ABSTRACT
The sanctuary of the Dioscuri, protectors of shipping, goes back to the seventh century. Relics of the original temple can be seen together with two altars, one small, associated with the temple, one the main sanctuary altar. Thera is in many ways the most fascinating of the Aegean islands because of the colossal eruption which caused the centre of the island to vanish in the middle of the second millennium bc, the possible relation of this cataclysm to some of the stories of flood preserved in legend, to the eventual destruction of Minoan Crete, and indeed to the account of Atlantis in Plato. Lesbos is the largest of the islands lying off the Asia minor coast. There was an important bronze age settlement at Thermi. The Greek occupation was Aeolian and led to the establishment of five city-states on the island, Mytilene, Methymna, Eresus, Antissa, and Pyrrha.
