The Complete Pompeii

[Ursus]

Joanne Berry, The Complete Pompeii. London: Thames & Hudson, 2007.

Pp. 256; ills. 318 (275 in color). ISBN 978-0-500-05150-4. $40.00.

 

Reviewed by Wakefield Foster, University of Missouri-Columbia

(wakefieldfoster@...)

Word count: 2358 words

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To read a print-formatted version of this review, see

http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/bmcr/2008/2008-03-33.html

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Joanne Berry has spent many years working at the archaeological sites

of Pompeii and Herculaneum (Unpeeling Pompeii: Studies in Region I of

Pompeii, edited by Joanne Berry [Milan: Electa, 1998]), and her

enthusiasm for the mystique and wonder of these ancient cities'

unexpected treasures is evident on every page of The Complete

Pompeii.[[1]] The strength of Berry's book is in its wide range of

information on the subject, concisely and thoughtfully arranged to

appeal to scholars and teachers -- classicists, archaeologists, and

historians -- as well as to students and the layman. Her choice of

illustrations deftly supports the text and elicits the reader's

continuing interest. The Complete Pompeii provides background

information about the "discovery" of Pompeii in the early eighteenth

century, though local inhabitants had always called the site, a

sixty-or-more acre field, Civita (which Berry renders as La Civita\).

Berry begins by summarizing what we already know of Pompeii and

outlines, often in close detail, what we are learning from ongoing work

of the lives and deaths of the city's inhabitants. Her purpose is

clearly to present in a single volume an up-to-date account of the

facts and controversies surrounding Pompeii in the early twenty-first

century. Regarding the often unintelligible and confusing mass of

archaeological remains of public and private buildings and public

spaces, Berry has a distinct talent for gleaning valuable insights

about the ancient Pompeians' daily lives. The author astutely

interweaves her information about the site with past and more recent

political and historical background circumstances. The saga of

Pompeii's excavations has always been inextricably tied to political

contexts from Charles VII of Palermo to Mussolini. Pompeii remains

arguably the most important civic monument in Italian culture and has

been exploited to this end for good and bad.

 

The Complete Pompeii begins with a chapter titled "Disaster in the

Shadow of Vesuvius", which describes how Pompeii (and Herculaneum) were

destroyed by the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79. Berry reproduces in

full the two letters by Pliny the Younger who described to Tacitus what

he had seen from a distance -- the distinctive "umbrella pine" shape of

the cloud which has given modern vulcanologists the term "Plinian" for

this early phase of an eruption. The author includes other ancient

references to Vesuvius, including suspicions by some observers (Strabo,

Vitruvius, and Diodorus Siculus) that Vesuvius may have been an active

volcano in its past. This is interesting because it suggests that not

everyone at the time was surprised by what happened. Suetonius and Dio

Cassius describe an admirably organized relief effort overseen by the

emperor Titus, a disaster relief operation which apparently puts to

shame FEMA's efforts in New Orleans.

 

Chapter Two, "Rediscovering Pompeii's Buried Past", provides background

information about the first digs, or rather plundering, of the site,

which seems to have been discovered, at least in the modern era, in

1708. Berry points out, however, that extensive tunneling found beneath

the hardened ash, lapilli, and tufa may date to soon after the eruption

when the city's inhabitants returned in search of their possessions.

Sadly, as Berry writes, Pompeii suffered much irreparable destruction,

both to the site and to artifacts buried within it, when haphazard

digging, often by fortune hunters, uncovered, re-covered, shuffled, and

re-shuffled discarded piles of detritus, thus obliterating find-spots

of artifacts that were later returned. The first modern consideration

for the condition of the digs is found in a letter by Horace Walpole in

1740, in which he deplores "the lack of judicious direction over the

recovery of this reservoir of antiquities. . . . If only a man of

learning had the inspection of it and directed the working, and would

make a journal of it" (40.)

 

Chapter Three, "Birth and Growth of a Roman Town", examines the recent

upsurge in interest in Pompeii's history before the eruption of AD 79.

A number of strategically chosen stratigraphic excavations are being

carried out in different parts of the town in an effort to establish a

chronology of settlements by Oscans, Greeks, Etruscans, and Samnites

before Pompeii came under Roman control in 290 BC (64-66).

Interestingly, a Bronze Age settlement in the region of Campania near

the present site of Nola had been destroyed sometime in the fourth

millennium BC by an eruption of Vesuvius.

 

Berry's focus in Chapter Four ("The People of Pompeii") is aimed at the

inhabitants of Pompeii. She estimates the population at between eight

and twelve thousand people, consisting of the freeborn, freedmen, and

slaves. The city's racial diversity was apparently not as mixed as

expected for a port city. Romans predominated alongside much smaller

numbers of Oscans and Greeks. Berry asserts that some evidence may

point to the presence of a Jewish and/or Christian community in Pompeii

and Herculaneum, such as the names Mary and Martha inscribed on walls

and some few Semitic inscriptions on amphorae, which, of course, may

only indicate the presence of Jewish traders. She admits that the

paucity of evidence makes the suggestion of a Jewish community very

unlikely (201). Although many houses of the elite have separate slave

quarters, it has long been a question whether and how slaves were

buried. Berry points out interestingly that "there is evidence to

suggest that some slaves at least were buried in the family tombs of

their masters" (91).

