Nine months ago (November 2020), archaeologists excavating a part of the Ancient Roman city of Pompeii found themselves in a rare Indiana Jones-esque situation. In a fancy villa to the north of the city, along this corridor, lay the burnt encasements of these two bodies.
Figuring out what these two were doing in that fateful eruption in 79 CE takes next-level Sherlock Holmes skills, but basically the forensic archaeologists think the pair were likely to have been a slave and citizen, maybe master. Both males, the younger (18-25 years) had several compressed vertebrae, which would have been typical for slaves whose daily lives were often filled with literally bone-crushing labor. The older man (between 30-40) had a stronger bone structure. Both wore tunics.
The working theory is that these men managed to survive the initial eruption of Mount Vesuvius — no mean feat, considering that covered the whole city in ash — but then died the next day from another blast as they were trying to escape. In the same location was a stable which had held three horses with harnesses on their necks — they had been discovered in 2017.
The recent discoveries out of Pompeii come from the north part of the city archaeologists call “Reggio V”, a section that until recently had been completely unexcavated. Throughout the pandemic, a team of archaeologists, historians, and forensic scientists have continuously investigated this section of Pompeii.
The new findings help us understand Ancient Roman lives better: the bodies of this sad duo, for instance, provide confirming physical evidence about the stridently hierarchical social structure, and help explain the reasons why Roman aristocrats continuously made such a big deal about their privilege regarding having their bodies whole and unmutilated.
Source(s): _The Guardian_ @theguardian.com. “Pompeii dig reveals ‘almost perfect’ remains of a master and his slave”, Angela Giuffrida, Nov 21, 2020.
