The ancient cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum that once flourished in circa 60AD have been the subject of thorough investigation, immense awe and unending curiosity over the four centuries when excavations led to its rediscovery.
The City of Pompeii was a Roman colony situated at the foot of the great volcano, Mount Vesuvius, in the present day Italy. Now around the present day Naples, the city had a highly sophisticated culture. It had arenas, theatres, beautiful public baths with walls covered in intricate art patterns, a well-designed network of streets and roads, huge aqueducts to carry fresh water into the city, well-designed cemeteries, and imposing architecture which reflected the prosperity and affluence of the city’s dwellers. There is no contention that the city was far more civilized and well-planned than the utter chaos of an average Pakistani city of today, almost two thousand years later.
So well-planned were the aqueducts that diversions within it created three streams. One stream fed the public fountains. A second stream carried water to the public baths while the third stream brought water to the most affluent Pompeian citizens. Blocks would be placed in the aqueducts to divert the flow to the appropriate destination. In times of drought, the rich were the first who would loose their water supply, the baths were the second to go dry. In extreme cases of drought, water was provided only to the public fountains.
The city was dotted with holiday villas of the wealthy citizens that brought abundant riches from visiting tourists. Trade flourished and the economy boomed. As a popular holiday resort, the city was frequented by rich Roman senators and emperors. Excavations have found numerous brothels as well, identified by intact frescoes depicting the goings on of the houses. The society accepted homosexuality and promiscuity.
The people of the city patronized art as manifest from the numerous murals and mosaics found in excavations. Some of the murals show detailed depiction of daily life, sports, traditions and the mosaics lining walls and on the floors.
Struck by a massive earthquake in 62 AD, majority of the buildings in the city tumbled down. The city was rebuilt with reinforced materials to withstand another earthquake. In fact, an organized and comprehensive programme to rebuild public buildings took place. However, destruction was the city’s fate as it lay in the lap of a colossal active volcano on a tectonic plate.
On 24th August, 79AD, the mighty Vesuvius erupted on a then unprecedented scale. The eruption was preceded by a mild earthquake as proved by extensive studies of volcanologists and geologists and from the accounts of Pliny the Younger, a Roman administrator and poet, who witnessed the entire destruction while fleeing 18 miles away from the volcano. Pliny was 18 at the time and gave a detailed description of the great disaster in which his uncle, Pliny the Elder also perished.
Volcanologists now use the term “plinian” to refer to sustained explosive eruptions which generate high-altitude eruption columns and blanket large areas with ash. It is estimated that at times during the eruption, the column of ash was 20 miles (32 km) tall. About one cubic mile (four cubic kilometres) of ash was erupted in about 19 hours. The pyroclastic explosions resulted in an onslaught of lava as fast as 100 km/hr onto the unsuspecting city.
The spilling of ash and lava onto the city was within a matter of minutes and never gave a chance to a majority of citizens for escape. Many who took shelter in nearby hills were quickly caught by a rain of volcanic debris. About 10 feet (3m) of ash, soot and volcanic debris fell on Pompeii, burying everything except the roofs of some buildings. The city was abandoned and its location forgotten.
Looting and plunder soon followed the dead city by Romans themselves. By 1595, amateur excavations discovered the forgotten city of Pompeii. Organized archeological excavations began in the mid-nineteen century. The eruption which buried the town in ash actually captured a moment in time. Under the ash, everything remained as it was at the time of the eruption. It was a pulsating moment of an alive city, teeming with people, forever arrested in eternity. It truly became an Ibrat for countless generations of people as referred in the Holy Quran for destroyed cities. It was all very ironical for the city dwellers to have been caught totally unprepared by death, as they took pride in predicting the future through signs and portents.
The same was the fate of the adjacent city of Herculaneum. The city had been inhabited by the elite of the Roman society. Even worse than Pompeii, the people of Herculaneum never got the chance to react to the sudden affliction that hit them on 24th August 79AD. There are numerous moulds of people mummified by a thick layer of lava and ash in their very last moments. By studying bone fractures and the position of the remains, anthropologists and volcanologists have established that the fugitives were wrapped in a 900-degree Fahrenheit cloud. They died instantly of thermal shock, not from slow suffocation as scientists long assumed. Around 80 bodies recovered from the ruins of the city, holding onto precious valuables show the last minute futile attempt to flee the city.
The volcanic showers lasted for two days and the clouds of darkness covered the cities for some days more, forever cloaking them in an eerie silence.
The ancient cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum that once flourished in circa 60AD have been the subject of thorough investigation, immense awe and unending curiosity over the four centuries when excavations led to its rediscovery.
