In the wider area, where nowadays the organized archeological site of Akrotiri is situated, one of the most important and long-lasting centres of the Aegean and Cycladic culture developed [4500 BC - late 17th c. BC]. Today, the visitor walks around the excavated part of the city of the Late Cycladic period, under the modern bioclimatic shelter. The city was buried under the deposits of the catastrophic eruption of the volcano of Thera, probably at the end of the 17th c. BC, during the peak of its prosperity. Streets with sewerage networks, squares, and multi-storied public and private buildings, once equipped with rich household items and decorated with masterpiece frescoes, comprise part of the densely populated centre of a city, which owed its prosperity mainly to the commercial and maritime activities of its inhabitants, a fact testifying the advanced cultural level of the Theran society of the time, as well as the dramatic chronicle of this glorious city's end.