In Their Final Moments, a Pompeii Family Fought to Survive

One day in the year 79, Pompeii came under fire. The explosion of nearby Mount Vesuvius sent a mushroom cloud of ash and rock into the atmosphere, pummeling the ancient Roman trading hub and resort in a ceaseless hail of tiny volcanic rocks.

Many residents ran for their lives, trying to find safety with their loved ones before searing volcanic debris buried the estimated 1,500 residents who remained in Pompeii.

In a study published last month in the journal Scavi di Pompei, scientists documented events at one home in the doomed city where a family sought refuge inside a back room by pushing a wooden bed against a door in a vain attempt to stop a flood of volcanic rocks from the sky, known as lapilli.

The small-but-well-appointed residence is known as the House of Helle and Phrixus, after a richly decorated fresco in the dining room. It depicts the mythological siblings Phrixus and Helle escaping their wicked stepmother on a winged ram only to have Helle fall and, ominously, drown in the sea below.

As with many ancient Roman residences, its atrium, an open-roof room centrally located in the home, was used for ventilation and rainwater collection. But on that day, the recess allowed volcanic rock to more rapidly overtake the space. Most Pompeians “had no clue what was happening,” said Gabriel Zuchtriegel, an author of the study and the director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii. “Many thought the end of the world had come,” he added.

In the years that followed, the hot ash that eventually buried the home solidified and left an imprint that archaeologists filled with plaster to reconstruct the shape of the wooden bed that remained. The technique helps illustrate the horror of the Pompeian dead in their final moments and how perishable everyday items made of wood, textiles and leather were situated in their environments.