Catalogue of Tsunamis in the Eastern Mediterranean from Antiquity to Present Times

This paper presents a systematic compilation of all data pertaining to tsunamis observed or recorded in the Eastern Mediterranean from antiquity to present times (1500 b.C. to 1980 a.D.). The first catalogue has been published by Prof. N.N. Ambraseys in the "Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America" (Vol. 52, No 4, October 1962) and this has formed the skeleton of this paper. All of the available information has been compiled from historical accounts, newspaper archives, other reports, and recent mareographic data. The earthquake data have been extracted from the Seismological Institute of Athens and relative biblio-graphy.


INTRODUCTION
between 31°-44° N and 18°-36° E excluding Black Sea and the Italian coasts of the Adriatic Sea is the object of the present paper.
The first catalogue has published by N. Ambraseys in "Bulletin of the Seismological Society of America" (Vol. 52, No. 4, p.p. 895-913, October 1962) and this has formed the skeleton of this paper.
In this catalogue we have compiled and thus rendered available the mass of interesting information about seismic sea-waves which lies buried in many Greek, Byzantine, Arabic and Latin textes.
As will be seen from the references, the material, both printed and manuscript, are ample.
We are convinced that a systematic and scholarly investigation into so many of the manuscripts and textes which we were unqualified to render and which we left out, could easily double the entries and clarify many points in our catalogue.
Some feu of the Byzantine and Arabic sources we quote have, it is true, been read in whole or in part by few authors of earthquake catalogues; but as far as we are aware, for one reason or another, practically none of the information supplied in these catalogues is absolutely correct or complete. Some authors erred in rendering Muslim or Byzantine chronologies with the result to date in their catalogues scores of events by as much as six centuries too early (Ambraseys, 1961). Others, owing to errors resulting from transcribing events and toponymies from Latin translations of Greek or Arabic texts, or owing to differences in chronology resulting thereof, repeat in their catalogues the same event two or more times, or enter non-existant events.
In some instances also they treat the seismicity of a whole year for a given region collectively and enter it as one earthquake. The most critical of these errors where they affect our catalogue are pointed out in their appropriate place in the paper.
Actual harm has been done to the science of seismology by premature conclusions from fragmentary data, and particularly from data repeated from publication to publication with a constantly increasing number of inaccuracies with no reference to the original source of information. Under such circumstances one can hardly be unjust to those who maintain that the observations of seismic phenomena of old date are scientifically inadequate.
In preparing our catalogue we were fully aware that its outcome would be more suggestive than definitive. Also we were aware of the fact that the older historical accounts of seismic phenomena rarely include much useful information other than reports of damage and casualties. These we considered worthwhile our labours.

KEY TO CATALOGUE
The catalogue is arranged in the following manner. Dates are given in headlines in the new style (Gregorian). They are followed by the name of the region in which the seismic sea-wave was felt. This is followed by the name of cities, towns or areas which were particularly affected. The intensity, m, of the wave is given in small roman numerals and it refers to Sieberg's modified intensity scale where the height of the wave on land or the distance which it flooded inland is known and is inticated as (H =) and (L=) respectively in meters. Near the geographical coordinates of the epicentre of the main earthquake shock, when known are given together with the intensity of the shock (7=in the modified Mercalli scale), magnitude (M = after Gutenberg) and the focal depth (d=, s: shallow, n: normal, ¿: intermediate). This is followed by the references consulted which are pertinent to the Phenomenon itself, to the accompanying earthquake, and to the information necessary for the dating of the event. Numerals outside the parentheses refer to references in the Bibliography. In the parentheses, roman numerals refer to the book (liber) and the following numbers to the chapter and line respectively of the text. P : refers to a standard system of pagination while p : indicates the page. Folio is indicated by f. Page references to an authority is not given when the material in that authority is arranged chronologically. Entries marked with an asterisk are doubtful events quoted mostly by modern writers, which have been included for the sake of completeness.
Place names mentioned in the original suffered many changes during historical and recent times. When these differ from those of today, the former are shown in brackets where they first occur, and the modern name is used thereafter. Modern places are spelt after Lippincott.
In what follows the headlines more information is given mainly about the events from 1500 BC to 1650 AD and some of them up to the present time. For all the other events only a bare outline is given.
With so many dates, controversial points, so many foreign names and such a multitude of references as crowd this paper; though we have done our best to be as accurate as possible, many errors must necessarily have crept in. We shall feel most greateful to those who will point these out to us.