Marking 5o years of excavations at Akrotiri – his life’s work – archaeology professor Christos Doumas talks about the “Pompeii of the Aegean.” BY TA S S O U L A E P TA K I L I
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ebruary, 1961. A young archaeologist arrives by sea in Santorini, after a 48-hour sail from Mykonos! He has changed boats twice, overnighted in Syros and Ios, and now catches his first glimpse of the caldera at dawn. “Anyone who hasn’t visited Santorini by boat at least once, entered that giant crater and sensed the awe that it provokes, is missing out,” says Christos Doumas, emeritus professor of prehistoric archaeology. Back then, he was 28 years old and a junior archaeologist in the Cyclades. His mission was to evaluate a group of graves (early Christian, as it turned out) that had been revealed during building work to enlarge the high school of Thera – as the island is officially called. Santorini in those days bore no relation to the glamorous image it presents today. “Everywhere there was evidence of the great earthquake of 1956. Oia was a tiny village, almost in ruins. At Fira, there was only Nikolas’ taverna. That is where all of us, the workers who weren’t locals, went to eat. Most of the island’s inhabitants were farmers or herders – there were very few craftsmen – and given that they only produced grapes and tomatoes, they had to import a lot of their produce.” That year, Doumas spent only a few weeks in Santorini. But he would come back, and stay for good.
1968: Christos Doumas with acclaimed archaeologist Spyridon Marinatos (right), who had begun excavations at Akrotiri a year earlier in search of the prehistoric settlement.
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