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An ornate courtyard found in an otherwise humble home may have reflected the owners' aspirational vision of the future.Discoveries in Pompeii—from elaborate frescoes to garden shrines—have taught researchers a lot about the city's wealthiest residents. Until recent years, however, the lives of the lower and middle classes have garnered less interest.But now, archaeologists have excavated several rooms in a middle-class home partially destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 C.E. Frozen in time, the rooms provide a snapshot into the lives of everyday people in the ancient Roman city, according to a statement from the Archaeological Park of...

Oct. 18 — Bacteria found in a 2,000-year-old piece of cheese could be the final evidence that this food was a continuous source of infectious disease in the ancient Roman world. According to a study published in a recent issue of the Journal of Infection, a tiny piece of cheese containing disease bacteria was carbonized in the volcanic eruption that one night in late August, 79 A.D. covered Pompeii and the nearby towns of Herculaneum and Stabiae with nine to 20 feet of hot ash and pumice. About 250 people fled to the beach, trying in vain to escape the...

Hear from experts about the challenges of unraveling and reading hundreds of carbonized papyri scrolls buried by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in AD 79. Classicists David Blank of the University of California Los Angeles and Richard Janko of the University of Michigan discuss early and current attempts to open the fragile layers and decipher their texts, and computer scientist W. Brent Seales of the University of Kentucky shares how advances in technology and machine learning might allow the still unopened ancient book rolls to be "virtually unwrapped" and read. October 19, 2019, The Getty Villa, Malibu, California.Reading the Herculaneum...

Scientists have successfully sequenced human genome from an individual who died in Pompeii, Italy, after the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79.The researchers examined the remains of two individuals who were found in the House of the Craftsman in Pompeii and extracted their DNA. The shape, structure, and length of the skeletons indicated that one set of remains belonged to a male who was aged between 35 to 40 years at the time of his death, while the other set of remains belonged to a female aged over 50 years old.Although the authors were able to extract and sequence...

...the latest discovery to surface in the archaeological dig they have led since 2001: a painted tomb from the 2nd century B.C. In excellent condition, the tomb depicts a banquet scene, fixed by pigments. Twice the size of Pompeii, the ancient city of Cumae is located 25 km west of Naples on the Tyrrhenian Sea facing the island of Ischia, at the Campi Flegrei Archaeological Park. Ancient historians considered Cumae the oldest Ancient Greek settlement in the western world. Founded in the latter half of the 8th century B.C. by Greeks from Euboea, the settlement grew quickly and prospered over...

Italian archaeologists have found a site near Naples where the precursors of non-stick pans were produced more than 2,000 years ago. The finding confirms that non-stick frying pans, an essential tool in any modern kitchen, were used in the Roman Empire. The cookware was known as "Cumanae testae" or "Cumanae patellae," (pans from the city of Cumae) and was mentioned in the first-century Roman cookbook De Re Coquinaria as the most suitable pans for making chicken stews. However, the pans from Cumae remained a mystery until 1975, when Giuseppe Pucci, archaeologist and professor of history of Greek and Roman art,...

Join @Darius Arya Digs for a walk inside Pompeii, including a trip to REGIO V, with new, amazing discoveries. You'll also visit the newly opened Antiquarium, Pompeii's own on site museum, for amazing artifacts from the site, many on display for the first time.What are the newest discoveries at Pompeii?December 14, 2021 | Ancient Rome Live0:00 Introduction1:13 Pompeii's Forum1:27 The Basilica of Pompeii1:59 The streets of Pompeii2:44 New discoveries in Regio V5:00 Villa of the Mysteries6:04 Villa of Diomedes6:47 House of the Ceii7:41 The new Antiquarium

In the 19th century, the archaeologists tasked with excavating Pompeii and Herculaneum ran into a problem: Everywhere they turned, they found erotic art, from frescoes of copulating couples to sculptures of nude, well-endowed gods.At a time when sex was widely considered shameful or even obscene, officials deemed the images too explicit for the general public. Instead of placing the artifacts on view, staff at the Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli stashed them in a secret room closed to all but scholars and, according to Atlas Obscura, male visitors willing to bribe their way in. Between 1849 and 2000, the works...

Archaeologists recreated a Pompeiian villa destroyed by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 C.E. using virtual reality technology to better understand how visitors would have seen the ancient home, according to the recently published paper in the archaeology journal Antiquity. The researchers carefully created a digital model of the ancient home known as the House of the Epigrams, a villa excavated in the 1870s and so named because it contains mythical paintings accompanied by Greek epigrams. While the owner of the house is impossible to know for sure, researchers have suggested it may have belonged to a Lucius Valerius...

...A century later, the Italian military historian Flavio Russo suggested that the attribution should be settled by scientific investigation. Might an isotopic examination of the teeth reveal where the skull’s owner had spent his childhood? A campaign led by La Stampa eventually raised funds for a study of the relic at the hands of a scientific team fronted by popular historian Andrea Cionci. The results, released in January 2020 at the Museo dell’ Arte Sanitaria, were somewhat ambiguous. Isotopic examination of the lower jaw indicated a childhood consistent with the early life spent by the Elder Pliny in his north...

