40.40.45N 014.45.28E

 

POMPEII

 

From Solerno the train to Pompeii was easy, cheap 1.50 each way, and took around 40 minutes.

 

OK so we all know the story of Pompeii, a busy Roman town surprised by an eruption of Mount Vesuvius and buried for roughly 2000 years.  Of course the most common thing we know is that archaeologists found cavities, filled them with plaster and hey presto here’s a statue of some poor Roman citizen frozen in time.  The morbid casts are indeed impressive, the detail an amazing document of the time. 

 

One of the famous casts at Pompeii

 

The scale of the excavation is terrific, this is a city of some 20,000 people – it is huge.  In places we see in tact paintings and decorations, Pompeii must have been very impressive in its day.

 

 

 

 

But for me the most memorable bit is the ruts in the road caused by wagon wheels, the roads are made of volcanic stone from Vesuvius but even in this hard surface it is not hard to pick out the well worn wagon tracks, 2000 years ago there was already the need for a uniform measure of axle width.

Footpaths, culverts, gutters – and discernable wagon tracks in a stone road.