Pompeii
HISTORICAL NOTES
One quick
glance at the lay-out of the city and a fundamental fact immediately catches
one's eye: Pompeii, unlike Herculaneum and ancient Naples, is not the fruit
of an organic design of city planners. In the regular town design two
atypical nuclei stand out: one, roughly quadrilateral, around the "civil
forum" and the other around the tiny "triangular forum" next to the theatres
district. To those nuclei is linked the rest of the city which by contrast
looks "new": all this enclosed within solid city walls.
This observation reveals the secret of the origins and development of
Pompeii: its port on the mouth of the river Sarno is evidence of its
Mediterranean vocation - from the earliest history - with respect to its
vast hinterland which in time came to include Acerra, Nola, Nuceria, as the
ancient historian Strabo attests.
On a bed of prehistoric lava, Pompeii is founded in the second half of the
VIIth century B.C. with an organization effort that presupposes objectives
of lookout and defence connected to the nature of the relations between the
Greeks and the natives.
The natives, peaceful when first colonized, later matured notions of armed
action when the Chalcidenses, who held defensive posts along the sea-coast,
threatened to cut off for ever the peoples of Campania from access to the
sea. Despite the documented existence of a Doric temple dating from the
second half of the VIth century B.C. on the terrace of the triangular forum,
and other indications that were held valid until only a few years ago,
Pompeii was not a Greek city, even though it had been influenced by Greek
culture ever since the most archaic epoch. In the light of the results
obtained from the stratigraphic researches carried out in these last years,
it appears that Pompeii, at the time of its foundation and its first
development, was much more conditioned, politically, by the Etruscans than
by the Greeks.
There is also evidence that it was connected to an "Etruscan territory"
centred on Capua (Santa Maria Capua Vetere), which comprised large portions
of inland Campania and, through the Sarno valley, the Sorrento peninsula.
Disconcerting evidence of this has been found at Vico Equense.
Pompeii's commercial vocation upsets completely the former architectural and
decorative order, transforms the habits of its inhabitants, generates
self-made entrepreneurs and exploiters.
A "vertical section" of the city in the last decades of its life before the
79 A.D. eruption of Vesuvius, would offer a picture - in contrast with the
calm of former times - of roads, inns, taverns bustling with people,
brothels in full activity, stall keepers in the forum, the amphiteatre
cram-full of people, slaves of an irrational passion for sport, always ready
for a brawl, walls covered with election slogans in favour of this or that
candidate, graffiti with names, quips, love messages everywhere.
House building in the meanwhile was capriciously spreading beyond the walls,
it consolidated westwards in dismal phalansteries. Painting lost its
capacity of perspective. The former articulation which can be seen in the
vast cycles of paintings of the "Villa of the Mysteries" (Villa dei
Misteri), is often reduced to nothing but commonplace and poor quality
decoration.
In the last few
years every possible effort has been concentrated on restoration but
excavations have also been going on the city walls, bringing to light the
walls from "Porta di Sarno" to "Porta di Nola" and beyond towards "Porta
Vesuvius".
Stratigraphic research work has also been given a substantial boost.
The four-storey building that incorporates the walls, north of "Porta
Marina", has been excavated while the diggings at the "House of Julius
Polybius" (Casa di Giulio Polibio) have brought to light new and sensational
discoveries.
The zones that still have to be excavated in the north-eastern area may hold
some more unexpected surprises in store but at this point we can say that
the "picture" of life in Pompeii, thanks also to stratigraphic research, has
already been quite clearly defined.
The eruption
The eruption of the Vesuvius, which raged from the
afternoon of August 24th through to the 26th, were recorded, albeit a few
years later, by Gaius Plinius Secundus, who in 79 AD was seventeen years old
and staying with his uncle, an admiral in the imperial fleet and a keen
naturalist. He was persuaded to narrate the events by Tacitus in two letters
when the latter was acquiring material for the second part of his "Historiae".
Those last days of August had been preceded by earth tremors, a common
enough phenomenon in Campania that aroused no particular apprehension. But
early in the afternoon of the 24th an enormous cloud in the shape of a pine
tree appeared and it changed colour continuously.
