, "New Estimates for the Volume of the Minoan Eruption," TAW III: 2, pp. 113-21;
14. L. Wilson, "Energetics of the Minoan Eruption," TAW I, pp. 221-28, and "Some Revisions," TAW II, pp. 31-35.
15. H. Sigurdsson, S. Carey, and J. D. Devine, "Assessment of Mass, Dynamics, and Environmental Effects of the Minoan Eruption of the Santorini Volcano," TAW III: 2, pp. 100-112.
16. Recent findings have called into question the traditional model of volcanic and other sulfate aerosols causing global cooling: R. J. Charlson and T. M. L. Wigley, "Sulfate Aerosol and Climate Change," Scientific American 270/2 (1994): 48-57. As for the Theran aerosol, the latest estimates vary on the amount of sulfur produced by the eruption, but it may have been relatively low per total volume of ejecta, like Katmai (1912) and Krakatau (1883) (Sigurdsson, Carey, and Devine, "Assessment" and Pyle, "New Estimates"). Manning cautions that these may be underestimates because the geological record is unlikely to preserve the highly soluble anhydrite, "which seems to be a key indicator of the high-sulphur content of the magma... [so] the true scale of the sulphur yield remains a mystery"
17. Thera, Sulphur, and Climatic Anomalies. Oxford Journal of Archaeology 1992 11 245-253
18. For general discussion of the many possible causes for global temperature drops, see H. and E. Stommel, Volcano Weather: The Story of 1816, the Year without a Summer (Newport, Rhode Island, 1983).
19. R. \V. Decker, "How Often does a Minoan Eruption Occur?" TAW III: 2, pp. 444-52, with tabulated information on worldwide explosive eruptions.
20. See J. V. Luce, The End of Atlantis: New Light on an Old Legend (London, 1969), for concise discussion of the Platonic passages and other texts involved.
21. Planet Earth: Volcano (Alexandria, Virginia, 1982), pp. 58-60, with textual and visual documentation for Tambora's eruption. See also Stommel and Stommel, Volcano Weather for observations in New England.
22. See T. Simkin and R. S. Fiske, Krakatau 1883: The Volcanic Eruption and Its Effects (Washington, D.C., 1983), esp. pp. 154-59, 395-418, and color pls. 9-14, for descriptions and images of the atmospheric phenomena produced.
23. The standard guide to Classical and later eruptions remains F. Fouqué, Santorin et ses éruptions (Paris, 1879).
24. Doumas, "Eruptions of the Santorini Volcano from Contemporary Sources," TAW I, pp. 819-20.
25. S. Hood, "Traces of the Eruption Outside
26. Thera," TAW I, p. 686.
27. Most recently on this, see D. J. W. Meijer, ed., Natural Phenomena: Their Meaning, Depiction and Description in the Ancient Near East (Amsterdam, 1992).
28. J. K. Bjorkman, Meteors and Meteorites in the Ancient Near East (Tempe, 1973).
29. B. J. Kemp, Ancient Egypt: Anatomy of a Civilization (London, 1989), p. 72 and fig. 24:9. One is reminded here of the hundreds of pumice lumps, each in a conical cup, found with cultic paraphernalia at Nirou Khani, a Minoan site on the northern coast of Crete
30. (Hood, "Traces," pp. 681-90); other evidence for pumice in Minoan cult comes from Zakro and Palaikastro.
31. J. Mellaart, Çatal Hüyük: A Neolithic Town in Anatolia (London, 1967), pp. 176-77 and pls. 59-60.
32. A. Catagnoti and M. Bonechi, "Le volcan Kawkab, Nagar et problèmes connexes," N.A.B.U., June 1992, pp. 50-53. We are grateful to Harvey Weiss for his description of Kawkab's present appearance as well as for reference to L. Dillemann's topographic guide to the volcanoes and other physical features of northern Mesopotamia: Haute Mésopotamie orientate et pays adjacents (Paris, 1962). Catagnoti and Bonechi's proposal to identify Sargonic Kakkaban with a settlement near Mt. Kawkab raises the possibility that the mountain itself could be a theophoric element in the name Ila-kabkabü, the father of Shamshi-Adad. For bibliography on this name and other instances of kakkabu in personal names, presumably simply meaning there "star,"
33. see I. J. Gelb, Computer-aided Analysis of Amorite, Assyriological Studies, no. 21 (Chicago, 1980), p. 304;
