<P> The Minoan eruption is a key marker for the Bronze Age chronology of the Eastern Mediterranean world . It provides a fixed point for aligning the entire chronology of the second millennium BCE in the Aegean, as evidence of the eruption is found throughout the region . Despite the evidence, the exact date of the eruption has been difficult to determine . Archaeologists have traditionally placed it at approximately 1500 BCE . Radiocarbon dates, including analysis of an olive branch buried beneath a lava flow from the volcano that gave a date between 1627 BCE and 1600 BCE (95% confidence interval), suggest an eruption date more than a century earlier than suggested by archaeologists . Thus, the radiocarbon dates and the archaeological dates are in substantial disagreement . It has also been recently suggested that there may be regional variations in the calibration curve which might alter a date by up to 20 years . </P> <P> In 2012, one of the proponents of an archaeological date, Felix Höflmayer, argued that archaeological evidence could be consistent with a date as early as 1590 BCE, reducing the discrepancy to around 50 years . </P> <P> Conversely, the radiocarbon dates have been argued to be inaccurate on scientific grounds . That argument has been made, in particular, by Malcolm H. Wiener . The primary problem is that C - deficient carbon, sourced from the environment, might easily have affected the radiocarbon dates . </P> <P> Archaeologists developed the Late Bronze Age chronologies of eastern Mediterranean cultures by analysing the origin of artifacts (for example, items from Crete, mainland Greece, Cyprus or Canaan) found in each archaeological layer . If an artifact's origin can be accurately dated, it gives a reference date for the layer in which it is found . If the Thera eruption could be associated with a given layer of Cretan (or other) culture, chronologists could use the date of that layer to date the eruption itself . Since Thera's culture at the time of destruction was similar to the Late Minoan IA (LMIA) culture on Crete, LMIA is the baseline to establish chronology elsewhere . The eruption also aligns with Late Cycladic I (LCI) and Late Helladic I (LHI) cultures, but predates Peloponnesian LHI . Archeological digs on Akrotiri have also yielded fragments of nine Syro - Palestinian Middle Bronze II (MBII) gypsum vessels . </P>

What stories grew out of the eruption at santorini in b.c. 1625