Life of enslaved people discovered in Pompeii in Ancient Rome – 08/21/2023 – Science

Archaeologists have discovered a small room in a Roman villa near Pompeii believed to have been used by enslaved people, shedding light on its precarious condition in the ancient world, Italy’s culture ministry said on Sunday.

The spot was found in the village of Civita Giuliana, about 600 meters north of the walls of Pompeii, which was destroyed by a volcanic eruption of Mount Vesuvius nearly 2,000 years ago.

The room contained two beds, of which only one had a mattress, two small wardrobes and a series of urns and ceramic containers, in which the remains of two mice and a rat were found.

“These details once again underline the precarious and unsanitary conditions in which the lowest echelons of society lived at that time,” the Ministry of Culture said in a statement.

Furniture and fabrics that were covered by Vesuvius’s devastating explosion of rock fragments, gas and ash have decomposed over the years, leaving a void in the rubble.

When filled with plaster, this void reveals the original shape and contours of the material long gone, including the outline of a crumpled blanket left on the bed.

“It looks like a photograph… However, this is an image from almost 2,000 years ago,” the ministry said.
Excavations at the Civita Giuliana village were carried out in 1907-1908 and again from 2017, when the police realized that the site was being looted by illegal miners.

Archaeologists said that part of one of the beds was destroyed by a tunnel used by thieves to access another part of the village.

Pompeii and the surrounding countryside were submerged in volcanic ash when Mount Vesuvius exploded in 79 AD, killing thousands of Romans who had no idea they lived beneath one of Europe’s biggest volcanoes.

The eruption buried the city in a thick layer of ash, preserving many of its residents and buildings.