POSITION OF POMPEII; ITS GENERAL APPEARANCE, ROADS, WALLS, GATES, STREETS, ETC

POMPEII is situated on an isolated hill, or plateau, which rises in the plain at the southern foot of Mount Vesuvius. This hill, which is sufficiently marked in form, though of moderate size, must have been produced by a stream of lava thrown up by Vesuvius centuries before the foundation of the city, and in a period too remote for memory or record. On the western side of the town, or that facing the sea, the ascent is so abrupt and sudden as almost to resemble a cliff; whence some writers have been led to conclude that its walls on this side were originally washed by the sea. In support of this opinion it has been said that shells and sea sand have been found by digging on the side adjoining the coast; and it is even asserted that rings have been found close to the ruins, intended, as is supposed, for the mooring of vessels. The authority of Strabo, in a passage before quoted, has been adduced to confirm this view; but his words serve at least equally to prove that the trade of the place was carried on by the river Sarnus, which runs past it a little to the south. If so, however, this stream has shrunk among the other physical changes which have occurred in the country; for it is now nothing more than a rivulet, entirely unsuited to any purposes of trade.

Pompeii at present stands about a mile from the sea, and very strong arguments have been adduced to prove that it must have been at the same distance in ancient times. The writers who hold this opinion consider that the beds of shells and the rings said to have been found prove nothing. The shells may have existed there long before the foundation of Pompeii; and that the rings asserted to have been found, of which there are no longer any traces, served for the Mooring of vessels, is a mere conjecture. On the other hand it is affirmed that graves have been found where the harbour Must have existed; and Overbeck, one of the latest writers on the subject, says that he has not only found remains of ancient buildings several hundred paces on the other side of the railway to the south of Pompeii, but also that there exist, about half a mile south-west of it, at the mill near the bridge over the Sarno and the mouth of the canal which runs to Torre Annunziata, some very considerable remains of ancient foundations, cisterns, and amphorae, built into the walls; nay, that these are even buried under white lapilli, or pumice stones, such as could have been thrown out only by the eruption of Vesuvius in A.D. 79. Nor can it be said, that if the ground had the present configuration when Pompeii was founded, the city would have been built by preference closer to the sea. The hill was chosen as a stronger situation, as a city beneath it would have been commanded by any inimical force that might have occupied it. Another argument may be adduced from the circumstance that Herculaneum, to the north of Pompeii, and Stabi (Castellamare), to the south, which were overwhelmed by the same eruption, still lie on the margin of the sea, showing that on both sides of Pompeii no alteration in the coast-line was produced by that catastrophe.

The situation of Pompeii appears to have possessed all local advantages that the most refined taste could desire. Upon the verge of the sea, at the entrance of a fertile plain, on the bank of a navigable river, it united the conveniences of a commercial town with the security of a military station the romantic beauty of a spot celebrated in all ages for its pre-eminent loveliness. Its environs, even to the heights of Vesuvius, were covered with villas, and the coast, all the way to Naples, was so ornamented with gardens and villages, that the shores of the whole gulf appeared as one city; while the prodigious concourse of strangers who came here in search of health and recreation added new charms and life to the scene. But these advantages were dearly purchased. An enemy, at that time unknown, was silently working its destruction an enemy which, from time to time, still desolates the modern towns which stand upon the buried and long-forgotten cities of antiquity.

The chief approach to Pompeii was on the north-west by the Via Domitiana, a branch of the great Appian Way, which, turning off at Sinuessa, ran along the coast from Naples, through Oplontis, Retina, and Herculaneum, entering Pompeii by the gate named after the latter city. A second road, issuing from the Gate of Nola, joined the Popilian Way at that place; while a third, from the Gate of Stabi , divided into two branches, one of which ran to the town of the same name, while the other led to Nuceria. These seem to have been the chief approaches, though of course there were roads leading to all the other gates.

