Friday, July 6, 2012

A Day in Pompeii

Yesterday Dr. M & I decided to head down to Cincinnati


to check out the newest exhibit at the Museum Center.



As most of you are aware, Pompeii was destroyed by a volcano back in the olden days (79 A.D.).


I enjoyed exploring the exhibits & checking out the artwork that has been excavated from the scene.








And I enjoyed hearing about the lives of the people who lived there - it was a city of about 20,000 people!

They ate out a lot because many of them lived in apartments without kitchens


Plumbing items!


The little spoon was used to mix cosmetics - all of the items in this case were related to that. 


Burial items
But the further we went into the exhibit the more disturbed I got. The story stopped being about an ancient city's destruction, & became more about the lives of actual people who were destroyed in just a few hours. 


Carbonized loaf of bread
The person who baked it never ate that beautiful loaf of bread. The people who died were never buried with their tokens. 


There is a short film reenacting what happened the day that Mt. Vesuvius blew. 





I don't think there was anything left alive to witness that final scene of destruction. 


Over 13 FEET of ash covered the city.
The next room showed body casts of people who had not fled the city. It was heart wrenching. I couldn't bring myself to take any pictures of them.

But because I am the Bug, I was able to recover myself once we hit the gift shop. Am I ready for my world to go up in flames (it's sure been hot enough!)? I think so!


[Note - low light, no flash photograph = less than stellar pictures!]

17 comments:

  1. Fascinating post, DanaBug! It's such a huge historical event, affecting so many - must have been terrifying. And your pictures are fine :D It's good to know these things are preserved so that their story is told and they're remembered.

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  2. some friends of mine have been to Pompeii and Herculaneum. gave us a little slide show of the pics they took.

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  3. It is always fascinating to get a glimpse into how life was lived so long ago. It does bring the experience home in a more real way to look at the ordinary things that have been left behind, preserved for people to find.

    I had similar feeling when I went to the Titanic Exhibit...

    Thanks for taking us along!
    R

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  4. What a wonderful show . I've been to Pompeii but most of the artifacts have been carted away to museums and I haven't seen many of the pieces you photographed.

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  5. Wonderful history trip. I'm glad you recovered in time to post that final photo.

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  6. I enjoy days like you had. It looks like you did too.

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  7. Oh - I love museum exhibits describing life in ancient times. Sometime I wonder about those people in Pompeii that didn't make it out...and then I just have to stop thinking about it. Just too awful.

    Great pictures!

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  8. I've always been fascinated by Pompeii - their life, the beauty of the art, the terrible end. I have a friend from Sicily - she says they used to sit on their balcony and watch Etna roil and erupt, just like we watch tv. Good gosh.

    Those columns are exquisite - they look amazingly like William Morris' work. Maybe he took some of his designs from them. And I love that last photo.

    I'm really amazed - I just yesterday saw a post about all of the pigs in Cincinnati. I know so little about the town, but I'm learning fast!

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  9. What a great exhibit! Those of us who have never seen a volcano (thankfully) probably can't imagine how destructive it is. I remember when Mount St. Helens blew it all seemed so surreal. Volcanoes seemed like something from the past, from the dinosaur era, not a modern occurrence!

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  10. What a great exhibit. How long will it be there? I love the shots. The bread one was really cool. Glad you had a good time.

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  11. What an interesting exhibit! One would hope most died slipping into a coma after inhaling the noxious gases long before the lava flows came their way.

    Wouldn't that helmut make a cute pattern for a hat? Knits, purls and baubles in the center of those squares. Hmmmm....

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  12. great photos and looks like the exhibition was fascinating

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  13. The Pompeii exhibit in Cincinnati closes after August 12, 2012. It is a traveling exhibit, but I don't know where it might go next. Here's the website:

    http://www.cincymuseum.org/pompeii

    Also, the Museum Center is in the 1920s era Union Terminal, which is a magnificent structure with gorgeous artwork in and of itself. Additionally, it was the model for the Hall of Justice, home of the Justice League of comic book superheroes ;-)

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  14. So...pompeii probably started the fashion of "take-away food". love facts like this.

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  15. For some reason, I read the title of your post as 'A DOG in Pompei'. Guess that's a different story altogether! Fascinating exhibition, though, by the looks.

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  16. We lived in Cincinnati for three years while my husband did his residency. We loved the museum and all the great places to eat. And the baseball, and the symphony and everything. Glad you are near enough to visit now and then.

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  17. Absolutely fascinating! I'm going to see if the exhibit will be anywhere near me. We saw the terra cotta warriors at Nat Geo Museum in DC and it made me want to go see them in situ!

    I remember seeing films in the 1960's about the casts of the bodies and being horrifically fascinated.It sounds like the artifacts make it "real" to us.

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Thanks for stopping by - I'd love to hear what you have to say!

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