BBC\'s Pompeii

[Epictetus]

The BBC has an hour-long show on Pompeii airing tomorrow (14.12.2010) in the UK, except for Scotland, which gets it Friday (17.12.2010). The rest of us will probably have to wait for it to trickle through syndication.

Pompeii: one of the most famous volcanic eruptions in history. We know how its victims died, but this film sets out to answer another question - how did they live? Gleaning evidence from an extraordinary find, Cambridge professor and Pompeii expert Mary Beard provides new insight into the lives of the people who lived in the shadow of Mount Vesuvius before its cataclysmic eruption.

In a dark cellar in Oplontis, just three miles from the centre of Pompeii, 54 skeletons who didn't succumb to the torrent of volcanic ash are about to be put under the microscope. The remains will be submitted to a barrage of tests that will unlock one of the most comprehensive scientific snapshots of Pompeian life ever produced - and there are some big surprises in store.

Using the latest forensic techniques it is now possible to determine what those who perished in the disaster ate and drank, where they came from, what diseases they suffered, how rich they were, and perhaps, even more astonishingly, the details of their sex lives.

The way the remains were found in the cellar already provides an invaluable clue about the lives of the people they belonged to. On one side of the room were individuals buried with one of the most stunning hauls of gold, jewellery and coins ever found in Pompeii. On the other, were people buried with nothing. It looked the stark dividing line of a polarised ancient society: a room partitioned between super rich and abject poor. But on closer examination the skeletons reveal some surprises about life in Pompeii.

Mary Beard gives a little comment about it on her blog, too.

Based upon the teaser it doesn't look to have much new information, but I've always enjoyed Beard so hopefully it will be a good show.

[Robert Vermaat]

I'm going to tape it.

[ParthianBow]

Apart from Mary Beard's alarming tendency to look at the cameraman/editor to one side of the cameraman/someone off camera, it was absolutely excellent. And so was she, I stress.

Two major points of interest:

1) More than 700 bags of human faeces has been removed from the sewers in Herculaneum, and preliminary tests show that the average Roman's diet (the sewers drained down from blocks of 'middle-class' flats) was excellent - far better than is commonly thought. They ate large amounts of meat, including huge quantities of fish; they ate plenty of nuts and fruit too. The testing on the 'slave' skeletons found beside the 'owner' skeletons in the cellar reveals the same story.

2) The bones of two children, probably twins, and of about 10-12 years of age, show many of the signs of congenital syphilis. If this theory is substantiated, it will bring forward the first recorded date of this disease by more than 1400 years. Maybe Columbus' sailors weren't guilty of being the first to bring it to Europe!

[jvrjenivs]

I'm going to tape it.

Can you get me a copy?