Researchers reconstruct house from old Pompeii using 3D-technology
Posted on 10/27/2018 4:54:10 PM PDT by SunkenCiv
It does not matter if Pompeii is damaged by visiting tourists, Professor Mary Beard has said, as she argues it would be "ghastly" to keep the public away from ancient ruins.
Prof Beard, a Cambridge classicist and leading authority on Roman history, said she was "culpably laid back" about the crumbling of houses and walls, insisting they must not be restricted to academics.
Arguing it is more important the ancient world engages the imagination of tourists, keeping them interested in history, she said: "The world isn’t going to stop if Pompeii loses a house."
"It's had a good innings," she said. "And it wasn't very well-built in the first place."
Pompeii has been plagued with difficulties in recent years, with environmental issues and huge numbers of visitors impacting on its preservation.
But Prof Beard, who won the 2008 Wolfson History Prize for her book Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town, said tourists could and should not be blamed for disrupting the 2000-year-old site...
"On cultural tourism, I'm terribly and perhaps culpably laid back. "Pompeii's job, actually, is to interest us in the ancient world. That's what it's there for.
"And the very idea that somehow it should be so carefully preserved that only a load of academics, rich people and television cameras are allowed actually there, while 10km down the road we build a little mock-up for the plebs, is ghastly.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Researchers reconstruct house from old Pompeii using 3D-technology
Walk around in a 3D splendid house from the ancient Pompeii
Mary Beard: why ancient Rome matters to the modern world
The Guardian | October 2 , 2015 | Mary Beard
Posted on 10/08/2015 5:15:59 AM PDT by lbryce
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/bloggers/3346146/posts
She's got some of the very best vids on the Roman Empire that I've seen.
I haven't read the book, but I wonder if it would have been possible if everything had been destroyed by the time she got there.
"I got mine!"
I’m reminded of the cave paintings in France. They used to be open to tourists, but it was discovered that that the paintings were deteriorating because of the CO2 exhaled by the tourists. So they built a nearby replica, so the tourists se that instead of the real thing. Kind of like Disneyland.
A bunch of the budget for Pompeii's maintenance and restoration comes from tourists. Much more damage was done to the buried ruins by the original excavators, who were dumbassed hirelings of the local nobility.
The headline makes her sound like a philistine, but she’s actually got a valid point. The place was a town destroyed by a volcanic eruption. It’s already ruined. The elements (sun, rain, wind) wear away at the place, too. Of course, you want to minimize destruction to the site by tourists, but to close the place off to tourists to “preserve it” does seem a bit misguided.
Simply incredible they could build pristine architectural buildings like that way back in 79 AD.
Seems like webcams would be nicer, and more widely available. Wouldn't even have to go to France.
I’ve downloaded, and watched several of her documentary series, and I’ve found her an excellent historian. You can tell she really loves Roman history, It would be a pleasure to take a course from her.
I’m not sure I agree with her. How long before the tramping of tourists destroy the place?
On the other hand she could easily play Margaret Rutherford’s part in Blithe Spirit. Anyone else notice her resemblance to her?
Should be a standard practice to install CO2 scrubbers.
I don’t really have a problem with this.
We can still “see” it but the original can still be study years from now when science based study increase in technique.
I’m torn.
It comes down to how much you value a site, or an artifact.
I want tourists to tour Pompeii, and I agree with this attitude: “Yes, tourists will have an impact and it will degrade the site.”
The same applies to the Acropolis, the Tower of London, and Hampton Court.
The sites are NOT there only for the enjoyment of academics, and should not be sealed off.
And yet . . .
I do not want anyone breathing too hard on the Mona Lisa or the Last Supper, or touching many of the sculptures of the masters.
So I am clearly of two minds. The subject clearly has two sides.
Most tourists do just tramp through, and the roads and floors are almost all hard paved. There's some graffiti left by moderns, as well as the ancient graffiti which has been studied. Most of the city is still underground. The bulk of the Pompeii site excavations are over a century old. And the city was centuries old when it was buried by a volcano. Oh, it was buried over 1900 years ago. I think it's doing okay. In another century or so it'll probably be covered with one or more domes made of artificial sapphire.
I had toured the “Spruce Goose” in LA 30+ years ago. Recently I toured it in McMinnville, OR and there were glass partitions where I hadn’t seen them before. The docent told me it was only open for a year in LA when there was so much vandalism they had to wall it off.
Wouldn’t even have to go to France.
As an aside, I collect ancient coins—Greek and Roman. One of the nice things about ancients is that you don’t have to handle them by the edges like more modern coins. They have survived for millennia and won’t be damaged by the collector’s mere touch.
COITO ERGO SUM
The basic structures are probably safe (until the next time Vesuvius buries everything, which is a much greater risk anyway), but the fresco paintings found in a good many houses will vanish with time, just as the much more fragile Mona Lisa will crumble into dust. It's more important to exhaustively document them before they vanish.
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