 

A popular window into daily life in Pompeii has long been provided by

its variety of graffiti, ranging from the vulgar (Phoebus the perfumer

fucks the best) to the pragmatic (A brass pot disappeared from this

shop. If anyone brings it back, he'll be rewarded with 65 sesterces),

and including drawings and caricatures.[[2]] It remains unknown how

many people in the Roman empire could read and write, but the fact of

over 11,000 examples of the written word at Pompeii suggests that a

considerable number of Pompeians could, at the very least, read and

write at a rudimentary level. Berry interprets a wall painting from the

house of Julia Felix as a school scene; it depicts a row of boys

sitting (out of doors) in the Forum with wax tablets on their knees

while another boy receives a caning by the schoolmaster. The reviewer

is particularly grateful for Berry's inclusion, though necessarily

limited, of erotic scenes from the infamous "secret cabinet" in the

Naples Museum in the form of paintings, sculpture, and mosaics, as well

as a more extended section (112-119) discussing the roles of women in

Pompeian life.

 

Chapter Five ("Life in the Public Eye") deals with public life, the

dynamics of which can be studied in surprising detail at Pompeii.

Reputations and status were enhanced for individuals who won public

office. Particularly unique to Pompeii and found in great numbers are

"programmata" or posters painted in red or black on white background

supporting specific candidates for public office. Berry writes that,

based on their freshness at the time of excavation, we know the names

of leading candidates for the aedileship (junior magistracy) in AD 79.

 

Berry devotes several pages to descriptions and color plates of the

theaters of Herculaneum and Pompeii. Remarkably, a large arena-shaped

depression in Civita was repeatedly dismissed by mid-eighteenth-century

excavators as simply a low spot in the field, and it was not until much

later that archaeologists revealed it to be Pompeii's beautifully

preserved amphitheater. Pompeii boasted a covered theater, or Odeon,

the roof of which would have greatly enhanced acoustics, making it an

attractive and forgiving venue for reading poetry and rhetoric (124),

and an open-air theater was found next to it. A new fashion for

porticoed buildings in Augustan Italy may be evident, Berry suggests,

in the similarities between the porticoed Eumachia Building (excavated

in 1822 -- its function debated ever since) and the portico around

Pompeii's forum. The basilica with portico at Herculaneum is another,

though controversial, example.

 

Although we can study the structure and often the decoration and

contents of Pompeian houses, we remain far removed from being able to

reconstruct the composition of individual households, their domestic

organization, and the activities that took place within the houses

(154). Other recent scholarship makes less problematic the topic of

domestic organization.[[3]] In Chapter Six ("Houses and Society"),

besides houses and their inhabitants, Berry examines wall paintings,

mosaics, and garden layouts and offers sumptuous color photos of many

of the lesser known mosaics and wall paintings. Many of the finest

examples of mosaics are found in Pompeii and Herculaneum where they

have been described as "carpets," since emblems are often placed at

their centers. She provides a detailed and informative outline of the

four styles of Pompeian wall-painting from 150 BC to AD 79 (170-71). Of

course, Berry lavishes a much deserved attention on the House of the

Faun, which was certainly one of the wealthiest and most luxurious

houses in Pompeii: "Originally excavated in 1830-32, the House of the

Faun was stripped of its elaborate mosaics by the excavators, abandoned

to the elements, and finally damaged in the Allied bombing of 1943.

What can be seen today only hints at the grandeur of the 32,000 square

foot house, the largest in Pompeii" (163). Lastly, Berry devotes

several pages to the domestic gardens of Pompeian houses and to

descriptions and photographs of a sampling of the thousands of

household objects of unknown provenance stored at the Naples Museum.

 

In Chapter Seven ("Gods, Temples, and Cults") Berry examines what can

be reconstructed about public religious and cult practices in Pompeii.

Apparently, Venus held the most popularity in the town: "More

statuettes and wall-paintings [of Venus] have been found in the houses

and streets of Pompeii than any other deity" (195). Of course, these

may only be ornaments, since statuettes and wall-paintings of Dionysus

are also found at the site. After 80 BC, when Pompeii became an

official Roman colony, Roman temples or existing temples that had been

Romanized dominated, although other, local deities retained some of

their earlier importance along with certain approved "foreign" cults

such as that of Isis. However, excavations even in the early eighteenth

century were well documented, though the sites were usually looted of

objects of value such as wall-paintings. Early visitors often made

drawings of the paintings and the original excavators kept

documentation so that in recent years there has been considerable

success in reconstructing the original find-spots of looted material,

and we have a good idea of what the temple looked like in AD 79 (205).

