Update from the Amalfi Coast #2 Pompeii

Tuesday, May 17. We want to go see Herculaneum (Ercolano as its known today) and Pompeii.  Both of these UNESCO sites were close to Naples.  While M was researching Pompeii he came across an article that talked about Herc. a Roman town which had been covered by the same eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD as Pompeii. Someone came across this town in about 1750 (give or take a decade or two) while digging a well for their home.  It is an amazing site, located below grade of the actual modern day Ercolano.  The volcanic debris that landed on this town was such that it sealed the town preserving wood, cloth and other organic material.

             When we came upon it through the gates – it’s incredible how so much/many of the buildings survived.  One can see mosaics clearly visible on the floors, walls covered in marble with vivid color to provide décor.  Roadways laid with large stones and parts of temples still standing.  It really was like stepping back in time 2000 years (except for all the school tours and other tourists like us)!

 Pompeii is a much larger site with most people visiting there.  The busloads of tourists, and their guides were evident as we maneuvered through the crowds.  If we thought it was busy today – it must be just wild in the summer.  The area around Pompeii is much more commercialized with shops, snack bars, tourist bus parking lots, campgrounds etc.  It’s hard to believe that in a few hundred metres, you step back in time by two millennia!  The town-site of Pompeii was much bigger – with something like only a third of it open to public viewing.   Some places are still being excavated.  Here you get the sense of grandeur as we step through the basilica area (which was a word first used for judicial buildings and then later used to describe large cathedrals).   Into the forum area, basically the main square of the town, we see pillars still standing as well as parts of temples, shops, platforms for orating as well as for statues for the nobility.  The site itself is very big and one would be pressed to see all of it in a day.
We rented audio guides and learned much about the town and life of long ago.   As it is today, we learned about the importance of the water systems within the buildings and town, large stones elevated in the streets were crosswalks for when water was running in the streets.  We also had a chance to see a couple of preserved corpses complete with teeth, which had been discovered – with the body showing that the person had been running when covered with ash - amazing!