Tea at Trianon: The Buried City – Unearthing the Real Pompeii

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Tuesday, March 24, 2026

The Buried City – Unearthing the Real Pompeii

From Reid's Reader:

Zuchtriegel makes it clear that Romans followed and copied Greek art. In fact at one point he notes that Pompeii did not ever have the best art work. He says that ancient Rome, Capua and Verona had more great art works than Pompeii ever had, and they had larger arenas. He spends some time examining the famous copy of the statue of the Greek god Apollo and its connection with Greek culture. Sensuality and eroticism were displayed in some of the houses of the rich. Zuchtriegel spends some time with freaks and hermaphrodites as they were depicted in Greek tales. Wealthy people’s walls were painted with images of Greek fables and the doings of the Greek gods, sometimes dealing with rape or violence but just as often dealing with images of serenity or weddings. One house, excavated in the early years of archaeologism [in the late 19^th century] was named as the House of the Vetti, generally interpreted as a brothel. Wealthy people also had slaves, and the prostitutes were slaves. Slaves could be freed sometimes, but often this would simply mean that an old slave was of no worth anymore and the freed slave was left in poverty and would have nowhere to go.

Having explained all of this, Zuchtriegel notes that in the last years of Pompeii there was a god that was very popular. This was the Greek Dionysus. But he also notes that the very ground Pompeii was built on was originally Etruscan land, and the Etruscan gods were related to nature and agriculture. There were many rituals that had been carried through to the late years of Pompeii. He then returns to the state of the city as it now is. Among other things, some of the ruins were destroyed during the Second World War due to American bombing near to Naples. For a long time there were misunderstandings about the meanings of some buildings that had been buried in the 79 A.D. earthquake. For example, one building that was dug up by amateur archaeologists in the early 20^th century, became known as the Villa of Mysteries because it looked dark and there was a long frieze whose meaning was difficult to understand. Could it have been the site of a forbidden cult? But it is now understood that there was no mystery at all. The villa, as it originally stood, was open to the passing public, there were no orgies taking place in it, and the images on the wall had to do with celebrations of a wedding.

It is in the last parts of The Buried City that Gabriel Zuchtriegel goes back to what actually happened when Pompeii was almost obliterated. He likes to show how ordinary people – not just the rich – were going through the streets of the city just before the sky fell in. One example was a chariot that has only recently been dug up by modern archaeologists. Only parts of it survived, but it was clearly being driven on its way to some ordinary event. Zuchtriegel also often reminds us that those who lived in the most horribly cramped quarters were the poor people – who made up most of the population – and the slaves. As he sees it, the most important people in Pompeii were the poor and the slaves who kept the city running. They were the ones who drove carts bringing into the city the food that came from the fields and the fishing boats, cooked and produced meals, looked after the children of rich etc. Yet they had to live in the worst houses.
Regrettably, says Zuchtriegel, despite all the help of the police, there is still in Naples the Camorra – the Neapolitan version of the Sicilian Mafia - which illegitimately raids parts of Pompeii, stealing antiquities and selling them to the rich in the black market. But things are now being tightened. There is the frequently-asked question “How many people lived in Pompeii at the time it was destroyed?” Answers range from 40,000 to 20,000, but one also has to be aware of the fact that the rural areas, which brought in grain, stock and milk, should also be seen as part of Pompeii. At an odd point, too, Zuchtriegel says that Pompeii was probably economically declining in the years before its ruin. Apparently more local farmers now raised grapes as wine became most important… but this meant that grain had to be imported from different countries – like Egypt - at great price. (Read more.)