A Walk Through the Ashes of the Past
The fertile slopes of Mount Vesuvius and the nearby shore of the Bay of Naples were an ideal environment for agriculture and commerce, busy ports, and luxurious resorts for wealthy citizens of the Roman Empire. Frozen in time by the eruption of Vesuvius nearly 2000 years ago, the towns and villas of the area are now revealing their secrets to archaeologists, historians, and a public hungry for stories of the ancient world.
Visitors to Pompeii: Stories from an Eruption will see casts of victims and a rare treasure trove of art and artifacts from several of the best-researched sites. Walk among these ancient artifacts and learn what they’re telling scientists about the lives of people in Herculaneum, the suburbs Oplontis and Terzigno, and the most famous of them all, Pompeii.
The Casts
If there is one thing nearly everyone associates with Pompeii, it is the human casts.
Once the debris from the eruption of Vesuvius had buried the nearby cities, the volcanic ash cooled and hardened around its victims. The bodies gradually decomposed inside this hard, protective case, leaving cavities in the shape of human beings caught in the final moment of their lives. Injecting plaster or resin into the cavities, preservationists have given us the casts for which Pompeii and Herculaneum are widely known.
Twelve casts are on display in this exhibition. One of the most poignant depicts a family group—two adults, a small child, and an infant—who died together when their house collapsed on them. There is a man found seated with his back against a wall, and another caught as he tried to climb the stairs. One cast shows a woman once thought to be pregnant, though most scholars now believe her clothes are simply bunched up around her belly.
The largest of the casts is of a different type. It presents a group of 32 skeletons found in one of the arcades—vaulted rooms where boats were kept—at the seafront in Herculaneum. Many of the town’s inhabitants had fled here, carrying their most valuable possessions and hoping to make their escape by sea. It is possible that many did—but these 32 victims were among at least 300 left behind.
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