The Mysterious End of the Minoans

What happened to the Minoans?

The Minoans of Crete disappeared, mysteriously, more than two thousand years ago. Their civilization came to a sudden end. All the Minoans left Crete.

Although no one knows for sure, many historians think that the Minoans left when a volcano erupted on a nearby island called Thera. Thera looked like a small island, and people lived on it, grew crops and raised animals in its fields. But Thera was actually the top of an active volcano that poked up from the Mediterranean Sea.

One day, the small island began to shake underfoot. The people of Thera could feel constant small earthquakes. Many left the island at once, taking all their possessions with them! But the earthquakes died away, and the people who were still on Thera decided to stay. They started to rebuild the walls that had fallen down.

But the volcano wasn’t finished. Bits of rock called pumice started to spray out of the volcano’s funnel. It covered the whole countryside. Smoke began to come out of the ground.

The rest of the people of Thera decided to leave—and just in time! The volcano exploded, spraying lava and rock all over the island. Huge boulders were thrown up from the inside of the volcano and fell like rock bombs on top of the villages of Thera. Suddenly, the volcano collapsed inward. The sea rushed in to fill the hole, and the whole island of Thera sank beneath the sea! The island of Thera was gone forever.

The island of Crete was still there. But a tidal wave thrown up by the volcano swept its shores. Huge clouds of ash, dust and smoke floated down the wind to cover it. Ash covered the crops. Food supplies were wiped out. People could hardly breathe, because of all the dust and smoke in the air. Historians think that many of the Minoans left the island of Crete because the volcano ruined the air and land. Others stayed, but they struggled against starvation. Finally they were forced to battle their neighbors for food. Minoan cities were never strong and powerful again. Ash and dust helped bring the first great civilization of Crete to its end.

Note to Parent: The Minoan civilization reached its peak between 2200–1450 BC/BCE. Since the Minoans are important for elementary students primarily as predecessors of the Greeks, I have included them slightly out of chronological order.