What do the bodies excavated in Pompeii, or rather the casts made in Pompeii, tell us?
Well yes, because the bodies found there and interpreted by many as bodies petrified by the lava of Vesuvius, are actually plaster casts made by archaeologists during their discoveries.
But let’s reconstruct everything calmly, trying to understand what happened.
Pompeii, as many people know, was destroyed by a very violent eruption of the explosive type of Vesuvius in 79 AD, recounted in the letters of Pliny the Younger.
The eruption lasted approximately three days.
On the first day Pompeii was completely submerged with about 3 meters of ash and lapilli, which entirely covered the city. During this eruptive phase, numerous inhabitants who had not left the city in time died. Either trapped in the environments invaded by pumice and lapilli or run over by the collapses of the roofs of their houses caused by the weight of the eruptive material. Only skeletons were found of these victims.
On the second day it seemed that the eruption had stopped, but it suddenly resumed with the arrival of the powerful pyroclastic flow. Precisely Pompeii was hit with 6 waves of pyroclastic flow, which caused death and devastation.
The flow characterized by ash, 400° water vapor, and gas overwhelmed all the cities on the slopes of Vesuvius including Pompeii.
During this phase the Pompeians who could not initially escape were overwhelmed by the flow remaining imprisoned forever there in that place. In the exact location where they found death.
This was as a result of the ash that compacted around their bodies leaving the perfect imprint after decomposition.
This dynamic of the eruption that particularly affected Pompeii, unlike the other Vesuvian cities, made possible the creation of the famous Pompeii casts.
Where to find casts in Pompeii and how were they made? Find out in our article, click on the link: CASTS OF POMPEII.
Revolution in the history of victims
Casts were first made on human bodies by Giuseppe Fiorelli in 1963. The archaeologist managed to make approximately 100 casts of people, many of which were destroyed during the bombings of World War II.
Thanks to them it has been possible to reconstruct part of the history of the inhabitants of Pompeii, but a recent analysis performed on these remains has completely revolutionized their history.
In fact, an international research team examined the bone remains trapped in the plaster using minimally invasive techniques on 14 of the 86 casts at the site. But only on 5 bodies could accurate data be obtained, this was because of the plaster that had invaded the organic elements of the bodies.
The investigation, made it possible to accurately identify the genetic relationships and sex of these men, women and children, arriving at a sensational discovery. And disproving the considerations that had been made to date about these bodies.
Bodies found in the house of the Golden Bracelet
An important revelation came from the Golden Bracelet house where the bodies of four individuals were found one next to the other, believed to have always been an entire family.
In fact, one of them was thought to be a woman wearing a gold bracelet and her own the child sitting on her stomach. Next to her was a man (believed to be the father) with another small child.
But the study of their DNA uncovered a completely different reality from what was thought.
Not only was it shown that these individuals had no kinship ties to each other. But it also turned out that the body with the bracelet and the baby in her arms was not a woman but a man. Who had black hair and skin and had no biological connection to the child. A startling reality then that completely revolutionized their story.
But not only that another important piece of evidence came from the cryptoporticus house, here two bodies were found clutching each other in a tender embrace and always considered to be two sisters or a mother and daughter.
In reality it turned out that, at least one of the two bodies is a male and there is no genetic relationship between them. While the other body’s sex could not be defined. Although there has been speculation that it was a man and that the two were lovers.
A most important study, this DNA study represents an important first step toward reconstructing the genetic makeup of the Pompeian population.
Thanks to it it has been possible to trace the ancestry of these men, discovering that many were dark-skinned and descended from recent immigrants from the Eastern Mediterranean. And that therefore in Pompeii in the first century there were inhabitants from all the provinces of the Roman Empire.
