Last week I left Rome to come to the sleepy town of Sorrento. It is a resort town and pretty much closes down shop at the end of October. There aren’t amazing sights to see or museums or glorious cathedrals; mostly just locals, this time of year, going about their business. It’s been a welcome break. I spent most of my days here strolling the abandoned streets and shops. On Sunday, the place was suddenly booming with people about and shops reopened. And then it was back to sleep today, Monday. There are a lot of restaurants in town that are still open and I’ve had some of my best meals in Italy here. Sorrento is known for their lemons and is the place that invented Limoncello. I’m not a particular fan, but it is much better here than anywhere else. On Sunday, I attended church at the Cathedral and it was packed (I’ll make some further observation comments about this in another blog post at the end of this Sabbatical) with a combined choir of young and old, whose music was wonderful. They even sang two songs in English! I have a number of pictures of Sorrento, but there is nothing terribly remarkable about it. The Old Town looks just like any other Old Town in Europe and the New Town looks pretty much like every other New Town in Europe. However, in anticipation of today’s trip to Pompeii, I’ll post a picture of Mt Vesuvius as seen from Sorrento. That’s it in the far off distance. It looks downright harmless, doesn’t it.
I got to visit Pompeii today! In 79AD Mount Vesuvius erupted and one of the largest cities below the Mountain was covered in 30-40 feet of ash. This town of Pompeii was a regular, bustling trade town in the Roman Empire. It had been established about 700 years prior to the eruption and was built on the backs of tradesmen who found the port of Pompeii an easy place of access to Italy. Neither rich nor poor, the city of Pompeii was a perfect example of everyday life in the Roman Empire for normal citizens. And Mt Vesuvius’ eruption captured this for the world to discover nearly 1900 years later. Prior to the volcano erupting, there had been a series of Earthquakes which had damaged the aqueduct which brought water to the town out of the mountain. Because of no water, many of the citizens of Pompeii had already fled. Archaeologists know this because at the local watering hole where people came to draw water, as well as the pipes that constantly flowed with water throughout the town were marked with the number of days there had been no water - some were marked with 14, some with more. Then the volcano erupted. It was recorded by Pliny the younger, who witnessed it and wrote about it. Initially, the volcano sent small rocks pummeling the city. Those who had stayed behind began leaving at this point, although there were some who still stayed behind. These few took refuge in the root cellars of many of the houses. However, over the next 12-16 hours, an ash cloud, driven by the winds, rained 30-40 feet of ash on the town. Those who remained suffocated and died. Then it rained and the rained seeped through all the ash and over the course of hundreds of years, all organic matter decomposed - plants, cloths, food, animals, and people. While they were excavating, archaeologists found holes/cavities within the ash. They poured plaster into these self contained molds and found the shape of organic matter that had left its imprint - plants, animals, people. In all of Pompeii, there have only been about 20 body casts made/found. I did not get an opportunity to visit Herculaneum, a more prosperous but smaller town nearby. While Pompeii had 20,000 inhabitants and only about 20 body cavities found, Herculaneum had about 4,000 residents and more than 300 separate individuals’ bones have been found. Why the difference? The initial eruption spared Herculaneum as the wind direction sent the ash cloud down to Pompeii. And being further up on the aqueduct chain, the earthquake hadn’t cut off Herculaneum’s supply of water. About a day after Pompeii’s demise, the continually growing heat and lava rock within Mt Vesuvius churned with gasses that got superheated and this superheated rock/ash/gas combination suddenly overtook Herculaneum. Scientists believe that within seconds, all living matter exposed to that intensity of heat and gas, ceased to exist. That’s why so many bones were found in Herculaneum, but so few found in Pompeii.
I think Hollywood or sensationalize news has made the casts of the bodies found in Pompeii sound like those are actually bodies, but they are not. They are more like a cast made of someone who created a snow angel. The only difference in Pompeii; they died there, a very long time ago. And as we all do, they returned to the dust and left their imprint in the surrounding ash.
Here are my pictures from Pompeii:
And here is the cast of the negative space left of the body that was no longer there but had decomposed of one of the victims of the eruption. I know that’s a long tortured sentence, but I’m trying very hard to make it clear that this is not a person. The volcano ash didn’t turn them into stone or had mummified or petrified the body. It’s like the physical memory of the person that used to be there. Most of the other casts are on loan in various museums throughout Italy and the world.
I was initially scheduled to come home on Nov 23. Due to the cancelation of my return flight by the airline and some long conversations with Expedia, the third party responsible for my itinerary, and Air Canada, I’m not able to get a return flight home until November 28. I had anticipated this difficulty as I was already having problems with my itinerary before leaving. The airline had initially canceled my flight from Frankfurt to Montreal and changed my Montreal flight to Pittsburgh to be a return flight from Toronto, instead. However, they failed to make a new connection from Frankfurt to Toronto. So, I had a flight from Venice to Frankfurt and a flight from Toronto to Pittsburgh. But somehow, magically I guess, I was supposed to get from Frankfurt to Toronto! Then they wanted me to fly over the course of several days between each of the cities. Fly, stay, fly, stay, fly…. I wasn’t interested in that, either. So, my soonest option was to fly (all in one day) on November 28. Having a few extra days, I’ve decided to finish my Italian tour in Sicily. So, tomorrow I’m off to Sicily. And Sicily is probably one of the most important places when it comes to their contribution to Italian food.
Speaking of food, here are a few pictures of the last few meals I’ve had. They’ve been some of the best so far in all of Italy. Over one meal, I met a couple from Russia who are living in Lisbon. We had some interesting conversations about politics and the war and the number of Russians fleeing their own country.
They were proud to be Russian, but upset with what is happening. In many ways, I could empathize, as I’m proud to be American, but upset with the way things have been going with divisiveness, shootings, political games, etc…. I think we bridged a gap, neither of us had expected when we sat down to eat.
Limoncello!
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