34. H. B. Huffmon, Amorite Personal Names in the Mari Texts: A Structural and Lexical Study (Baltimore, 1965), p. 220.
35. Sargonic and later northern Mesopotamian parallels for geographical features in Semitic name-giving have been discussed by W. G. Lambert, "The God Aššur," Iraq 45 (1983): 84-85.
36. On the other hand, I. J. Gelb in L. Cagni, ed.. La lingua di Ebla (Naples, 1981), p. 15, prefers '"lla (god) is his star."
37. C. Vandersleyen, "Une tempête sous le règne d'Amosis," Revue d'Egyptologie 19(1967): 123-59
38. and idem, "Deux nouveaux fragments de la stéle d'Amosis relatant une tempête," Revue d?gyptologie 20 (1968): 127-34.
39. E. N. Davis, "A Storm in Egypt during the Rejgn of Ahmose," TAW III. 3, pp. 232-35.
40. Vandersleyen, "Une tempête," pp. 155-56.
41. Davis, "A Storm in Egypt," p. 232. For the common use of the preposition hr (literally, "on") in expressions for "in Egypt," see Wb. III, p. 131/28. In this and the following passages under discussion, textual commentary is limited exclusively to the few points of disagreement with published translations. For all other textual matters, the reader should consult the thorough analysis in the original publications by Vandersleyen.
42. H. Goedicke, "The Chronology of the Thera/ Santorini Explosion" Ägypten und Levante 3 (1992): 60-61.
43. W. Helck, Historisch-biographische Texte der 2. Zwischenzeit und neue Texte der 18.Dynastie, 2d ed. rev. (Wiesbaden, 1983), p. 104. Vandersleyen had initially suggested an identification with Deir el-Ballas;
44. see idem, "Une tempête," pp. 151-53.
45. S. W. Manning, The Absolute Chronology of the Aegean Early Bronze Age (Sheffield, 1995), Appendix 7, pp. 200-216.
46. Translated from earlier Babylonian prototypes, similar omens describing the effects of lunar halos survive even in Demotic Egyptian texts of the second century A.D. (R. A. Parker, A Vienna Demotic Papyrus on Eclipseand Lunar-Omina [Providence, 1959]).
47. On this genre of omen texts, see J. Bottéro, "Symptô mes, signes, écritures en Mésopotamie ancienne," in J. P. Vernant et al., Divination et rationalité (Paris, 1974), pp. 100-103;
48. S. M. Moren, "The Omen Series Šumma Alu: A Preliminary Investigation," (Ph.D. diss., University of Pennsylvania, 1978);
49. A. L. Oppenheim, Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization (Chicago, 1977), pp. 224-25.
50. On the trustworthiness of using other genres of omen texts for historical purposes, see J. J. Finkelstein, "Mesopotamian Historiography," Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society 107 (1963): 461-72, wherein he argues (p. 463) that they "take precedence both in time and in reliability over any other genre of Mesopotamian writing that purports to treat of the events of the past."
51. E. Reiner cautions that "such historical omens have their relevance for the Mesopotamian scene, yes, but as 'historiettes', not history" ("New Light on Some Historical Omens," in Anatolian Studies Presented to Hans Gustav Güterbock on the Occasion of His 65th Birthday [Istanbul, 1974], p. 261).
52. J. Cooper goes further, asserting that most apodoses seem "historically groundless" ("Apodotic Death and the Historicity of 'Historical Omens'," in B. Alster, ed., Death in Mesopotamia [Copenhagen, 1980], p. 102, with full references to earlier scholarship on the issue);
53. skeptical assessment also by M. Liveran? in Akkad, the First World Empire: Structure, Ideology, and Tradition (Padua, 1993), p. 44.
