Because the excavated site at Akrotiri is a protected ruin rather than a display space, most of its finest artefacts — wall paintings, pottery, tools — have been moved to purpose-built museums, primarily in Fira, with some of the most significant pieces held in Athens.
Museum of Prehistoric Thera
Located in Fira, this is the primary home for artefacts recovered from Akrotiri — pottery, furniture fragments, tools and some of the site's celebrated wall paintings, presented with context on daily life in the Bronze-Age settlement before the eruption. A natural pairing with a visit to the excavation site itself; see our Akrotiri guide.
Archaeological Museum of Thera
Also in Fira, this collection focuses on later periods — from the Geometric era through Roman times — including finds from Ancient Thera, the ridge-top city above Kamari and Perissa covered in our Perissa guide.
Megaro Gyzi and local folklore collections
Smaller museums around the island, including a cultural centre in Fira housed in a restored mansion, cover more recent island history — Venetian-era rule, 20th-century island life, and the aftermath of the significant 1956 earthquake that reshaped much of the caldera-rim architecture you see today.
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