Archaeologists excavating the Roman coastal retreat of Herculaneum have unearthed the remains of a victim from the Vesuvius eruption in AD 79... During the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, the town was buried under thick layers of ash and pumice, followed by pyroclastic material that carbonised organic remains...Previous excavations in the 1980’s of the towns shoreline discovered skeletons on the beach and in the first six so-called boat sheds. Archaeologists at the time suggested that these victims were waiting for rescue, when they were killed instantly from the heat generated by a pyroclastic flow att temperatures of around 500 °C.For the...

Marcus Venerius Secundio died in his 60s decades before Mount Vesuvius’ eruption...As Silvia Lambertucci reports for Agenzia Nazionale Stampa Associata (ANSA), the skeleton, which still has hair and a partially visible ear, belonged to a man who died in his 60s in the decades leading up to Pompeii’s destruction.Per a statement from the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, experts discovered the remains at the necropolis of Porta Sarno, just east of the ancient city center. An inscription on the man’s tomb identifies him as Marcus Venerius Secundio, a formerly enslaved individual who later became a priest...The skeleton shows signs of partial...

The little slave room contains three beds, a ceramic pot and a wooden chest.Pompeii archaeologists said Saturday they have unearthed the remains of a "slave room" in an exceptionally rare find at a Roman villa destroyed by Mount Vesuvius' eruption nearly 2,000 years ago.The little room with three beds, a ceramic pot and a wooden chest was discovered during a dig at the Villa of Civita Giuliana, a suburban villa just a few hundred metres from the rest of the ancient city.An almost intact ornate Roman chariot was discovered here at the start of this year, and archaeologists said...

The catastrophic impact of Vesuvius effectively froze the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum in time, like insects trapped in amber. This has provided archaeologists with unique insights into the lives of those living in the shadow of the volcano thousands of years ago. The opportunity to actually walk around an ancient city, almost as it was, allows us to connect with our past in tangible ways.The scientific study of the remains of victims of Vesuvius are, however, not without controversy. Until very recently, the prevailing theory was that the heat and force of the pyroclastic flow pouring out of Vesuvius...

Excavators have discovered a large four-wheel ceremonial chariot at a villa near Pompeii, an ancient city in southern Italy. Excavators found the bronze and tin chariot almost fully intact, with wooden remains and the imprint of ropes, according to an announcement on Saturday from the Archaeological Park of Pompeii. "It is an extraordinary discovery for the advancement of our knowledge of the ancient world," said the outgoing director of the park, Massimo Osanna. "At Pompeii vehicles used for transport have been found in the past, such as that of the House of Menander, or the two chariots discovered at Villa...

A stunning fresco in the garden of Pompeii's Casa dei Ceii (House of the Ceii) has been painstakingly laser-cleaned and touched up with new paint by expert restorers. The artwork — of hunting scenes — was painted in the so-called 'Third' or 'Ornate' Pompeii style, which was popular around 20–10 BC and featured vibrant colours. Poor maintenance since the house was dug up in 1913–14 saw the hunting fresco and others deteriorate, particularly at the bottom, which is more vulnerable to humidity. The main section of the fresco depicts a lion pursuing a bull, a leopard pouncing on sheep and...

A fast-food eatery — or thermopolium — discovered at Pompeii has been completely excavated, helping to reveal some top dishes of the ancient Roman city. The site is about 18 miles southeast of Naples, Italy. Luigi Spina/Archaeological Park of Pompeii ================================================================== Ever wonder what a 2,000-year-old fast-food restaurant might look like? Well, new photos from researchers might give you an idea. Archaeologists said on Saturday they excavated a complete thermopolium — a Roman food counter — in the ancient city of Pompeii. Researchers are analyzing the findings to create a more complete picture of the daily life — and diet...

Known as a termopolium, Latin for hot drinks counter, the shop was discovered in the archaeological park's Regio V site, which is not yet open the public, and unveiled on Saturday. Traces of nearly 2,000-year-old food were found in some of the deep terra cotta jars containing hot food which the shop keeper lowered into a counter with circular holes. Archaeologists also found a decorated bronze drinking bowl known as a patera, ceramic jars used for cooking stews and soups, wine flasks and amphora. Pompeii, 23 km (14 miles) southeast of Naples, was home to about 13,000 people...

Officials at the archeological park in Italy said Saturday that archeologists have unearthed skeletal remains of two men attempting to escape death the eruption. Researchers found parts of the skulls and bones while excavating the ruins of what was once a large villa with views on the Mediterranean Sea, located on the outskirts of Pompeii. The bones were found at at Civita Giuliana, the same area where archaeologists excavating a stable dug up the remains of three harnessed horses in 2017, officials said. The first victim was determined to be a young man, between the ages of 18 and 25,...

A girl's name, mysteriously called 'Mummy', has been discovered in a large cryptoportico in a new dig at Pompeii, director Massimo Osanna told ANSA Monday. The discovery, just to the north of the Roman city, is part of a large and refined complex dating back to the time of the Emperor Augustus, he said. The complex will be uncovered and eventually opened to visitors, Osanna said. He also vowed to bring to light the recently discovered 'villa of the harnessed horse'.