Posted on 05/05/2024 7:55:53 AM PDT by SunkenCiv
The ruins of a Roman villa near Mount Vesuvius, discovered under the remnants of another villa built above it many years later, may have been where Augustus, the first Roman emperor, drew his last breath, archaeologists say.
The earlier villa, which excavations suggest was inhabited before the first century A.D., seems to have been destroyed in the devastating eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D. 79, and the later villa was built there in the second century...
She noted that the site corresponds with writings by the Roman historians Tacitus, Suetonius and Cassius Dio, who recorded that Augustus died in A.D. 14 at his family's villa near Nola. But the precise location of the villa is unknown, Muramatsu said. The modern town of Nola is about 5 miles (8 kilometers) northeast of the archaeological site at Somma Vesuviana, on the northern slopes of Vesuvius...
The second-century villa at Somma Vesuviana was destroyed by an eruption of Vesuvius in the fifth century, and its buried ruins were discovered in 1929. They were identified as the possible location of Augustus' villa, but a lack of funding prevented the site from being explored further.
In 2002, the University of Tokyo team and local archaeologists started work at the site and recovered many beautiful marble statues and other artifacts. But studies of the archaeological layers showed they dated to after the A.D. 79 eruption.
Now, as archaeologists have dug into much deeper layers of the site, they've discovered ruins of part of an earlier villa that was built there before the eruption and was buried by layers of rock and ash ejected by the volcano.
(Excerpt) Read more at livescience.com ...
Archaeologists from the University of Tokyo have worked at the Somma Vesuviana site since 2002 but only announced their discovery of the earlier villa in April this year.Image credit: © 2024 Institute for Advanced Global Studies, University of Tokyo; (CC BY-ND 2.0 DEED)
The other GGG topics added since the previous digest ping, alpha:
Most of the Nola keyword is about New Orleans; here's the ones that are not, sorted:
Did they find the poisoned fig trees that killed him?
“Don’t eat the figs.”
Suetonius
The original boy named Sue
:)
Pingus
The buried cities of Vesuvius are the gift that keeps on giving. The cities of Stabiae, Herculaneum and Oplontis are really yielding some great stuff.
CC
I saw that portrayed in I Claudius years ago Is that how he actually died?
LOL. Me too. That's why I said it.
Livia Drusila / Julia Augustus was a powerful woman and political schemer, suspected by Roman historians of being involved in the deaths of several political rivals, but I don't believe anyone at the time claimed she actually killed Augustus Caesar
There is another series that ran the last few years about Augustus and Livia But they didn’t keep running them till their deaths. Maybe they will finish it and maybe I will remember it. LOL
Yup. The late Michael Grant did a couple of survey books, “The Cities of Vesuvius” and one about the naughty art that’s in a adults-only gallery in the museum of Naples.
Olivia must have been visiting that day.
Brian Blessing was great in that role. George Baker was good as Tiberius too.
Just saw that Bernard Hill died today. Played a great Duke of Norfolk in Wolf Hall. Also played captain of Titanic, and King in LOTR.
thanx
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