Italy Trip Sept 2025 - Part 6 Herculaneum, Campania

Herculaneum was Pompeii's smaller and more affluent neighbour and it was estimated to have a population of about 4-5,000 people.

When Vesuvius erupted in AD79, Herculaneum was hit by a number of pyroclastic surges containing mud, gas and hot ash which covered the town up to a height of a three storey building. People would have been killed instantly by the intense heat. By contrast, Pompeii which is about 5km further away from the volcano was hit by a reduced pyroclastic temperature, which preserved bodies and wooden objects in different ways.

These photos were taken from current town levels looking down into the ancient town. It shows you how deep the area was covered by the debris coming from Vesuvius.

The entrance to a house. There is obviously a fair amount of restoration work done to these buildings in order to preserve them for future generations, and to show visitors how the houses would have looked. Much has been damaged over the centuries by earlier restorations using the wrong kinds of material, plus climactic factors and tourists (graffiti and taking of souvenirs). The money made from visitors goes towards conservation of the sites (Herculaneum, Pompeii and a few other smaller sites).

A painted wall, showing an arch with birds on top. It's not in a very good state compared to the frescoes we later saw at Pompeii!

Inlay flooring.

More remains of wall decorations.

The House of the Wooden Partition

Some of the houses at the two archaeological sites have names due to special things found within them.

You will see the wooden partitions further down. This house is a large one and has a pool in the atrium with an open bit of roof above. The pool is called an Impluvium and is for collecting rainwater. There are other rooms off this atrium and there was a second floor above.

The open roof called a Compluvium with original carved decorations.

The pyroclastic flows at Herculaneum have, amazingly, preserved wooden objects which were carbonised by the heat.

Below, the wooden partitions (now preserved and covered with glass or plastic to protect them). Also found around the town were such things as ceiling beams, beds, tables and a cradle. A carbonised wooden bed was found in this house.

Outside there was a restaurant, a Roman take-away as it were. Most ordinary Romans did not have kitchens in their small houses, going out to get food prepared by other people. Only the rich had their own kitchens. The prepared food was stored in these large terracotta pots.

Changing room in the Womens' Baths

This is an amazingly preserved building and this room is where the ladies would have changed before going into the rooms with baths. They left their clothes in partitions on the shelf you can see. The mosaic floor is just amazing. 

Look at that octopus!

The House of Neptune and Amphitrite

This was not a paricularly large house, but it contains some special things. When you enter into an open atrium there is a marble pool, or impluvium. Straight in front of you is an amazing wall mosaic in another open courtyard. 

This courtyard was a small Triclinium or open air dining room. This amazing mosaic features the sea god Neptune and his wife, Amphitrite. Do click on the photos to view them larger as they come up much sharper and you will see much more detail.

Nymphaeum - a Roman water feature. The tank that contained the water would have been above the niche.

Close up you can see the remains of shell decorations around the arch.

The Boat Sheds

Originally there were no bodies found at Herculaneum so it was assumed that people had managed to escape. Then when excavations started around this lower area near the sea, remains were found. (The sea now is much further away). Some 300 bodies were found inside the boat sheds. It was thought they had come here to try to escape by boat but the intense heat from a pyroclastic flow had got to them first.  

The skeletons in the photo are not real, models have been made to evoke the awfulness of the situation for the townfolk.

You can see how far down the boat sheds were - they are the arches at the bottom of the image.

Try as we might, we could not find our way down there. There was a main ramp going down from this level, but it was roped off. People were walking around down there but we had no map of the site and after walking around for a few hours we decided to not bother trying again. 

It was also horribly humid both here and at Pompeii.  We are so used to dry heat that one forgets just how tiring humidity is.

Another view of the culprit, Vesuvius!

Our journey from Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli to Sperlonga, then Herculaneum and Pompeii.

P.S. We just watched a really interesting documentary about Vesuvius last night which gave further insight into the volcanic blast and the preservation of bodies. Apparently this was first shown in 2010 but programmes about Pompeii seem to be quite popular in the last few years - in fact this is why we were interested enough to go and visit ourselves! The programme is available on Youtube here. It's called 'Pompeii: Life and Death in a Roman Town' presented by Mary Beard.

Italy Trip Sept 2025 - Part 5 Sperlonga, Lazio and Vesuvius, Campania

We had a night at Sperlonga, about halfway between Rome and Naples, in a campsite right beside the beach. It was a lovely beach with plenty of public area available for once.  We walked all the way along the beach up to the castle thing you can see in the distance, me paddling all the way. Bliss! I was thinking I could be tempted to have a dip here, but I hate waves - something that all the Italian coastline seemed to have. In Mediterranean France the sea is much calmer.

This is the modern part of the town on the other side of the hill where the old town was perched. The next day we walked here via the beach again - a lot preferable to walking up the steep hill and down again! We had come here in search of the market, but it was hard to find. After asking several shopkeepers, we eventually did find it - but there was very little to it and hardly anyone there.  And that was our only experience of an Italian market!

Some pretty fishing boats in a marina on the way back to the campsite, contrasting with the modern boats.

