Volcanic ash rained down, followed by a fiery flood of pyroclastic rock and toxic gas; the noonday was cast into darkness. Where only moments before a normal August afternoon had been underway, now lay mayhem and devastation.

The opulent villas, commoners’ homes and shops, bakeries, artisan laboratories, food vendors’ stalls …all were buried under a suffocating layer of volcanic hell along with the citizens who occupied them. Forgotten until its rediscovery 1,700 years later, Pompeii is now the world’s most recognized and visited archeological site.