IT was an ordinary day when Mount Vesuvius plastered nearby towns in thick volcanic ash 2,000 years ago.
A treasure trove of objects was buried, each giving an insight into the lives people led.
Butchered giraffe
In the drains beneath the long-gone markets of Pompeii, archaeologists have found a rich variety of foods – from sea urchin to shellfish.
But perhaps the most exotic find was the leg joint of a butchered giraffe.
It is thought to be the only giraffe bone ever recorded from an archaeological excavation in Roman Italy, according to archaeologist Steven Ellis, who directs the University of Cincinnati’s excavations at Pompeii.
The discoveries point to busy trade relationships outside of Italy.
“How part of the animal, butchered, came to be a kitchen scrap in a seemingly standard Pompeian restaurant not only speaks to long-distance trade in exotic and wild animals, but also something of the richness, variety and range of a non-elite diet,”; explains Ellis.
Glass brain
In Herculaneum, a town to the west of Mount Vesuvius, two bizarre pieces of dark-coloured glass were found inside the skulls of two individuals.
The first piece of was identified in Herculaneum in 2020.
A glassy, black material was found inside the skull of a man on a wooden bed, who was buried by volcanic ash.
While the was found earlier this year.
Experts believe these are fossilised brains, caused by the extreme heat from the short-lived ash cloud that swept through the ancient town of Herculaneumin 79CE.
Herculaneum was buried under roughly five times the amount of ash that Pompeii was.
Similarly, the second victim had also been lying on their bed when the cloud descended.
For the brain to become glass, it must have been heated to above 510°C before quickly cooling.
This is an incredibly rare process is called vitrification.
Cheeky art
The Romans’ affinity for brothels, alcohol, and pornography has been well documented and discovered among the ruins of Pompeii.
Hundreds of sexually explicit works of art from Pompeii have been placed in the Secret Museum in the National Archaeological Museum in Naples.
These include graphic sex scenes – which experts believe could be advertisements for local brothels – as well as lots of phallic statuary, believed to bring wealth, fertility, and good luck.
Some of these pieces were so cheeky that they were deemed “pornographic”; in 1821, and the museum closed the room to visitors in 1849.
The Secret Museum didn’t reopen for good until 2000.
Graffiti
Pompeiians were politically active – and they have the graffiti to show for it.
There was an upcoming election when the city was buried by Mount Vesuvius.
Political slogans and messages of support for candidates can still be seen preserved on the walls today.
Though it wasn’t just political statements being plastered around.
Last May, charcoal wall drawings were unearthed that
The drawings, which were of children’s height, suggest they had attended gruesome gladiator battles in the city.
The simple etchings depict men with shields and spears fighting animals and each other.
Gabriel Zuchtriegel, director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, said children of the time would have come into contact with extreme forms of speculated violence.
This includes the frequent executions of criminals and slaves.
“We came to the conclusion that in all likelihood the drawings of the gladiators and hunters were made on the basis of a direct vision and not from pictorial models,”; he said in a statement at the time.
“Probably one or more of the children who played in this courtyard, among the kitchens, latrine and flowerbeds for growing vegetables, had witnessed fights in the amphitheatre.”;
Surgical tools
Archaeologists have also recovered surgical instruments from Pompeii – which paint a squeamish picture of medical practices in 79 AD.
Medical tools have been found in various parts of the excavated city, but most most were found at a structure known as the House of the Surgeon.
While the Romans had not yet developed germ theory, many of the tools were made of copper alloys.
Copper has antimicrobial properties – meaning the tools may have prevented infections.
