Andrew Wallace-Hadrill

Few sources reveal the life of the ancient Romans as vividly as do the houses preserved by the eruption of Vesuvius. Wealthy Romans lavished resources on shaping their surroundings to impress their crowds of visitors. The fashions they set were taken up and imitated by ordinary citizens. In this illustrated book, Andrew Wallace-Hadrill explores the rich potential of the houses of Pompeii and Herculaneum to offer new insights into Roman social life. Exposing misconceptions derived from contemporary culture, he shows the close interconnection of spheres we take as discrete: public and private, family and outsiders, work and leisure. Combining archaeological evidence with Roman texts and comparative material from other cultures, Wallace-Hadrill raises a range of new questions. How did the organization of space and the use of decoration help to structure social encounters between owner and visitor, man and woman, master and slave? What sort of "households" did the inhabitants of the Roman house form? How did the world of work relate to that of entertainment and leisure? How widely did the luxuries of the rich spread among the houses of craftsmen and shopkeepers? Through analysis of the remains of over two hundred houses, Wallace-Hadrill reveals the remarkably dynamic social environment of early imperial Italy, and the vital part that houses came to play in defining what it meant to live as a Roman.

In ad 79, the volcano Vesuvius erupted, burying the cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum under ash and rock, and leaving them remarkably well preserved for centuries. While Pompeii has been extensively written about and popularized, the remains of its sister city, a smaller yet wealthier community close to the sea, are less widely known, but they have yielded spectacular archaeological evidence. Herculaneum is based on the latest excavation work and incorporates much new material that has revolutionized our understanding of the site. The book draws on a decade’s work with the Herculaneum Conservation Project which has begun to reverse the neglect of previous years which had reduced this extraordinary site to a critical condition. Illustrated with more than 300 newly taken colour photographs and archive illustrations, plus eight spectacular 360-degree panoramas, it is the definitive overview of what we know and understand about Herculaneum, of what is still unknown and mysterious, and of the potential for future discoveries in both archaeological and political contexts.