The wonders of the world

by John Loraine Abbott

“The amphitheater was in a remote part of the city, near the eastern wall. It has undergone so little dilapidation, that it appears almost perfect. We approached it by ascending the ground until we were quite at the top, and we then descended by the stone seats, quite to the arena, which, by pacing, we found to be two hundred and forty feet by one hundred and twenty. From the arena we looked up over the entire circuit and elevation of the seats, which are almost perfectly preserved—thanks to the sepulture of seventeen hundred years. Had this amphitheater been in the midst of Naples, as the Coliseum was at Rome, it would, no doubt, have fared as ill at the hands of the architects. It was easy for us now to people it in imagination, with the thousands of Romans who have so often gazed and applauded from these seats, while blood, both brute and human, was flowing in the arena where we were standing. Such may have been the scenes when the tempest of fire broke forth, for the people of Pompeii are said to have been then engaged in the amphitheater.

“There are two buildings for public baths, which are well preserved; the bronze seats and braziers still remain in them. For men, there was a common bath, circular and large enough for entire immersion; it is of marble, and is now in good condition. The dome, or ceiling, has in part fallen in, but the portion over the bath is preserved. We measured the room and found it to be sixty feet by twenty. There was another bath for women, contiguous to this, but at a proper distance. This marble bath is quite perfect, and the room being entirely arched has been preserved uninjured. It is most interesting. There is a living fountain at one end, and there was an arrangement, whose object is even now quite apparent, for warming the room by hot air or steam. Here, in this ancient ladies’ bath, we dined upon our stores brought out from Naples. Intruding upon this retreat, once so sacred, we seated ourselves quite conveniently, on the side of the bath, in a fine frescoed room of sixty feet by sixteen. This was the most perfect building that we saw in Pompeii. In this vicinity, there is a living fountain still abundant, and the river Sarno runs at this moment beneath Pompeii. Through a wide opening we saw its copious and lively stream still flowing in its ancient channel, apparently undisturbed by volcanic and earthquake convulsions.

“The walls of Pompeii are still in good condition; they were three miles in circuit, from eighteen to twenty feet high, and twenty feet thick. Seven gates have been discovered; the gate of Herculaneum, of Vesuvius, of Capua, of Nola, of Sarno, of Stabiæ, and of the theaters. The sites of nine towers have been ascertained. We ascended the wall by stairs of stone, doubtless coeval with the wall itself: the view was imposing. Vesuvius rose above the desolated city, looking down upon its naked walls and roofless houses. The volcanic mound still covers two-thirds of the city, and nothing on its upper surface tells of what lies below. It were greatly to be desired, that an enlightened and energetic government, with adequate means, would uncover the entire city, with its numerous hidden works of art and materials of history.

“The baker’s shop, with his oven of arched and modern form, the tub of stone in which he wet his broom, and the hourglass-shaped mills of hard lava for grinding the grain, we saw all perfect. There were mills of two sizes: one small, such as could be turned by hand, as when ‘two women were grinding at the mill,’ and one much larger, and provided with square holes to receive the ends of levers, requiring, of course, much more force to turn them, and doubtless worked by men. The shops of the wine and oil merchants were provided with large amphoræ set in masonry under the counter, for storing those fluids, and numerous other arrangements for the convenience of the occupants were visible.

“In one house we saw a small circular window, in which part of the glass plate which originally filled it still remains. One other similar glass is said to have been found, although shutters were in general use for most of the windows. As there were no windows, as with us, opening upon the street, and all the doors and windows of the house opened upon private courts and gardens, there was in this mild and equable climate far less occasion for the use of glass than might seem at first requisite. That they understood the manufacture of glass, and how to color it, by the use of the oxyds of cobalt and copper, is abundantly proved by the remains of this ancient art now in the Borbonico museum, at Naples.

“One peculiarity in the construction of the Pompeian houses favors the removal and preservation of the frescoes. The walls upon which the pictures are painted are not solid, but the frescoed surface is supported by studs of masonry or iron, at a distance of some four or five inches in front of the brick walls. Security from dampness is thus obtained, and the task of removing the valued surface much simplified and facilitated. The declining sun found us still lingering on the seats of the amphitheater, at the remotest angle of the city wall, dwelling with delight upon these memorials of the past, and speculating upon the probability of renewed activity in Vesuvius, whose quiet blue cone rose over our right shoulders crowned with a soft cloud of vapor. It was late in the evening of this most interesting day when we reached the door of our hotel, long after darkness had hidden the landscape.

THE MUSEUM.

“The Musæo Borbonico (as it is now called) contains all the most choice and valued works of art and objects of interest which the excavations at Herculaneum and Pompeii have brought to light. To this we repaired on the day following our visit to Pompeii, to follow up our researches into the details of these most interesting discoveries. Here we saw the golden ornaments found upon the skeletons in the house of Diomede, as before mentioned, and many others also. One pair of bracelets weighed a pound each. As for the workmanship, all that was said of the Etruscan golden ornaments is substantially true of the Pompeian. The ladies of these cities were certainly well provided with costly jewelry, both of pure gold and of the same metal set with precious stones. There was one ribbon of wrought gold. Ring stones and brooches without number are preserved here, and among the cameos in agate, are the largest as well as the smallest and most exquisite of these elaborate works of art ever found. Many of the latter can be appreciated only when examined under a strong magnifier.

“Utensils in earthen ware are abundant, but porcelain seems to have been unknown to the Romans. Blown and molded glass of various forms and colors, and designed for various uses, is also common. Pickle jars and olive jars, still retaining their preserved fruits in good condition, were found, and others contained cosmetics or colors. One elegant vase, of the color of lapis lazuli, has figures in white enamel cut on its sides, reminding us of the celebrated Portland vase. The Romans seldom employed iron for culinary purposes, but almost every vessel of this description was fashioned from bronze. A very extensive collection is found in this museum, reproducing nearly all our modern metallic vessels both of utility and ornament. They are generally elegant in form, and are often ornamented with artistic designs, especially in the attachment of the spouts, handles, feet or other prominent parts. They are generally also in a remarkable state of preservation, being for the most part merely covered by a thin coating of greenish rust, easily removed. Sometimes, however, they are corroded through and through with holes. Among the bronze vessels in the collection is one showing that the Romans were well acquainted with the modern device of a heater to keep liquids hot in a large vessel. It is quite on the model of the coffee urn of our day. They also employed, as is evident, steam and hot water to keep dishes hot; for there is a very pretty affair in bronze, like a shallow pan, to hold water, set on legs, with a fire beneath, and provided with valves for the escape of steam.

“Among the objects most frequently found in Pompeii are fishing-nets and tackle, showing the habits of the people in this particular to be similar to those of the modern towns of the same coast, although now Pompeii is a mile from the sea. The iron rings in the walls for fastening vessels were also found, and prove still more conclusively the accumulations in seventeen hundred years. Two vases were discovered in Pompeii full of water; in one it was tasteless and limpid, and in the other brown and alkaline. Among the things preserved in the buried cities were walnuts, chestnuts, almonds, dates, dried figs, prunes, corn, oil, peas, lentils, pies and hams. Papyri were found in large numbers, but the rolls were blackened, as were the timber and the corn, as vegetables are by inhumation in coal beds. Beside the pickles, and olives, and roe of fish, already mentioned, we saw in a glass globe, in this part of the museum, wheat, and barley also, blackened by age and dampness. The loaves of bread, bearing the baker’s stamp, which were found in the shop already named, are singularly perfect, showing distinctly the lines of quartering in which the loaf was designed to be cut.