The admiral was studying the cloud, not knowing its cause, when a call for
help arrived from Rectina, the wife of Tascio, who lived at the foot of
Vesuvius. She found herself hemmed in by the eruption, with only the sea
offering a possible route to safety. The admiral ordered the entire fleet to
put to sea, intending to take off as many as possible of the numerous
inhabitants along that part of the coast.
During the crossing the ships were covered in the ash pouring out of the
volcano, which as they drew nearer the coast became hotter and denser,
containing flaming pumicite and lapilli. The force of the eruption was such
that the ships could not land and had to sail on the port of Stabiae, four
miles to the south of Pompeii.
The admiral went ashore and had dinner as guest of Pomponiano, continuing to
scrutinising the spectacle that, with nightfall, had become truly awesome.
There was no let up in the shower of ash, which built up in drifts in the
central courtyard of the house, forcing the diners to leave the dining room
before they were trapped inside. What is more, the tremors went on unabated,
shaking the buildings to their foundations, and everybody chose to stay out
in the open, covering their heads with cushions to protect themselves from
the storm of scorching particles, rather than risk being buried under
falling masonry.
At dawn on August 25th the light of the sun was unable to penetrate the
thick veil of soot hanging over the never-ending eruption, while the
condition of wind and sea continued to make escape impossible. The admiral
was overcome by the choking ashes mixed with sulphurous exhalations and he
died along with many other inhabitants of Pompeii. The contorted corpses of
some of them have been restored to us in plaster casts, bringing home the
excruciating suffering of a death by suffocation from fumes.
During the years the city passed into total oblivion, such that even its
name was forgotten. Even in the first years of excavations, which began in
1748, no one was quite sure whether the site was Stabiae or Pompeii, until,
as Winckelmann recorded, an inscription came to light which proclaimed
unequivocally the name of the Pompeiian colony.
Since then more than two centuries have gone by, and millions of visitors
have come to experience one of the most significant legacies of the ancient
world, carrying away with them sensations and reflections which may indeed
be of use in charting their future lives
The Visit
Porta Marina. The name is modern and indicates that the roads passing through this gate led down to the sea. The gate originally had two arches (one for pedestrian only) made into one barrel vault in opus cementitium (a compound of mortar and stones)
The Antiquarium
is a museum which assembles the evidences of
the life and the civilisation of Pompeii including the famous casts of the
corpses of some inhabitants and animals died during the eruption. We can
found other important founds to the Archaelogical National Museum in Naples.
The Forum centre of the city, a large rectangular square rich of columns and bases of innumerable statues
| 1 - The
Basilica court site 2 - Temple of Apollo 3 - Temple of Vespasian and Jupiter 4 - Macellum o covered market 5 - Forum Baths 6 - Temple of Fortuna Augusta. |
 1 |
 2 |
 3 |
 4 |
 5 |
 6 |
Along
the elegant Via di Mercurio we can found, with the other constructions, The
House of the Big Fountain and The House of the Small Fountain, so called by
a kind of fountain typically oriental, in fact they came from Egypt
House of the
Faun 
is considerate the most beautiful example of a
private house of the ancient world because its greatness, the elegance of
its architecture and the splendid mosaics.
House of the
Vettii is, instead, the most famous,
perhaps by the famous little statue of th
e
god Priapo, it is the most admired; it was of two rich
merchants and it is full of very well preserved paintings , statues,
decorations and wonderful rooms.
There are many
other beautiful houses , and we can visit, moreover, in Pompei many Shops,
Bakeries and Artisan Laboratories, and the most famous is the Fullery of
Stephanus , that show us the evidence of a rich life that in a moment it is
stopped as suspended in the time.
|
 2
|
 3 |
 4 |
Villa dei Misteri,
Not far from the excavations we can visit
Villa of the Mysteries, a large construction (55 rooms), famous because its
beautiful paintings inspired by the Dionysiac mysteries that had happened
here.
| 1) Via dell'
Abbondanza 2) Venus in the shell 3) House of Venus |
 1 |
 2 |
 3 |
1