
The Fires of Vesuvius
Pompeii Lost and Found
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.00 for first 30 days
Buy for $21.49
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Phyllida Nash
-
By:
-
Mary Beard
Pompeii is the most famous archaeological site in the world, visited by more than two million people each year. Yet it is also one of the most puzzling, with an intriguing and sometimes violent history.
Destroyed by Vesuvius in 79 CE, the ruins of Pompeii offer the best evidence we have of life in the Roman Empire. But the eruptions are only part of the story. In The Fires of Vesuvius, acclaimed historian Mary Beard makes sense of the remains. She explores what kind of town it was - more like Calcutta or the Costa del Sol? - and what it can tell us about "ordinary" life there. From sex to politics, food to religion, slavery to literacy, Beard offers us the big picture even as she takes us close enough to the past to smell the bad breath and see the intestinal tapeworms of the inhabitants of the lost city. She resurrects the Temple of Isis as a testament to ancient multiculturalism. At the Suburban Baths we go from communal bathing to hygiene to erotica.
Recently, Pompeii has been a focus of pleasure and loss: from Pink Floyd's memorable rock concert to Primo Levi's elegy on the victims. But Pompeii still does not give up its secrets quite as easily as it may seem. This book shows us how much more and less there is to Pompeii than a city frozen in time as it went about its business on 24 August 79 CE.
©2008 Mary Beard (P)2019 TantorListeners also enjoyed...




















People who viewed this also viewed...


















Amazing!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Exceeded expectations
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Interesting details
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Great Listen
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Mary Beard is always fun and informative!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
An Excellent Guide to a Lost City
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
It’s about Pompeii’s life, not about its destruction
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Enchanting
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Very informative
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
It’s worth listening to a few times because there’s so many compelling details about this lost people and how they lived. It’s a mystery unraveled.
Pompeii unveiled
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.