Stunning artworks have been uncovered in a new excavation at Pompeii, the ancient Roman city buried in an eruption from Mount Vesuvius in AD79.
Archaeologists say the frescos are among the finest to be found in the ruins of the ancient site.
Mythical Greek figures such as Helen of Troy are depicted on the high black walls of a large banqueting hall.
The room’s near-complete mosaic floor incorporates more than a million individual white tiles.
A third of the lost city has still to be cleared of volcanic debris. The current dig, the biggest in a generation, is underlining Pompeii’s position as the world’s premier window on the people and culture of the Roman empire.
What’s clear, however, is that all the properties were undergoing renovation at the time of the eruption.
Escaping workers left roof tiles neatly stacked; their pots of lime mortar are still filled, waiting to be used; their trowels and pickaxes remain, although the wooden handles have long since rotted away.
For some reason this is the coolest thing out of the article for me. That we were able to figure out what was happening there, that day, at that moment. Wild.
Imagine if this was your work on a wall like this being unearthed.
This could have just been another day of hum-drum work for them. But now their legacy has been revealed at an unfathomable time in the future.
So very few people will ever have this and I’m sure nothing I ever accomplish will be remembered or delight so many people upon it’s discovery in the future, should any of it even survive that long.
I’d be willing to bet they’d rather have not been killed by a volcano at all than be remembered.
Without the volcano they’d still be long dead, but their art wouldn’t be internalized.
Absolutely beautiful frescoes. And I’m glad we’ve gotten good photographs of them, because they most likely started to fade and/or flake the minute they were exposed to air, similar to the terracotta warriors in China. Ancient paint is really difficult to preserve.
Wow, those are very well preserved. I’m surprised they’re leaving it open to the sky like that.
For the frescos that must stay in position, a plaster glue is injected to their rear to prevent them coming away from the walls. Masonry is being shored up with scaffolding and temporary roofing is going over the top.
Get a load of this person actually reading the article and not just looking at the photos!
(thanks)
That was just for the purpose of taking photos. They aren’t leaving them like that.
