#mt. vesuvius

[nemfrog]

Vesuvius eruption of 1829.

La terre avant le déluge. 1874.

Internet Archive

[ashintheairlikesnow]

I watched a documentary on Mount St. Helens while working the other day - well, I "watched" it. That mostly means I listened to it and occasionally clicked over to see some visuals while tippity-typing my actual job stuff.

They noted that the volcano had been rumbling and beginning a very telltale bulge along one side for weeks ahead of the eventually eruption. Volcanologists and seismologists were more or less shouting at the top of their lungs that this thing was about to blow.

And at first they evacuated the area it was assumed the eruption would hit most severely. Those people began to complain because it hadn't erupted yet and they wanted their stuff.

Famously, old Harry R. Truman simply refused to be evacuated at all. He had lived by Spirit Lake and on the mountain for long enough that he intended, if he had to, to die there.

Which, of course, he did.

But my point is that the governor gave in and allowed some property owners to head up to retrieve belongings. More were set to go up the next day.

It had been weeks, of course. It's understandable that despite the growing bulge and continued low grumbles and earthquakes that people simply assumed if it was going to happen, it would have by now.

They were, of course, horrendously mistaken.

Listening to it brought to mind the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum, buried by the explosive eruption and pyroclastic flow from Mt. Vesuvius. There had been earthquakes and telltale signs in the days leading up to the eruption.

We tell ourselves that they didn't know. They couldn't have been sure what would happen. They didn't have a connection between those omens and the eruption until after it happened.

After all, nearly all of Pompeii evacuated before the worst day came. Thousands set out for safe ground, having no idea what would come. But they knew they were being warned.

But I imagine some people didn't so much stay, as they left and then came back, reasoning they could return to pick up some things, special possessions or mementos.

I wonder how many people who originally evacuated had come back to Pompeii, only to witness the apocalypse when it was too late to escape it.

They didn't know.

In 1980, plenty of people did, and they went back up the mountain anyway.

Maybe in Pompeii, there were those unlucky enough to bet wrong.

Or, in the case of Mr. Truman, maybe there were Pompeiians or Herculaneum citizens who knew it would be deadly, whatever it was. And yet they stayed within the homes they loved, surrounded by the memories of the life they had built, and waited.

[fossilizedfolklore]

I feel as if I am obligated to share this Milo Rossi video on Pompeii.

The history of Pompeii is what gave me my love of history. I remember being a small child and my stepmom showing me a book that shows the before and after of the eruption. I remember going to an exhibit of Pompeii and seeing the plaster forms of people who must have thought the world was ending. Somehow in that I found my love of history and now I’m a sophomore public history major who plans on getting my masters in museum studies to become an archivist. I want to spend my life studying and preserving the history of people from the past.

So here’s a video on Pompeii that I absolutely LOVED

[stone-cold-groove]

Eruption of Mount Vesuvius - 1944.

[gregorygalloway]

Mt. Vesuvius began erupting around 13 March, with the activity contained within the rim of the volcano, until 18 March, when lava escaped the rim, the beginning of the last major eruption (to date) that would last for a week.

Within the next few days, a number of nearby villages were destroyed, as well as many as 90 aircraft of the US Army Air Force, stationed at the nearby Pompeii Airfield.

[uwmspeccoll]

The Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius

The Eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in 79 CE remains one of the deadliest natural disasters in recorded history. Not only did the volcano destroy the economically powerful city of Pompeii, but Herculaneum, Oplontis, Stabiae were also buried and thus lost to the Roman Empire. The number of victims is unknown, but given the size of the four cities, estimates have reached over 18,000 individuals.  

Today only one first-hand account of this horrific event survives in two letters from Pliny the Younger to the Roman historian Tacitus. They are preserved as letters 6.16 and 6.20 in the collected Epistles of Pliny. Among our holdings of the works of Pliny is this 3-volume set of the Epistles with William Melmoth’s 18th-century translation edited by Clifford Herschel Moore, and printed by the Harvard University Press in an edition of 405 copies for members of The Bibliophile Society, Boston, in 1925.

While the term ‘volcanic eruption’ evokes scenes of lava and fire, the reality is much more frightening. Curiously, there is no word for volcano in the Latin language. While ancient Romans were aware of the destructive power of volcanoes, there’s some debate about whether they were aware that Vesuvius was a volcano before its eruption. Signs of the eruption began back in 62CE with a great earthquake that caused much of the city to collapse. Smaller earthquakes continued over the next 15 years until one was accompanied by the rise of a column of smoke from Mt. Vesuvius in October 79 CE. 

The hot gases that made up the column of smoke began to cool, darkening the sky, and not long after a rain of pumice began to fall, and after 15 hours ceilings began to collapse. Nevertheless, many residents chose to take shelter rather than flee. At 4am the first 500C pyroclastic surge barred down the volcano, burying Herculaneum. Six more of these surges occurred before the end of the eruption, destroying Pompeii, Oplontis, and Stabiae. 

The 17-year old Pliny was in the port town of Misenum across the Bay of Naples from the volcano at the time. Pliny’s uncle, Pliny the Elder, commander of the Roman fleet at Misenum, launched a rescue mission and went himself to the rescue of a personal friend. The elder Pliny did not survive the attempt. In Pliny the Younger’s first letter to Tacitus, he relates what he could discover from witnesses of his uncle's experiences. In a second letter, he details his own observations after the departure of his uncle.

Mt. Vesuvius is still active and according to volcanologists, erupts about every 2000 years, which would be right about now. Who will be our next Pliny the Younger?

Our copy of The Epistles of Pliny is another gift from our friend and benefactor Jerry Buff.

View more of my Classics posts.

– LauraJean, Special Collections Undergraduate Classics Intern

[puppet-purgatory]

today while working I am thinking about (spins wheel)

Mount Vesuvius and the Olympic Torch being old men. Vesuvius is more of a grandpa type and the Torch is more of a cranky old neighbor. they fight all the time about ridiculous shit. they embody the ancient Greece vs. Rome feud. ALWAYS on each other’s ass about the STUPIDEST shit that happened Three Thousand Years Ago, Guys, get over it!!!! they’re QPRs but the R stands for Rival

[thinkingimages]

Old Vintage USAF Photo EYE OF THE VOLCANO Mt. Vesuvius Naples Italy vernacular image taken during a United States Air Force reconnaissance mission circa 1954