The city was anciently surrounded with walls, of which the greater portion has been traced. Its general figure, as defined by them, is something like that of an egg, whose apex is at the amphitheatre. Its circuit is nearly two miles, the greatest length little more than three quarters of a mile, and the breadth less than half a mile. Even Arrius Diomedes, who lived at the extremity of the suburb, would only have had about six hundred yards to walk to the Forum for his business, and less than a mile to the amphitheatre for his pleasure. The area of the city is about one hundred and sixty-one acres; the excavated part, which lies on the western side, is rather more than a third of the whole, and has been one hundred and eighteen years in excavating; so that new discoveries may still await our great-grandsons.

The course of the walls has been traced and ascertained by excavation. From the Gate of Herculaneum they proceeded in an easterly direction to the amphitheatre, and thence along the south side of the city to the quarter of the theatres; but from this point, and along all the western side, they have been pulled down since ancient times, and their place has been occupied on the west by the large three-storied houses built in terrace fashion on the steep declivity of the hill. For the greater part of their circuit the walls are curvilinear, avoiding all sharp angles as much as possible, in accordance with the principle of fortification laid down by Vitruvius, that it is desirable to avoid sharp angles, as offering more Protection to the besiegers than to the besieged. On many of the stones certain characters have been found, intended, apparently, as directions to the workmen, which are said by M. Mazois to be either Oscan or the most ancient forms of the Greek alphabet; whence some authorities have drawn the conclusion that the walls must be referred to a period antecedent to the Etruscan occupation of this part of Italy, and that they may probably be Pelasgic. Other writers again are of opinion that there are no grounds for referring them to so remote an age. They allow, indeed, that they must be of very considerable antiquity, and built in the times of Oscan independence, though they deny that the marks on the stones before alluded to bear any resemblance to the Oscan alphabet, and consider them to have been mere arbitrary marks of the stone-masons. It should be observed, however, that the towers and some parts of the walls are of a much later age than the remainder. These, which are probably repairs of the damage inflicted by Sulla in the Social War, consist of what is called opus incertum; that is, stones, mostly tufo or lava, broken into small pieces, cemented with mortar, and covered with a coating of stucco, so as to resemble the primitive walls; as may still be observed in some places.

With the exception of these restored parts, the structure of the walls is similar throughout, and consists of large well hewn pieces of stone in the lower courses Travertine, in the upper Piperino. They are fitted together without mortar, and join one another vertically in a somewhat oblique direction, so that the surface of each stone is usually a rhomboid or trapezium.

Within this external wall, with towers at intervals, the usual defence of the most ancient Italian cities, there was thrown up an agger, or earthen mound, which Vitruvius considered, when properly combined with masonry, proof against the battering-ram, or mining, or any known method of assault. His directions for constructing it are as follows. A ditch is to be dug as large and deep as possible, the sides perpendicular and walled. The earth is heaped up on the inside, and supported both within and without by walls strong enough to bear its thrust, bonded together, for further security, by internal cross walls, between which the excavated material must be firmly rammed down, that it may still offer substantial resistance, even when the external masonry has been ruined. A considerable breadth is to be allowed for this raised platform, so that cohorts may have room to fight along its whole extent, as if ranged for battle. The walls Of Pompeii answer this description; but there is no outer ditch, and it is doubtful whether one ever existed, or whether it was filled up in later times. This construction, however, does not extend to the south side of the city, which was less exposed to the attack of military engines, and therefore required less strength. On the north and north-east, the ramparts of Pompeii, as shown in the annexed cut, consisted of an earthen terrace (B) fourteen feet wide, walled and counter walled, which was ascended from the city by flights of steps (e), broad enough for several men abreast. The external face (A), including the parapet, was about twenty-five feet high; the inner wall was raised some feet higher. The external wall is inclined slightly towards the city; the lower courses, instead of being inclined, are set slightly back, one behind another. The style of masonry we have already described.

Restored section of the walls and agger of Pompeii.

Both walls were capped with battlements, so that from the country there was an appearance of a double line of defence, but the interior was useless except to give a more formidable aspect to the fortifications. These battlements were ingeniously contrived to defend the soldiers, who could throw their missiles through the embrasure in comparative safety, being protected by a return or shoulder of the battlement projecting inward. The towers, as we have said, are of less ancient date.