Revision of Post-Minoan Historical Eruptions at the Santorini Volcano

The Santorini volcano, Greece, attracts global scientific interest and constitutes a top tourist destination. The 17th century BCE eruption, known as the Minoan event, was likely the largest ever occurred in the Holocene. The evaluation of an enriched collection of documentary sources combined with scientific observations showed that during historical times 14 small-to-moderate eruptive episodes were reported from the 2nd century BCE up to 1950 CE. Among them two little-known episodes occurring in 1667 CE and 1773 CE were uncovered and analyzed based on European documentary sources. For the first time a reliability score has been assigned to each one of the 14 episodes. The completeness of the recorded eruption history after the 14th century CE looks like ten times higher than in the previous period but it remains unclear whether this reflects real eruption rate or reporting incompleteness. The eruptions occurring after the 17th century CE are characterized by lower size, in terms of Volcanic Explosivity Index (VEI), than in the previous period. However, this may be due to the incomplete record of earlier eruptions of low VEI magnitude.