Mount Vesuvius was believed to be a sleeping volcano. Nobody ever knew or heard of a volcano before. When it erupted at 79CE at around 1pm, the people of Pompeii thought that the gods have decided to erase them from the face of the world.
During the reign of Emperor Vespasian, Pompeii was a prosperous city, with public shows gladiatorial fights, streets buzzing with all types of people with different status: Patricians, plebeians, slaves or prisoners. Gladiators roamed the streets as public heroes; love notes left by female fans can be seen almost everywhere. All was pleasant until 10am, when the ground started to tremble slightly. The Romans, however, ignored it, and continued their daily chores. Little did they know of the disaster that was to follow. The earth tremors started to become more obvious, and the inhabitants of the city still ignored what was happening. Then, at 1pm, Mount Vesuvius erupts, spilling ashes everywhere, falling on roofs of the houses in the city. The ashes were becoming larger and larger as more of them rained down. People ran into their houses, seeking shelter – anywhere that could cover them from the horror coming from the once silent mountain. All those who stayed in the streets had their heads smashed open by stones of pumice that fell upon the city. Jupiter had decided to punish them all for all their bad deeds. Patricians hurried to their shrines, begging for mercy from the god of the sky and thunder. Very soon after the eruption, the Roman roofs, which were only built to withstand nothing more than rain, collapsed under the unbearable weight of the ash and pumice, crushing those it housed. A huge dark cloud swept over Pompeii like a blanket, trapping its inhabitants in darkness. Pliny the Elder, who was stationed at Misenum during the eruption, witnessed the eruption. He was an admiral of the Roman Navy and also a naturalist, and claims that the eruption is nothing more than a work of nature. Then, hot ash and lava came out of the volcano and swept into the streets of Pompeii, burning pedestrians and turning them into charcoal. Eyes burnt, skin cells and other soft tissues evaporated and brains exploded in the process. People of other cities near Mount Vesuvius either met the same fate or suffocated when the ash and smoke filled their lungs.