54. Fouqué, Santorin, pp. 1-6, with translations and discussion; see also n. 12 above.
55. We are grateful to Robert Biggs for suggesting that we look at the diaries; Alice L. Slotsky kindly analyzed the records for volcano weather and discussed numerous points. For translations of the relevant entries, see A. J. Sachs and H. Hunger, Astronomical Diaries and Related Texts from Babylonia (Vienna, 1989), pp. 247-53 (SE 114). We should also note that the diary (SE 129) for the winter and early spring of 183 B.C. reports overcast skies followed by severe cold, perhaps caused by the eruption of the eponymous Vulcano in Italy.
56. Evaluated in Fouqué, Santorin, pp. 1-6: (1) Strabo says the Rhodians "who were then in control of the sea" (ca. 197 B.C.) were the first to explore and build a temple on the new Theran island created by the eruption; (2) Plutarch regards the eruption and newly formed island as the fulfillment of an oracle foretelling unusual natural events when the Trojan descendants, i.e., the Romans, conquered their adversaries, in this instance the Macedonians, whose loss at the battle of Cynoscephalae in 197 B.C. put Greece under Roman control; and (3) Eusebius, who places the eruption in the third to fourth year of the 145th Olympiad, or 197 B.C. Of these linkages, neither Strabo's nor Eusebius's permits assignment of the eruption month. As for Plutarch's, the causal connection may have been compressed to fit his propagandistic purpose, since the Second Macedonian War began in 200 B.C., the first peace overture was early in 198 B.C, the decisive battle in 197 B.C., and the treaty passed by the Senate in 196 B.C.
57. (M. Cary, A History of Rome [London, 1962], pp. 200-203). We thank Victor Bers for guidance in Classical matters.
58. P. Warren, "Further Arguments against an Early Date," Archaeometry 30 (1988): 176-79;
59. Warren and Hankey, Aegean Bronze Age Chronology, p. 215; Muhly, "Chronology."
60. P. I. Kuniholm, "Overview and Assessment of the Evidence for the Date of the Eruption of Thera," TAW III: 3, pp. 13-18, with complete references and evaluations of each category of data. Add now the latest Greenland ice-core:
61. G. A. Zielinski et al., "Record of Volcanism since 7000 B.C. from the GISP2 Volcano-Climate System," Science 264 (1994): 948-52 (suggested Thera date 1623 B.C., with caveats). The authors emphasize (951 and personal communication) that any matching between ice core sulfate concentrations and eruptions before 1 B.C. is tentative.
62. M. Rose's report that this new ice-core "has confirmed an early date" is overly optimistic and disregards the caveats noted above ("Revising Bronze Age Chronology," Archaeology 48:1 [1995]: 20).
63. Possible corroboration comes from the Chinese Bamboo Annals, which report in epigrammatic style odd atmospheric phenomena and summer frosts at the beginning of the Shang Dynasty; this linkage depends on taking 1620 B.C. as the fall of the preceding Xia Dynasty, and on attributing the abnormalities in China to the Thera eruption (K. D. Pang, "Three Very Large Volcanic Eruptions in Antiquity and Their Effects on the Climate of the Ancient World," Eos 66 [1985]: 816).
64. Certainly a major atmospheric disturbance took place in the early seventeenth century B.C, but it was not necessarily brought about by Thera. If the event was indeed volcanically induced and not, say, caused by fluctuations in sunspot activity, the culprit could even have been an eruption in the southern hemisphere. Such is believed to be the case, for instance, with the A.D. 177 Greenland ice-core ash layers, borne there from New Zealand (Sullivan, "Santorini Volcano Ash").
65. Similarly, in A.D. 536-37, several chroniclers around the Mediterranean reported marked cold and strange atmospheric phenomena, but there are no known European or Near Eastern eruptions then. R. B. Stothers proposes that a volcano in Papua, New Guinea was responsible ("Mystery Cloud of A.D. 536" Nature 307 [1984]: 344-45).
66. On the problems in linking volcanism, climate change, and time, see T. Simkin, "Distant Effects of Volcanism-How Big and How Often?," Science 264 (1994): 913-14.
