Italy trip-Pompei

As a school child I remember learning about Pompeii, the ancient Italian city with it inhabitants buried alive from the near by volcano, Mnt. Vesuvius.  It captures the attention and imagination of most people that hear about it.  Seeing it first hand, I regret that I didn't remember or know more about it.  We should have figured out how to do a tour, I think I might have cared more.  As it was, we wondered around these ancient ruins of this enormous city (this was no little village like I guess I was expecting) for a very long time in the extremely cold and biting wind.  It really was winter and my dream beach vacation came quickly to a halt the day we toured this ancient city whose own demise was met nearly 2,000 years prior in 79 AD.  The city of Pompeii itself is said to be as old as 8-6 centuries BC.

After getting over the shock as to how large and never ending this city seemded to be, a few fascinating facts were brought to my attention.  In the picture below you can see rocks set into the street to allow people to cross safely during a flood or when they didn't want to step in horse poop.  More fascinating though is the worn down rocks that show the wear and tear from the chariots passing so frequently.  I wonder if there were ever traffic jams along this street.

There were lots of very large buildings in addition to all the smaller divided homes.  Temples, 2 amphitheaters, city open areas for play and exercise, agriculture land, restaurants and brothels can all be seen as you tour the city.

This was a fast food restaurant with the pots of food being built into the counter.

The thing that I was most interested in was the people!  I remember clearly the pictures of these people turned to ash and frozen in time during their dying moment.  I was quite disappointed at how unimportant these body casts seemed to be to those in charge of the exhibit.  They were tucked into some far away corner, no signs (that I noticed) leading the way either.  I'm glad we found them though thanks once again to Ted's navigation skills.  I think this display should be changed.  This is really what people remember when they visit.  These plaster casts of the victims who failed to escape, in their last moment of life, with the expression of terror on their face really make history come alive.

  I've learned that many of the people of Pompeii had all ready left the city before the eruption.  17 years prior there was a huge earthquake that caused a lot of destruction to all the buildings.  Fire spread and the survivors had to deal with anarchy, theft and famine. On top of that the frequency of smaller earthquakes were increasing leading up to the eruption.      No one knew that Mnt. Vesuvius was a volcano, there wasn't even a word for volcano in Latin.  So when the wells like this one suddenly dried up the remaining citizens didn't understand what that meant. Scientist now believe it was heat that killed the inhabitants first not suffocation from ash.

The eruption of AD 79 was very unusual, without lava or other characteristics normally associated with volcanoes. It was a Plinian eruption – the most dangerous and feared kind of all – involving super-heated gas, magma and ash that form a giant towering column that builds up into the sky. The magma cools and falls to the earth as pumice. Vesuvius erupts in this way once in every 2,000 years. Which means it is long due to erupt again, any day now!