Italy – Day Two

Italy

Day Two – 4 April 2016

Weather: Sunny, 22

Steps: 24,648

Not sure how much I slept last night. It was an on and off again type of night. I was finally up at 6:30 and down for breakfast at seven. My lunch was waiting for me when I was done. I met up with Annamaria at 7:40 to give her my money for Capri and was off.

There’s something to be said for pre-planning stuff. I knew exactly where I needed to go to get the Circumvesuviana train, how to buy a ticket, what stop to get off and knew to turn right out of the station to go to the entrance. The only piece of information that wasn’t right was the opening time. The net said 8:30. It was nine.

So, given this, I was the first one to reach the main square and got a great pic with no one in it.

When I got back to it six hours later, it was a zoo.

There are also a number of bronze statues throughout the city that weren’t there when I last visited Pompeii in 1994.

They are part of an exhibition of the late Polish artist Igor Mitoraj and are not meant to be indicative of the artifacts found in Pompeii. I would later see more of his pieces in Sicily.

Pompeii was founded around the 6^th or 7^th century BCE by a people from central Italy known as the Oscans. It was at a crossroads and had previously been used as a safe harbour by the Greek and Phoenicians. The city changed hands from the Greeks to the Smanites then Romans after which it was fortified.

In the years before 79 CE, Pompeii was subjected to numerous quakes including one in 62 CE which caused extensive damage throughout the city. Some citizens left the city rather than rebuild. Mount Vesuvius erupted on 24 August 79 CE according to the Pliny the Younger who documented the event. Other sources say it occurred on 23 November 79 CE and the types of clothes being worn by the victims, the type of produce found in the ash as well as coins known to had been minted in September 79 CE indicate this is the more likely date.

The eruption ejected gas, rock and ash more than thirty kilometres into the atmosphere. The column of superheated gases then collapsed on itself and rolled down the side of the mountain at a high speed. It extended out for more than ten kilometres from the volcano. The pyroclastic flow is responsible for most of the deaths in the city, killing them with the heat and choking gases even if they were sheltered. It is estimated the energy released by the mountain equates to thermal energy a hundred thousand times greater than the Hiroshima bomb.

The eruption lasted for hours and dropped more than twenty five metres of ash, entombing the victims. The number of dead is unknown but some fifteen hundred remains have been discovered in the ruins of Pompeii and Herculaneum but the toll is estimated to have been at least sixteen thousand.

Neither city was rebuilt and in time they were forgotten. The first time the ruins were noted was in 1599 when a canal was dug. The discovery of some frescos was promptly covered back over and forgotten again. It is believed they didn’t quite like the sexually explicit depictions in the art.

The next time it was unearthed was in 1738 when workmen were building a summer palace for the King of Naples over the ruins of Herculaneum. A decade later, a Spanish military engineer Rocque Joaquin de Alcubierre, began excavations in Pompei and they continued for decades. In 1863, when Giuseppe Fiorelli was in charge of excavations, they discovered voids in the ash that contained human remains. Fiorelli had plaster injected into the voids and the result was the moment of death of the victims of Vesuvius. Today, a similar technique is used but uses a more durable clear resin.

The sexually explicit paintings and frescos left excavators with a problem as the culture of Europe at the time was not as accepting of the images. In some cases, the images were covered with plaster or hidden away.

This is a photo I took in 1994 depicting Priapus showing how man is worth his weight in gold.

Guess that really upset some of the excavators.

Many of the artifacts from the cities are kept in the Naples National Archeological Museum. The explicit artwork that had for two centuries been hidden, displayed and hidden again depending on who was in control was finally reopened to the public in 2000. Minors are only permitted inside in the presence of an adult or with written permission.

There wasn’t any need of permission in Pompeii itself. There were minors everywhere.

I started with the Villa dei Misteris which is located a short walk from the site itself. It was a good one to start with since it was kind of detached from the site.

It has some of the best examples of intact frescoes on the site.

I tried to get to Casa Vettii where I could see the same “Man is Worth his Weight in Gold” fresco but that area was under heavy reconstruction. At least a third of the site was off limits behind fencing due to reconstruction, none of which was going on when I visited in 1994.

So I just wandered, going into any of the homes that were open and going mad with my camera.

I did find the House of the Faun which I had visited in 1994.

The preservation of some of the artwork is incredible like this piece from the Casa del Frutteto.

By eleven, the tour groups had arrived in force. I found the toilets in the middle of the site and noticed a lot of people walking in the same direction. I figured it meant a long line at the washroom but the line of people walked right by them and down a path. I wasn’t sure where they were going but the “tour group mentality” told me that if a lot of people are making for a particular spot, follow them.

And I was rewarded with a view of the site.

I made my way towards the amphitheater – which I didn’t even know was there when I visited Pompeii in 1994.

The two hour tour from Rome only touched on the west end of the site which is why I wanted to come back.

The amphitheater has a plywood pyramid built in the middle of it that has a small display inside. The ancient seats are inaccessible here but I take a seat on the edge of the pyramid and have my lunch.

From here, I skirted the southern edge and got another view, this time towards Vesuvius.

Just below here, I happened to peek into a doorway and found the display of plaster casts that used to be on display near the front of the city.

I was curious why they had placed it so far out of the way.

I also found the exhibit of skeletons.

And then I found the other two theatres.

I kept wandering and taking pics until after three.

I checked my phone and it registered twenty-two thousand steps. That’s between nine and twelve kilometres.

I checked the map and figured I had covered pretty well every open street. With agreement from my feet, I headed to the entrance, picked up a fridge magnet and went out to get the train.

I asked the attendant which track and his eyes just got wide as he said “it’s there. Run!”

I missed it by like two steps. Guess I should have walked 21,998. Then I would have caught it.

The next one showed up about twenty minutes later and took about forty minutes to get to Sorrento. It’s only a ten-minute walk back and I picked up some water on the way. I was dying for an ice cream but didn’t notice any shops along the way with the nice selections. They’re all in the city square.

I finally got back into my room about five and was ready to drop, but overall, happy how my feet managed the distance. I wouldn’t have been able to do this a year ago.

Tomorrow, another few thousand steps to add to my total…on Capri!

 

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