A few years ago I went to an exhibit in Cincinnati of artifacts from Pompeii. I've known the basics of Pompeii, as I assume most people do, my whole life; Roman city, buried in volcanic ash, found centuries later, the forms of dying people preserved where they fell. Seeing the exhibit, though, gave me a new sense of the value of the site to our understanding of the early Roman imperial period. Pots and statues, graffiti as aggressive advertising, the bread, olives and figs they ate: all of it preserved for us to study or gawk at, depending on our skills and interests. Of course, the paster casts of the hollows where people fell were arresting. Literal moments frozen in time. It was amidst all this archaeological wonder I found one sign which mentioned the first book written in English about Pompeii was Pompeiana from 1817. I resolved to read this book. Thanks to the wonderful people who digitize old books, it wasn't that hard to find online.
I have the impression, based on I don't recall what, the book was going to be a tour guide of the city. I expected it to describe both the city and the methods by which fancy English gentlefolk on the Grand Tour would get to and around the town. I wanted to read about Sergio who has the best and most reliable mules in the area and about Momma Caglione who prepares the finest meals. There was none of that sort of tourist stuff. It was just about what a person will see in city. I suppose I should have guessed that from the full title: Pompeiana; the Topography, Edifices and Ornaments of Pompeii.
The book is actually rather short. It goes over the known and supposed history of Vesuvius' eruptions. Then the major parts of the city as known at that time. I read the second edition from 1824, which says it has been updated in include some recent excavations. Even so, there wasn't much of the city known at the time. The amphitheater in the east was known but the middle of the city was still buried. Gell instead covers the buildings on the western edge of the town. The tombs and large houses on the main road outside the Herculaneum Gate, a few of the crossroads, a few of the temples; these things he discusses in detail giving count of rooms, supposed uses and any curious artifacts found in each. The frescoes and mosaics one would see in each building are also listed and described. What I liked best about the book was the numerous plates throughout. About every house and building described is also figured by good quality lithographs and many are given a numbered plan as well. The over-all impression of the book is to put the reader “there” in a very literal way.
The book serves as a time capsule because it shows things in Pompeii as they looked in the early Nineteenth Century. Gell laments the exposure to the elements which had already at that time damaged the colors of frescoes and the stucco covering some of the buildings. I expect this tension between uncovering and discovery of the ruins and the further damage the ruins are thereby exposed to will continue to be a major theme of the other books I read about Pompeii. Pompeiana tells everything which was known about a particular house at that time. I expect to see in the other books I read both a long shadow from this work and how understandings changed over the next two centuries.
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