Herculaneum Beach in the ancient Roman city of Herculaneum, buried with Pompeii by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius on October 24, 79 AD, is to be excavated and restored. When the archaeologists finish, visitors will be able to walk along Herculaneum Beach, as the elite Romans once did, before the lethal growth of nature destroys the region.
Herculaneum Beach: Created and destroyed by a volcano
As today, but perhaps even more so in the ancient world, people were attached to their ancestral territories. For thousands of years, people had cultivated on the hyper-fertile slopes of Mount Vesuvius, and no one in the Roman world predicted that their natural supporter of life, Vesuvius, was also a destructive god who would take everything back.
In his 2013 BBC2 documentary The other Pompeii: life and death in Herculaneum , Wallace-Hadrill recounted the disaster of 79 AD. and he said that we all make the “mistake” of seeing ancient Roman society as an entity in two parts: rich people or poor people. However, the presenter said: “Herculaneum returns the middle people – and they are extraordinary.”
The stunning paintings found in Herculaneum attest to its luxury reputation on the Roman coast. ( milosk50 / Adobe Stock)
A poorly preserved site becomes a case of textbooks of excellence
Herculaneum was an ancient coastal settlement, which is today located in the commune of Ercolano, Campania, Italy. According to Strabo Geography the city had ancient Greek origins and was always associated with the hero Heracles (Hercules), who was revered not only as the spiritual founder of the city, but also as the master of Mount Vesuvius.
Like the nearby city of Pompeii, Herculaneum was also destroyed and buried under thick volcanic ash and pumice in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. And it has also been well preserved under deep layers of ash.
Conformable New York Times in 2013, “Herculaneum went from one of the worst-preserved UNESCO sites at risk of being listed as endangered to becoming a case of successful archaeological conservation textbooks.”
Now, a new stage of planned archaeological excavations is about to begin, with the aim of restoring Herculaneum Beach in the Antica-Spiaggia area.
Boat huts on Herculaneum beach, where 300 skeletons were found. These unfortunate victims were about to be evacuated, but they never realized it. (Matthias Holländer / Public domain )
Herculaneum Beach was primarily a luxury seaside retreat
While Pompeii and Herculaneum were both covered with pyroclastic material from the volcanic eruption, the director of the Herculaneum Archaeological Park, Francesco Sirano, said several wooden and organic artifacts and objects were kept at the latter.
This was exemplified in an article in The telegraph who said the charred remains of nearly “300 people were discovered in a series of boat houses where the last inhabitants perished in the intense heat waiting to be rescued from the sea.”
Herculaneum Society we say that the city was smaller, but much richer than Pompeii. And while Pompeii was a thriving and highly industrialized city, Herculaneum served the powerful Roman elite “as a luxurious retreat from the coast,” comprising large and luxurious houses clad in marble.
Sirano told the Italian news agency ANSA that the Herculaneum Conservation Project ( HCP) began in 2001. But now the team of archaeologists has a renewed awareness of the complexity of the site, which it “expects from a more solid perspective.”
The skeletons of the victims of Herculaneum who perished due to the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD. ( waldorf27 / Adobe Stock)
Challenges of the Herculaneum beach restoration project
The ANSA report says the planned excavations are expected to last two and a half years. Archaeologists aim to reach the western part of the beach, which they will return to the original level of the sand, as it was at the time of the eruption in 79 AD.
Finally, future visitors to the site will be able to relive the last moments in October 79 AD, when the gods reset Roman society and punished them for their wealth and decadence.
However, because the beach in question is buried about four meters below the current sea level, this project will be different from any previous excavations at Herculaneum. Excavators say they expect to face a number of unforeseen problems with water drainage. But their expected obstacles are not limited to the dangers of heavy archeology and the removal of hundreds of tons of sand. The entire restoration project must also comply with modern water regulations.
Top image: Looking south from Naples along the coast to Herculaneum beach which is now restored. Source: Sergii Figurnyi / Adobe Stock
By Ashley Cowie