The City of Pompeii

It is August 24, 79 AD in Pompeii, the city of twenty thousand citizens. People are panicking and seeking shelter in at their houses and public baths; some flee the city. Everyone has pillows tied to their heads to protect their heads from falling objects.  Mount Vesuvius has just erupted. Clouds of ash mixed with big pieces of pumice have risen about Vesuvius and have started to move towards Pompeii. The city was covered in ash, pumice, and pieces hardened lava within a few hours.

I was very excited to go to Pompeii. I could not believe that I was going to see a completely preserved city from the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, go into the ancient houses, and walk on the streets used more than two thousand years ago. One of the most interesting parts of the visit was going into magnificent houses of wealthy people. The houses had the typical Roman house plan. When a person walked in he could see most of the house and how grandiose it was. First he would encounter the atrium where there was usually a basin collecting the rainwater. There were a lot of bedrooms surrounding all sides of the atrium. As he would walk in further, he would see a beautiful garden with bedrooms, kitchen, and garden room on its sides. The interesting part about the plan of the houses was that all of the rooms were facing the inside of the house and they did not have windows facing the streets.  Also, houses where not grouped into residential areas like nowadays. Houses would be surrounded by little shops and have a busy street running by them.

In Pompeii we went into a house of Menander. It was built in the third century BC and belonged to the family of Emperor Nero’s second wife. The house takes up almost a block and has the same structure as I just described above. As it was uncommon for people of that time, the owners flaunted their wealth through the size of the house and its paintings and architecture.  The house also has a private bath, which was a luxury at that time. The house of Menander has beautiful bright paintings, frescos and mosaics. One of the paintings shows a Greek playwright Menander, which explains the name of the house. It is unbelievable how well preserved and bright the paintings are. The house left a huge impression on me. The size, colors of the walls, and structure of it was impressive.

Another interesting observation that I want to share with you was the sign ‘HAVE” in front of the entrance in one of the other houses, which is a sign that welcomes people. It is interesting how customs of people two thousand years are so similar to ours.

This site visit was one of my favorites so far. When I walked into the city I felt like I had traveled through time.  The entire structure of the city, houses, shops, and roads were right in front of my eyes. There were political campaigns written on walls of the street, public drinking fountains in the middle of the street, and marks of the wagon wheels on the roads. We even needed to use a map to not get lost in the city. The visit also left a grim mark on me. We have seen the plastic casts of people that were killed during the eruption. The bodies left holes in the volcanic ash and disappeared with time. It was scary to see the exact positions and face expressions of dying people. Pompeii was definitely one of the most impressive sites I have ever seen.

~Natasha Antropova