Mystery #13

I am named after a Roman blacksmith god.

The first of five clues. Each one below gives a little more away.

1

I am named after a Roman blacksmith god.

2

I built most of the islands you would like to holiday on.

3

In 1815 one of me cooled the entire planet and cancelled a summer.

4

I can sleep for four centuries and still not be finished.

5

Lava, ash, and an eruption.

The answer

Volcano

Tambora's 1815 eruption gave the world a year without a summer — and, in a rained-in villa by Lake Geneva, Frankenstein.

About three quarters of the world's volcanoes sit on the ring of fire, the rim of the Pacific where oceanic crust dives beneath continental plates and melts. Tambora's eruption in 1815 was the largest in recorded history, throwing enough sulphur into the stratosphere to cool the planet by around half a degree and ruin harvests across the northern hemisphere the following year. Krakatoa in 1883 was smaller but louder: the sound was heard in Australia and on Rodrigues island, nearly five thousand kilometres away, and the pressure wave circled the globe several times.

Play it properly

Reading five clues at once is not the game. In the real thing they arrive one at a time and every wrong guess costs an hour. Play mystery #13 · today's mystery · the vault

Nearby mysteries

Previous: mystery #12. Next: mystery #14. Or try #39, #40, #41, #42, #43, #44.