History of Pompeii
Pompeii was an ancient Roman town-city near modern Naples, in the Campania region of Italy. Pompeii, together with Herculaneum and many villas in the surrounding area, was buried in ash and pumice during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79.
Researchers believe the town was founded in the seventh or sixth century BC by the Oscans. It later came under the domination of Rome in the fourth century BC and was conquered and made a Roman colony in 80 BC after it joined an unsuccessful rebellion against the Roman Republic.
By the time of its destruction, roughly 160 years later, its population was estimated at about 11,000 people and the city had a complex water system, an amphitheatre, gymnasium and a port. The eruption destroyed the city, killing its inhabitants and burying it under metres of ash. Evidence of the destruction originally came from surviving letters by Pliny the Younger, who saw the eruption from a distance and described the death of his uncle Pliny the Elder, an admiral of the Roman fleet, who tried to rescue citizens.
Pompeii: A World Heritage Site
The site was lost for about 1500 years until its initial rediscovery in 1599 and broader recovery almost 150 years later by Spanish engineer Rocque Joaquín de Alcubierre in 1748. The objects that have been found there give insight into the life of a city during the Pax Romana. During the excavation, plaster was used to fill the voids in the ash layers that once held human bodies, allowing researchers to see the exact positions people were in when they died.
Pompeii has been a tourist destination for over 250 years. Today it is part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site of Pompeii, Herculaneum and Torre Annunziata, and it is one of Italy’s most popular tourist attractions with more than 2.5 million visitors every year.
Source: Wikipedia.
