Pompeii

Pompeii (Latin: [pɔmˈpei̯.iː]) sat in what is now the town of Pompei, near Naples in Italy’s Campania region. During the 79 AD eruption of Mount Vesuvius, it—along with Herculaneum, Stabiae, and numerous nearby villas—was covered by 4 to 6 meters of volcanic ash and pumice. Because the ash largely preserved it, Pompeii provides a frozen-in-time view of Roman life and ancient city planning. At its destruction, it was a wealthy town with 10,000 to 20,000 residents. It boasted fine public buildings and luxurious private homes with lavish decorations, furnishings, and artworks—these drew early excavators. Later digs uncovered hundreds of private houses and businesses reflecting different architectural styles and social classes, plus many public structures. Organic remains, such as wooden objects and human bodies, were buried in the ash; as they decayed, archaeologists made plaster casts of people in their final moments. Graffiti on walls and inside rooms offers abundant examples of Vulgar Latin, the everyday spoken language, contrasting with the formal Latin of classical writers. Pompeii stayed mostly untouched until its rediscovery in the late 1500s. Major excavations only began in the mid-1700s, marking the start of modern archaeology. Early efforts were haphazard or marred by looting, damaging or destroying many items and sites. By 1960, most of Pompeii was uncovered but left to decay; further major digs were then banned or limited to targeted, prioritized areas. Since 2018, these efforts have led to new finds in previously unexplored parts of the city. Pompeii is a UNESCO World Heritage Site, called “the only archaeological site in the world that provides a complete picture of an ancient Roman city.” It is one of Italy’s top tourist attractions, drawing about 2.5 million visitors each year. **Name** In Latin, Pompeii is a second-declension masculine plural noun (Pompeiī, -ōrum). According to Theodor Kraus, the root likely comes from the Oscan word for five, *pompe*, suggesting either the community began as five hamlets or was settled by the *gens Pompeia* family group. **Geography** Pompeii was built about 40 meters above sea level on a coastal lava plateau created by earlier Vesuvius eruptions (the volcano is 8 km away). The plateau dropped steeply to the south and partly west into the sea. Three layers of sediment from large landslides—possibly triggered by heavy rain—lie atop the lava. Once on the shoreline, the city is now about 700 meters inland. The mouth of the navigable Sarno River, next to the city, was protected by lagoons and served early Greek and Phoenician sailors as a haven port, later developed by the Romans. Pompeii covered 64 to 67 hectares and, based on household counts, was home to 11,000 to 11,500 people. **History** Though best known for its Roman remains from 79 AD, Pompeii was built on a much older city. Expansion from an early nucleus (the old town) sped up after 450 BC under the Greeks, following the Battle of Cumae. **Early history** The first stable settlements date to the 8th century BC, when the Oscans, a central Italian people, founded five villages in the area. With Greeks arriving in Campania around 740 BC, Pompeii entered the Hellenic orbit. The key building from this period is the Doric Temple, set away from the center in what later became the Triangular Forum. The cult of Apollo was also introduced. Greek and Phoenician sailors used the location as a safe port. In the early 6th century BC, the settlement merged into one community centered on the important crossroads between Cumae, Nola, and Stabiae, and was surrounded by a tufa city wall (the pappamonte wall). This first wall—later used as a base—unusually enclosed a much larger area than the early town, including farmland. Building such an impressive wall at this time shows the settlement was already important and wealthy. The city began to flourish, and maritime trade started with the construction of a small port near the river mouth. The earliest settlement was focused in regions VII and VIII (the old town), identified by stratigraphy below Samnite and Roman buildings and by its irregular street plan. By 524 BC, the Etruscans had settled in the area, including Pompeii, using the Sarno River as a route between sea and interior. Like the Greeks, they did not conquer the city militarily but controlled it, leaving Pompeii with a degree of autonomy. It became a member of the Etruscan League. Excavations in 1980–1981 revealed Etruscan inscriptions and a 6th-century BC necropolis. Under the Etruscans, a primitive forum or market square was built, along with the Temple of Apollo, where objects including bucchero fragments were found by Maiuri. Several houses featured the so-called Tuscan atrium, typical of this people. The city wall was strengthened in the early 5th century BC with two façades of thin, vertically set slabs of Sarno limestone about four meters apart, filled with earth (the orthostate wall). In 474 BC, the Greek city of Cumae, allied with Syracuse, defeated the Etruscans at the Battle of Cumae and took control of the area.