How does pompeii teach us about history

People simply rebuilt what had been damaged and carried on as normal. Yet by the time Pliny the Elder and his fleet were sailing across the bay, it had became increasingly clear that carrying on as normal was no longer an option.

The volcanic cloud had blocked out the Sun as it released a vast quantity of pumice, which, although light and porous by nature, was soon raining down, and at such a rate that it floated on, and clogged, the water. The ships could not reach as far as hoped, so the helmsmen put in where they could — at Stabiae, a town just south of Pompeii.

Pliny the Elder disembarked to find the people beginning to panic. He saw one of his friends hastily loading his possessions aboard a ship in the hope of escaping, if only the wind settled.

In an attempt to calm him down, Pliny the Elder remained a figure of stoicism. He had a bath, joined his friend for dinner and went to sleep in his villa.

In the night, however, the household was awoken by powerful earth tremors. Pliny the Elder decided they should leave before the mounting pumice sealed them inside, so with a pillow on his head to protect himself from falling debris, he made his way to the coast.

Unable to sustain its own weight any longer, the enormous cloud had collapsed and released a series of burning avalanche-like waves — called pyroclastic surges — of volcanic ash, gas and rock over the region. Back in Misenum, Pliny the Younger described the hysteria at this sight.

He had tried to escape with his mother, but feared being trampled by the terrified crowds. Pliny the Younger was at a comparatively safe distance from the volcano in Misenum — the situation had become desperate across the bay. Herculaneum, at the base of Vesuvius, was engulfed by the first two pyroclastic surges. Hundreds of people had tried to take cover inside the boat houses along the coast, only for currents of magma and gas to hurtle towards them at a temperature of degrees Celsius.

They perished in the heat. Those in Pompeii suffered the force of three further surges. These killed everyone left by heat or asphyxiation, and completed the burial of the city. There is no surviving eyewitness account of the scenes in Pompeii and Herculaneum.

Pliny the Younger would, in later life, write down what happened in Misenum and Stabiae, where his uncle had ventured in the midst of the eruption. Standing on the coast, Pliny the Elder had found the sea too wild to escape, and died, apparently asphyxiated by a volcanic cloud. Relying on both his memory and reports obtained after the disaster, Pliny the Younger wrote two letters to his friend, the Roman historian Tacitus, which remain the only first-hand accounts of the eruption.

Although nearly 30 years had passed by the time Pliny the Younger composed them, he was mindful of being accurate and his words are certainly supported by the archaeological findings. His description of a large pine tree-shaped cloud rising and then collapsing with heavy pumice fall is particularly admirable. The archaeological evidence also provides additional information about the deaths — and more importantly, the lives — of the ancient citizens of Pompeii. We know that the eruption gave little opportunity for Pompeians to escape.

Those who perished were buried under a layer of pumice and ash that reached up to 20 metres thick. The decomposition of their bodies over the centuries left cavities in the volcanic deposit, into which a 19th century archaeologist named Giuseppe Fiorelli poured plaster in order to make casts of their final poses.

Many victims were found to be huddled together to comfort one another as the end came. Well over 1, bodies have been discovered at Pompeii to date, and as sections of the city have yet to be excavated it is likely that more will come to light.

It is, however, clear that many people did manage to get away. In spite of the substantial damage caused by the earthquake less than two decades before the eruption, Pompeii was a flourishing destination for the wealthy and distinguished.

At a little over acres, the city was dwarfed by Rome, which may have housed in excess of a million people. On a fateful summer morning in A. The darkness Pliny described drew the final curtain on an era in Pompeii. But the disaster also preserved a slice of Roman life.

The buildings, art, artifacts, and bodies forever frozen offer a unique window on the ancient world. Since its rediscovery in the midth century, the site has hosted a tireless succession of treasure hunters and archaeologists. For early archaeologists, the disaster of the city's final days was the primary draw, unearthing buildings and streets as they stood at the time of the eruption.

Ellis's team is particularly interested in a corner of the city near the Porta Stabia gate that is a bit off the beaten archaeological path. When they first cleared it of debris in the s, they left this block for ruin because it had no large villas and it was covered over with a terrible jungle of vegetation," he says. Much research has centered on public buildings and breathtaking villas that portray the artistic and opulent lifestyle enjoyed by the city's wealthy elite.

But while his quest is knowledge of the living Pompeii, Stanford University's Gary Devore , the project's co-director, notes that the eruption still resonates because of the intimate connection it created between past and present.

Even after hundreds of years of work, about a third of the city still lies buried. Yet there is no rush to unearth these hidden Pompeii neighborhoods. Volcanic ash long protected Pompeii, but much of it has now been exposed to the elements for many years.

The combined wear of weather, pollution, and tourists has created a real danger of losing much of what was luckily found preserved. Over his 13 seasons at Pompeii, Devore has witnessed great improvements in conservation and preservation of the priceless site. So it's incredibly important that we record in great detail, with the ability to recreate what we've taken away afterward. That's how we're part of the conservation of Pompeii.

A person standing in the doorway of the Monastery at Petra, Jordan, shows the enormity of the ancient building's entrance. Its most famous eruption took place in the year 79 A. When a group of explorers rediscovered the site in , they were surprised to find that—underneath a thick layer of dust and debris—Pompeii was mostly intact. The buildings, artifacts and skeletons left behind in the buried city have taught us a great deal about everyday life in the ancient world.

Greek settlers made the town part of the Hellenistic sphere in the 8th century B. An independently-minded town, Pompeii fell under the influence of Rome in the 2nd century B. By the turn of the first century A. Elegant houses and elaborate villas lined the paved streets. People gathered in the 20,seat arena and lounged in the open-air squares and marketplaces.

On the eve of that fateful eruption in 79 A. The Vesuvius volcano did not form overnight, of course. Vesuvius volcano is part of the Campanian volcanic arc that stretches along the convergence of the African and Eurasian tectonic plates on the Italian peninsula and had been erupting for thousands of years. In about B. That prehistoric catastrophe destroyed almost every village, house and farm within 15 miles of the mountain.

Villagers around the volcano had long learned to live with their volatile environment. Even after a massive earthquake struck the Campania region in 63 A. Pompeii grew more crowded every year. Sixteen years after that telltale earthquake, in either August or October 79 A. The blast sent a plume of ashes, pumice and other rocks, and scorching-hot volcanic gases so high into the sky that people could see it for hundreds of miles around.

As it cooled, this tower of debris drifted to earth: first the fine-grained ash, then the lightweight chunks of pumice and other rocks. For those who stayed behind, however, conditions soon grew worse. As more and more ash fell, it clogged the air, making it difficult to breathe.