The Wonder Book of Volcanoes and Earthquakes

by Edwin J. Houston

Fig. 13. The Volcanic District Around Vesuvius

The Phlegræan Fields was a name given by the ancients to some of the lowlands in the neighborhood of Naples; they were believed to be under the special protection of the Roman gods. When the frequent earthquake shocks shook these fields, the Roman people believed that conflicts were taking place between their gods and slumbering giants confined in the regions below the surface.

It is more than probable that Mt. Vesuvius has always been the centre of these volcanic disturbances. Long before the Christian Era, however, Vesuvius, or Somma, the name given to the old crater that then occupied the summit of the mountain, had been an extinct crater. Indeed, it had been so quiet that the people who lived on its slopes did not appear to know they were living on the slopes of a slumbering volcano. Their knowledge of volcanic mountains must have been very limited, for this mountain with the huge pit at its summit had all the appearance of a volcanic crater. When they climbed to the top of the mountain, which, of course, they frequently did to look after the vineyards they were cultivating on the slopes, and looked down into the deep pit from the rocks on its edge, they could see at the bottom of a great central pit three miles in diameter, a lake, with room here and there to enable one to walk along its borders. The walls of the precipice were covered with luxuriant vines.

When we say that none of the people even suspected that Vesuvius had ever been in a state of eruption, we must except some of their learned men. For both Diodorus Siculus, a native of Sicily, who lived about 10 b. c., and wrote an Universal History, containing some forty volumes, of which only about one-third remain, and Strabo, the Geographer, pointed out in a general manner, that Vesuvius, and much of the surrounding country, looked as if it had been eaten by fire. Then, too, a Roman philosopher who lived between a. d. 1 and a. d. 64, spoke of Vesuvius being "a channel for the eternal fire!"

Let us now endeavor to obtain some idea of the appearance of this region a short time before a. d. 79, when Vesuvius burst forth in a terrific eruption. The slopes of the mountain were covered with the rich vegetation that characterizes this part of Italy. When most volcanic ashes and lava have been exposed for some time to the atmosphere they make a very fertile soil. Now, this soil on the slopes of Vesuvius made the vineyards that covered the mountain slopes and the fields for miles around its base, bear very plentifully, so that the people lived very comfortably. Here and there on the slopes of the mountain large towns like Herculaneum and Pompeii had long been established, while, in the distance, was the large city of Naples. Besides these there were numerous populous towns and villages scattered here and there over the plain or on the lower mountain slope.

You have all probably read of the Roman gladiator, Spartacus. Spartacus was a Thracian by birth, and while a shepherd had been taken prisoner by the Romans and sold to a trainer of gladiators at Capua. Chaffing under the tyranny of the Romans, who forced him to fight in the arena with men and beasts, he revolted against his masters, and with a band of some seventy followers, fled to a mountain fastness in the crater of Vesuvius. Proud Rome sent a few men to recapture him, with scourges for his punishment, but they were beaten by Spartacus. Every day dissatisfied men like himself escaped from the Romans and joined his ranks. Rome sent a larger body of men against Spartacus, but they also were beaten. At last, recognizing the gravity of the position, the Roman Prætor, Clodius, was sent against Spartacus with an army of some three thousand men. Clodius caught Spartacus in the crater and guarded the only space by which it seemed possible for Spartacus to escape. Using the vines that covered the precipitous walls of the crater, Spartacus did escape, and falling unexpectedly on the armies of Clodius, routed them. After this victory, Spartacus with an army of over 100,000 men overran southern Italy, and sacked many of the cities of the Roman Campania. During this time Spartacus defeated one Roman army after another, until finally, in the year 71 b. c., Crassus was sent against him and vainly endeavored to conquer him. Being unsuccessful, Crassus urged the Roman Senate to recall Lucullis from Asia and Pompey from Spain, and finally poor Spartacus was cut down in a fight he made against Crassus and Lucullis.

But let us come to the great eruption of Vesuvius in a. d. 79. The people living on the slopes of Vesuvius were not without plenty of warnings of the dreadful catastrophe that was coming. As early as a. d. 63 there was a great earthquake that shook the country far beyond Naples. In Pompeii, then a flourishing city, the Temple of Isis was so much damaged that it had to be rebuilt.

Even if the earthquake shocks had not foretold the coming eruption, there were other signs. The height of water in the wells decreased. Springs that had never before been known to fail, dried up completely. These changes, as we well know, were due to the red hot lava being slowly forced up from great depths into the tube connected with the crater.

The earthquake shocks continued at irregular intervals for sixteen years, until, on the 25th of August, a. d. 79, about one o'clock in the afternoon, Vesuvius burst forth in the terrible eruption that destroyed the towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Pompeii was a seaport town situated near the mouth of the River Sarno, about fifteen miles southeast of Naples. It was a beautiful place, containing many splendid temples. Its people for the greater part lived luxuriously, for Pompeii was the summer resort of the richer people of Naples, some of whom lived there during the hottest months of the year.