Pompeii, Italy

In which I wander through the streets where archeology was invented, and think about souls past and present.

In Campania some frightening and astonishing events occurred. A great fire suddenly flared up at the very end of summer. Mount Vesuvius, which stands near the sea below Naples, has in it inexhaustible fountains of fire…

-Cassius Dio, The History of Rome

{Pompeii, Italy}

It is getting to be late fall, and the air is chilly when I visit the ruins of Pompeii. As I walk along the grid of streets the skies turn alternately blue and then grey - as skies do in fall - and clouds form and slowly disappear. Later in the afternoon, just as the impending sunset adds a hint of yellow to the horizon I stand in the heart of the city, in the remains of the Pompeiian Forum, and look towards Mount Vesuvius. A series of clouds gather right at the crest. They look for all of the world like smoke and ash.

Of course I know that there will be no eruption today - we have advance warning of these things now, and it is obvious that these are just clouds. But still, I wonder, is this how it looked in 79 AD? Or was it more dramatic?