668. The Natural History of Pompeii by Jashemski.- summary

668.  The Natural History of Pompeii by Jashemski. 

I.xiv.6-7  lararium has the Sarno river in it

Port was outside Porta di Stabiana
Onions cabbage grapes olives biggies
Best mill stones came from here- made from lava
walls outside house fair game for graffiti and adds
Boring street but houses looked inward

House of Polybius IX.xiii.1-3 owner apparently did not want to aqueduct water nib his house- he or she had the old style garden- this was my kind of guy

Pompeii is on a base of pyroclastic flow from very ancient times

The eruption which covered Pompeii the base was a pyroclastic flow, upper was a surge which moved at hurricane speed.

Area was/is very active- Phlegean fields= Laestrygonians with their hurling rocks

Pumice/lithic= tephra

Column  lifted material above, it became so heavy that this forced ash and gases to travel elsewhere, thus surges and flows.  The terrain helped to determine where the flows and surges would go.

Explosions were produced by magma mixing with ground water.

6AM- eartly beg eruption went east and did not rise very high.  12 noon- Pliny's mom saw a plume- soon to be 20 miles high- yes 20 miles high.  108 inches fell in 20 hours- then add on surge flows

At 16 inches house roofs began to collapse- people began to leave- this may have saved many lives.  The eruption oscillated between ash/lapilli fall and flows/surges SIX times.  Pompeii is 6 miles from Vesuvius.

The first surge hit outside wall at Herculean gate- must have caused panic and almost unbearable conditions- the heat.  Most bodies have been found at 9 plus feet .  Herculaneum- the ocean was directly at base of cliff.  The baths at Herc were protected by a wall to deflect water during a storm.  The arches where bodies were found were meant to be support for the wall above.  Years before the eruption- land was rising.  1 meter- not much BUT made beach water shallow. Thus docks would have been series of jetties jutting out into the sea.  Then when eruption was over as magma was removed from underneath Herc, the city sank 4 meters.   The first surge killed the inhabitants.  The vaults were used to store ships- none have been found- escape?  Water did not fill the vaults.  Bones, most of them, are in moist ash.  The ash fall reached northern Africa, Egypt, even Syria
70% of rain comes in Sept-March.  The porous material holds much water.  Generally the darker the soil the more organic matter present.
Figs, chestnuts- highly liked. The fruit of the arbutus and acorn was seen as the primitive food before Ceres taught agriculture- these are the symbol of the Golden Age. before humans had to work.

Arundo looks like a corn stalk- appears in paintings.
Beets- Romans ate the leaves, beet used as medicine.

They loved morning glory- these are in frigidarium of San Marco
chestnuts are in Naples
Room 23 of Oplontis- quince
ivy mounds are in Venus Marina
iris in peristyle garden Oplontis-  paintings apparently designed to coordinate with actual flow garden

juglans- walnut in Villa Mysteries tablinum- nuts were scattered at weddings with hope of fertility, used to dye wool, red hair dye

lentils and beets leaves used to make a salad
had lupines
malus=apple
morus-mulberry
Venus Marina- heron in front of a mulberry
opium poppy found in garden
pinus pionea- umbrella pine
platanus orientalis=plane tree- looacetolysis used to extract pollen and hydrofluoric acid to reduce mineral content.

chemicals in soil helped to preserve pollen
many olives at Polybius house

Platanus=plane tree-looks like a sycamore
emmer wheat in painting in Naples

Martial- dog poem-1.109

Pliny said that insects were the greets creation

Roman knowledge of nature provides insight as to how they related to their environment
she appears unaware of Pliny's remarks that plants do better when nibbled by insects
Cato- slime of olive pressings used to line granaries to keep out beetles, Varro used ashes.

Eumachia carvings has- flies, bees, butterflies, ants, spiders
galls from oak trees were sold for medicine- Romans did not like getting stuff from Docs- better to use free or cheap stuff
VI.vii.18 butterfly mural
I.ix.5 snake painting
Aesclapian snake feeds on small nest
snake protected home from harm and symbol of fecundity
snakes used to control mice and rats
Paintings indicate that Pompeians may have fed birds
dogs left behind to protect house- small dos may have been taken with family.
goats milk preferred
I.viii.12 assembled horse
melting pot society.