67. Manning, Absolute Chronology, p. 200.
68. K. A. Kitchen, "The Basics of Egyptian Chronology in Relation to the Bronze Age," in P. Àström, ed., High, Middle or Low?: Acts of an International Colloquium on Absolute Chronology, pt. 1 (Göteborg, 1987), pp. 37-55.
69. Vandersleyen, "Deux nouveaux fragments," p. 132.
70. For initial publication of selected fresco fragments, see M. Bietak, "Minoan Wall-paintings Unearthed at Ancient Avaris," Egyptian Archaeology 2 (1992): 26-28.
71. On the historical and art historical implications of this material, see V. Hankey, "Egypt, the Aegean and the Levant," Egyptian Archaeology 3 (1993): 27-29.
72. D. J. Stanley and H. Sheng, "Volcanic Shards from Santorini (Upper Minoan Ash) in the Nile Delta, Egypt," Nature 320 (1986): 733-35.
73. Questionable evidence linking the storm to year 11 of Ahmose is found in the notations on the verso of the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus ("problem" 87, col. III). These dockets record unseasonable thunder and rain on two consecutive days at the very beginning of year 11 of an unnamed ruler, generally assumed to be the last Hyksos ruler Khamudi, less likely Ahmose. See Vandersleyen, Les guerres d?mosis, Monographies Reine Elisabeth I (Brussels, 1971), pp. 34-40;
74. Wolfgang Helck, Historisch-biographische Texte der 2.Zwischenzeit und neue Texte der 18.Dynastie, Kleine ägyptische Texte 5 (Wiesbaden, 1975), p. 78, no. 113;
75. and cf. Charles Nims, Thebes of the Pharaohs (London, 1965), p. 199, n. 2 (references courtesy of E. Wente).
76. Michael and Betancourt, "Further Arguments for an Early Date," pt. 2 in "The Thera Eruption," fig. 3;
77. see also fig. 4, which charts the probability of the eruption's having occurred before 1550 B.C. (3 in 4) or after 1550 B.C. (1 in 4). At present, the available radiocarbon evidence exhibits "a greater degree of dispersion than one would wish," with a "trend to a date in the 17th century" rather than a statistically unequivocal result (C. Renfrew, "Summary of the Progress in Chronology," TAW III: 3, p. 242). Radiocarbon dates expected from material just beneath ash layers at Trianda and Mochlos, should those volcanic deposits prove to be of Theran origin, ought to produce much-needed clarification of the radiocarbon dating picture.
78. Sethe, Urkunden der 18.Dynaslie, Urk. IV/1 (Leipzig, 1906), pp. 24-25;
79. idem, Urkunden der 18. Dynastie: Übersetzung zu den Heften 1-4 (1914; repr. Berlin, 1984), pp. 13-14;
80. and see also S. Harvey, "Monuments of Ahmose at Abydos," Egyptian Archaeology 4 (1994): 5.
81. Helck, Historìsch-biographische Texte, pp. KM-10.
82. These passages have been discussed in brief by P. Michalowski, The Lamentation over the Destruction of Sumer and Ur (Winona Lake, Indiana, 1989), p. 79;
83. P. Attinger, "Remarques à propos de la 'Malédiction d'Accad'," Revue d?ssyriologie (RA) 78 (1984): 117, with references to earlier discussions;
84. see further, S. N. Kramer, Lamentation over the Destruction of Ur, Assyriological Studies, no. 12 (Chicago, 1940), p. 36, 11. 188 ff.;
85. CAD, s.v. išbilsu; and A. R. Millard, "The Sign of the Flood," Iraq 49 (1987): 63-69.
86. Bjorkman, Meteors and Meteorites, p. 123.
87. M. Leibovici, "Un texte astrologique akkadien de Boghazköi," RA 50 (1956): 15;
88. D. Arnaud, Recherches au pays d?štata Emar, vol. 6, pt. 4 (Paris, 1987), nos. 651 and 653.
89. C. Virolleaud, ACh Šamaš 14.1 ff.
90. U Jeyes, Old Babylonian Extispicy Texts in the British Museum (Leiden, 1989), p. 154: "cyclone."