[SunkenCiv]

Thanks blam.

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[gleeaikin]

I read an interesting analysis on the impact of Thera on the demise of the Minoan civilization.

According to this theory, the initial eruption would have caused a significant tsunami (there was a recent PBS story on research on Crete showing significant tsunami damage at the right age). This would have destroyed the port area, as well as killing many of the skilled workers who would have been near the shipyards. The ships at sea would have been able to survive and make it home OK, but there would have been few skilled workers to maintain them and build replacements for any lost, or as they deteriorated. Thus after about a hundred years, the Minoans would no longer have been the major seapower as their ships rotted away, and the Myceneans would have been able to successfully conquer them.