The oldest temple is the Augustan Temple of Fortuna Augusta. From the

Augustan period onward, public religion included gods directly

associated with the emperors, both dead and alive (192). Berry

describes these as "civic" or "state" cults that had little to do with

personal religious practice and more to do with allegiance to Rome.

Archaeological evidence dates two temples to the 6th century BC, the

Doric Temple, and the Temple of Apollo. She reports that there may also

be compelling evidence for a temple to Mephitis, the Samnite goddess of

love (188). A fourth temple predating the Roman period and established

by Samnite magistrates in the 3rd century BC is the Temple of Bacchus,

outside Pompeii at Sant' Abbondio. Of course, every Pompeian family had

in its home a special shrine -- the lararium -- honoring its own

protective deities -- the Lares.

 

Chapter Eight is titled "Economic Life in a Roman Town". The so-called

"Via dell'Abbondanza" is the longest and was apparently the busiest

street in Pompeii. Lined with shops of every kind, it stretched from

the Forum to the Sarno Gate and the Amphitheater (210). Because of the

region's volcanic soil, the fertility of Pompeii's land was renowned in

antiquity. Wine was the town's principal product, but fruit and nut

trees and vegetables were cultivated also. Berry includes a

comprehensive list of occupations attested at Pompeii in inscriptions,

graffiti, and wax tablets (221).

 

Fittingly, the book ends with "The Last Years of Pompeii". The quality

of life in Pompeii's last years was severely impaired by a devastating

earthquake in AD 63 or 62 (the issue is still debated) that lasted for

several days and was clearly a premonitory sign of the eruption of 79.

Berry summarizes thus: "The 16 years from this earthquake in AD 63 to

the eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79 were marked by disruption as the

inhabitants of the town attempted to rebuild their lives, and endured

further seismic activity" (234). Although many inhabitants, both rich

and poor, undoubtedly left the city in disgust after the 63/62

earthquakes, the majority clearly remained to face the final

catastrophe in AD 79. We have two ancient reports of the seriousness of

the earthquake, one by the historian Tacitus and the other, in much

greater detail, by Seneca, the philosopher and tutor to the young Nero.

In fact, Berry notes, Seneca's description of the town's destruction

has been fundamental to the modern discussion of living conditions in

the last years of Pompeii's life (236).

 

Berry is to be commended for producing a book that concisely gathers in

a single volume a wide variety of enlightening aspects of the famous

city destroyed and yet preserved in many ways that shed light on

first-century Roman life. The physical quality of the book is exquisite

-- satin gloss pages generously interspersed with color photographs

ranging from aerial shots to rarely shown artifacts (for example,

preserved organic material such as boiled eggs, which I have never seen

in my several visits to the Pompeii collection in the Naples museum). I

recommend the book to all audiences and especially to university or

secondary school Latin teachers, who will find it most valuable when

introducing their students to the Younger Pliny's famous letters to the

historian Tacitus, describing the events that led to his uncle's death

on the beach at Stabiae. More than anything, however, the book is a

comprehensive survey of what is arguably the most famous archaeological

site in the world.

 

Printer's errors:

 

p. 40: ". . . exciting finds made been made in . . ." should read ". .

. exciting finds had been made in . . ."

 

p. 219: ". . . such asa chisel" should read ". . . such as a chisel."

 

 

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Notes:

 

 

1. A spate of new books on Pompeii has come out recently (e.g.,

Dobbins and Foss, above; Alex Butterworth, Pompeii: The Living City

[New York: St. Martin's Press, 2006] and Allison Cooley, Pompeii

[London: Duckworth, 2003]), among which Berry's The Complete Pompeii

easily holds it own because of its broad scope and appealing admixture

of constituent text and illustrations.

 

2. There are a number of rather humorous graffiti that Berry didn't

include which might have added pleasantly to her list, such as "miximus

in lecto; fateor, peccavimus, hospes. Si dicis quare, nulla matella

fuit," ("I confess, innkeeper, that I did bad. I pissed in your bed. If

you want to know why, it's because there wasn't any pot!") [Walter H.

Marks, Claimed By Vesuvius (Wellesley Hill, MA: The Independent School

Press, 1975), 27].

 

3. For example, see J.-A. Dickmann, "Residences in Herculaneum." In

The World of Pompeii, John J. Dobbins and Pedar W. Foss, eds (London:

Routledge, July 2007); Stephan T.A.M. Mols, Eric M. Moormann, Omni pede

stare. Saggi architettonici e circumvesuviani in memoriam Jos de Waele.

Studi della Soprintendenza archeologica di Pompei 9 (Naples: Electa

Napoli and Ministero per i Beni e le Attivita\ Culturali, 2005); and

Penelope Mary Allison, The Archaeology of Household Activities (London:

Routledge, 1999).

 

 

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