Wood charcoal from Santorini (Thera): new evidence for climate, vegetation and timber imports in the Aegean Bronze Age

Wood charcoal from stratified layers at Akrotiri is helping to map the ecology of the island of Santorini before the volcanic eruption in the second millennium BC which brought Bronze Age settlement to an end. Far from being treeless like today, the island had a relatively moist and cool climate with diverse vegetation including open oak woodland. Olive cultivation can be traced back to the Early Bronze Age. Cedar, yew and beech were also imported from Lebanon, Cyprus and Anatolia as artefacts, or for building.