Pompeii continues to be a box of striking surprises. Thanks to new studies, some secrets are revealed and new knowledge is acquired about the customs of the Pompeians, but at the same time questions arise that cast doubt on some certainties given by officials.
Now it is the director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park, Gabriel Zuchtriegel, a prestigious archaeologist, who once again raises the debate about the last day of Pompeii. In 2018, an inscription was discovered that made it possible to establish the October 24, 79 AD like the last day of the ancient Roman city, buried by the eruption of Vesuvius.
Until six years ago, history books set August 24 as the most probable date on which the famous eruption occurred. The main source to place the catastrophe in this month was Pliny the Younger, who tells it in a letter to Tacitus. But that original text does not exist, but copies made in the Middle Ages by amanuensis, possibly with transcription errors. Therefore, in 2018 the story about the greatest tragedy of humanity due to the eruption of a volcano was “corrected”, thanks to the discovery of the charcoal inscription on a wall of the so-called ‘House with garden’.
«It is an extraordinary discovery, because it can finally be securely set the date of the eruption,” said the then general director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park, the archaeologist Massimo Osanna, today general director of Museums in the Ministry of Culture. The charcoal inscription dates back to “sixteen days before the calends of November”, that is, to October 17. Archaeologists believed it was very likely that the note had been written a week before the eruption. Therefore, his conclusion was that the great catastrophe It occurred on October 24.
In addition to the charcoal inscription, some studies abound in the autumn date, based on some important clues: the victims of Pompeii They were no longer wearing summer clothes, but autumn ones; in some cases even voluminous and heavy, certainly not summery. In many houses, such as that of the Menander or that of the Chaste Lovers, they have been found braziers to warm upsuggesting they were low fall temperatures.
Furthermore, a large number of chestnuts, typically from autumn, appeared in the excavations, and walnutswhich are usually collected between September and October, as well as a large amount of grenadeswhich are collected between the end of September and October. Archaeologists have discovered the existence of some agricultural lands that produced wine, and the vintagewhich takes place at the beginning of autumn, had already been completed when the eruption arrived.
Climate change
But now another hypothesis is proposed that is based on questions about the Climate change and agricultural practices which, in the Mediterranean area, changed already in ancient times, both from one region to another and over time. This is reflected in new studies of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, carried out by director Gabriel Zuchtriegel together with other researchers, who once again put on the table the date of the eruption traditionally set on August 24, 79 AD, having as a source the letter from Pliny the Younger.
This is how Zuchtriegel explains it: «At the moment we cannot exclude that the eruption occurred on August 24, as Pliny wrote, and we must ask ourselves what this could mean. Perhaps we have underestimated the literary traditionwhich is actually not as confusing as has often been believed.
On the other hand, Zuchtriegel raises the question of climate change and agricultural practices, which will contribute to reopening the debate with more interest: «Perhaps we have overestimated the stability of the climate and agricultural cycles: in reality, the climate too has changed in the pastalthough at a slower pace, and Pompeii offers a unique opportunity to study an ecosystem strongly influenced by human presence 2,000 years ago. “The biodiversity and the variety of practices, crops and local traditions – concludes the director – go far beyond the necessarily schematic picture offered by the ancient authors who dealt with agriculture.”
In truth, the date of October 24 is in the textbooks and has practically become the official date everywhere. So it will not be easy to reopen the debate, which would certainly be interesting to show how the climate and agricultural cycles have changed.
In this regard, the researcher Helga Di Giuseppe, archaeologist, wrote the book ‘Pompeii, the catastrophe’ in 2022, in which she firmly defended the date of August 24: «For the Romans August was autumn“We know this from most ancient authors, which is why some fruits that may seem strange to us today were absolutely normal for them to be ripe already in August.” The director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park recognizes that the new study “is not intended to be a final point, but rather a contribution to continue the discussion and open new perspectives«.
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