Up Pompeii!

One afternoon in AD 79 an unusual cloud appeared above Vesuvius in the Bay of Naples. ‘It was raised high on a kind of very tall trunk,’ recalled Pliny the Younger, likening it to an umbrella pine tree, ‘and spread out into branches.’ When, finally, the cloud collapsed and the sky grew dark, some people raised their hands to the gods. Others reasoned that ‘there were now no gods anywhere and that the night would last for ever and ever across the universe’.

There are corners of the ancient cities that have not seen daylight since they were buried in volcanic debris. While excavations officially began in Pompeii and Herculaneum in the mid 18th century, there remains much to uncover, and still more to restore. Next month, an exhibition dedicated to the Villa dei Papiri in Herculaneum will open at the Getty Villa in LA. Recent finds will be displayed alongside newly analysed treasures including a celebrated bronze ‘Drunken Satyr’. Meanwhile in Pompeii, the shoring up and conservation of the area known as Regio V, in the north of the city, as part of the €105 million Great Pompeii Project, is unearthing some extraordinary works of art.

The discovery of a scrawled note in the so-called House of the Garden, where a beautiful fresco of Venus and Cupid was also found, has even reopened the debate about when exactly Vesuvius erupted. ‘On 17 October,’ the charcoal graffito reads, ‘he ate too much food.’ Hardly poetry, but for the many archaeologists who believe that the eruption took place in October rather than 24 August — the date given in some manuscripts — it is catnip. Charcoal, after all, does not usually survive long.