Then it was time to drive further south to beyond Naples to the Roman sites of Herculaneum and Pompeii. This is a photo taken from Herculaneum of Vesuvius, the volcano which erupted in AD79 which buried both towns, killing an estimated 30,000 people. It last erupted in 1944, destroying some villages.

We booked a coach trip up to Vesuvius which took us from the station at Ercolano (Herculaneum) up to the parking zone on the mountain - the horizontal bit of road in the green area you can see below. The rest you had to walk.

It was a shame that it was so hazy (smoggy?) over Naples.

The path up felt like it went on forever! It actually takes about 40 minutes but it's all steep uphill.

After what seemed like an eternity we reached the edge of the crater. There are actually a few wooden hut tourist shops up here! I was able to get a stamp on that postcard above that I bought which proves that I have reached the crater (aside from my photos, of course 😀). It's a bit disappointing that the centre of the crater is filled in. It would be much more fun to be looking down into the bowels of the earth!

It doesn't show up very well here but on the right hand side just beneath the top there is some smoke coming out of the rocks!! Vesuvius is still alive.... 😱

There were some info panels talking about the bird life in the park - not that we noticed any, but it is a National Park and obviously there is all the area of the sides of the mountain, not just the crater area. They mentioned bee hotels for solitary bees, and monitoring of the Peregrine Falcon. Bird species are increasing since the area was designated a National Park and the mountain is a point of reference and a stopping off point for migratory birds which have crossed the sea. The park hosts about 150 species of birds, whether migratory, wintering, nesting or sedentary.

It was this trip in the bus where we think that Keith caught a cold/covid which I later got (and I'm absolutely sure it was covid)  - the downside to enclosed spaces with lots of people.

A few notes about Italy in general - the traffic was awful in the built up areas, so different from travelling around France and Spain in September.

We didn't go into Naples city but skirted the outskirts. What I couldn't get over was the amount of rubbish/trash everywhere by the sides of the roads. Wherever there was a layby was filled with sacks of rubbish, and general rubbish was just blowing around the sides of the roads. Totally shocking. Apparently this has been going on for years. 😠

And it was still green everywhere even this far south!

Italy Trip Sept 2025 - Part 4 Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli, Lazio

We only visited three Roman sites - but they were all spectacular compared to most that we have seen elsewhere. Most ancient sites have just the lower walls and foundations left, which show you only the outlines of buildings. The places we visited in Italy had whole walls, and some even had ceilings/roofs! Not bad for something 2,000 years old.

Hadrian's Villa, a UNESCO World Heritage site, is a large villa complex built between 118 and 138AD for the Emperor Hadrian. Hadrian was a well traveled man and asked for the many places that most impressed him to be reproduced inside. The complex contains baths, nymphaea, pavilions, gardens and residential structures representing the provinces conquered by the Roman Empire.

It always helps seeing a model like below to get a better feel for an archaeological site, although I don't know what a lot of the places in my photos are of now!

This wall is immense; I was astounded to see such a high wall still standing. It is a part of the 'Pecile' which you can see on the model above as the large rectangular shaped area with an open centre on the right. On the other side of this wall would have been a fish pond, like in the photo. This area had a covered roof and columns and was designed for the Emperor and his guests to take their daily strolls, known as ambulatio.

No idea what the buildings are but the whole area was nicely landscaped.

Below, either end of a grassy area beyond the Pecile. The bottom picture is of the Vestibule and above and below show a paved rectangular shaped roadway excavated in 2000 which looks like it is grassing over. This was the main entrance for guests going to the Canopus, where summer banquets were held.

The Small Baths - there were two bathhouses in this complex, this and the Large Baths.

Two floor tiles. There was no explanation as to why there were just two tiles sitting there, and if more were found, and where they might be now (a museum in Rome probably). They are examples of inlay work called Opus Sectile which was complex and very expensive, so generally limited to imperial properties.

Yet more buildings - wish I could tell you what they were but it was such a huge site and only the most obvious places could be figured out from the plan that we had of the site. And even if I had known six months ago, I can't remember now!

This was the Large Baths.

A Hooded Crow (Corvus corone cornix). I remember seeing these birds when we were in Italy decades ago and haven't seen them anywhere else. They are found in eastern and south eastern Europe, the Middle East, Scandinavia, Scotland and Ireland. Most of western Europe has the all black Carrion Crow.

The Canopus. At the end of this pool is the summer dining room, known as the Triclinium, where the Emperor would host elaborate banquets.

I think these buildings are around the Palace area.

The Hall with Doric Pillars - all that is left of it.

There was still some excavating going on, and below, some more lovely examples of Opus Sectile inlay flooring.

Common Wall or Moorish Gecko (Tarentola mauritanica).

The Teatro Maritimi. This wasn't a theatre but a villa within a villa. The Emperor could 'escape' to the island villa to be alone. It was laid out just like a typical villa with sleeping quarters, baths, a latrine and a central garden.

The Temple of Venus.

There was a Greek theatre down the hillside but it was closed for some reason that I can't recall.

Our journey from Levanto to Bolsena Lake and then to Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli.

I hope I haven't bored the pants off you with this Roman stuff 😁 - wait until we get to the more interesting photos of Pompeii - the frescoes are out of this world!