It's a busy day in Pompeii. Fabia visits the temple of Venus and offers a dove sacrifice to the goddess, asking for her blessing on her brother's upcoming marriage.
After a quick visit to the market, she sees her brothers Lucius and Marcus walking through the Forum. They go out to relax in the public baths.
Marcus spent the morning helping a master craftsman lay a grand mosaic floor while Lucius worked in the brick yard.
It has been 17 years since the earthquake in Pompeii and its neighbor Herculaneum, and there is still work to be done to rebuild and repair.
Fabia and her brothers are talking about the recent earthquakes that everyone is feeling. Lucius joked that there would always be work for the men rebuilding the walls at Pompeii.
He tells them how eager he is to tie the knot with his sponsa, or bride-to-be.
The siblings begin to discuss tomorrow's wedding—but a deafening boom interrupts them.
They see Vesuvius spewing smoke, ash, and rock into the air—and realize they're living in the volcano's shadow. They hug Venus for protection and pray to Vulcan for mercy.
Everyone now has to choose how to live. They have three options: seek refuge, escape south on foot, or flee west by sea. Lucius runs home but can't find his sponsa.
He decided to wait for her and lit an oil lamp.
Ash and pumice begin to rain on Pompeii. Fabia is a refugee with her husband Claudius and their daughters.
But after a few hours, their roof groans under the weight of volcanic debris, and they realize they can't stay. They decide to travel southeast away from the volcano.
The family joins the crowd of people wading through the hot ash on the Cardo Maximus and begins to make its way to one of Pompeii's southern gates. Marcus finally arrives at his home in Herculaneum and collects his wife and children.
They decide to escape by sea. But as they approach the docks, they discover waves filled with volcanic material, making it impossible for boats to get close to shore.
Trying to keep calm for their children, they huddle under covered boat docks. Now, the deadliest phase of destruction begins.
At this point, the force that propels the volcanic material, or tephra, into the air is reduced, and it collapses. Hot ash and toxic gas erupt in a wave known as a pyroclastic surge.
This first rise covers Herculaneum.
An hour later, the rest of the city's structures collapsed three more times. It has not yet reached Pompeii, but the buildings are burning in the hot, sulphurous air.
Lucius climbs out of his closet and tries his front door, but a thick blanket of ash and stone prevents him from moving. His lamp flickers and dies.
After more than 14 hours, sometimes walking up to their chests through ash, Fabia, her family, and others long gone, climb the southern Letari Mountains.
They reach a peak and stop to look back.
Another pyroclastic surge ran across the valley, crashed into Pompeii, and smashed into the upper levels of the town's buildings.
Fighting back tears, Fabia prays for her brothers and fellow townspeople, pushing her family to safety. According to modern analysis, these eruptions can last for days or weeks.
When it was over, about 300 square kilometers were gone, and Pompeii and Herculaneum were buried under up to 65 feet of tephra.
Despite some irregular looting and excavation, these towns remained buried until official excavations began in the mid-1800s.
Archaeologists have since analyzed skeletal evidence and volcanic deposits to reconstruct the timeline of the last moments of Herculaneum and Pompeii.
They provide a poignant glimpse into the experiences of the victims of the eruption. Much of our understanding of ancient Roman life—from food and furniture to architecture and economics—comes from these ruins.
In their time, they were just provincial cities on the Gulf of Naples. But their rediscovery has given us an unprecedented view of the ancient world and the lives destroyed by disasters.
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