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Speaker 1: Soon afterwards, the cloud began to descend and cover the sea.

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Speaker 1: It had already surrounded and concealed the island of Capri

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Speaker 1: and the promontory of mycene Him. My mother begged me

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Speaker 1: to leave her and escape as best I could, but

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Speaker 1: I absolutely refused, taking her by the hand and making

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Speaker 1: her to hurry along with me. Ash was already falling

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Speaker 1: by now, though in no great quantity. Then I turned

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Speaker 1: and saw a thick black cloud advancing over the land

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Speaker 1: behind us like a flood. Let us leave the road

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Speaker 1: while we can still see, I said, But we will

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Speaker 1: be knocked down and trampled by the crowd. We had

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Speaker 1: scarcely sat down when darkness came upon us. Not such

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Speaker 1: as we have when the sky is cloudy or when

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Speaker 1: there is no moon, but that of a room when

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Speaker 1: it is shut up and all the lamps put out

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Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff to blow your mind. A production of

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Speaker 1: I Heart Radios has to work. Hey, welcome to stuff

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Speaker 1: to blow your mind. My name is Robert Lamp and

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Speaker 1: I'm Joe McCormick. And if you know your ancient Roman literature,

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Speaker 1: you might have guessed from that opening that today we're

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Speaker 1: gonna be talking about the great eruption of Mount Vesuvius. Uh.

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Speaker 1: This is something that I've wanted to do an episode

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Speaker 1: on for a long time, mainly because I love some

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Speaker 1: of the ancient Roman original documents that we're going to

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Speaker 1: be reading from today that they are like so crisp

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Speaker 1: as a descriptive source of this ancient catastrophe that happened

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Speaker 1: in the year seventy nine. Yeah, this is a This

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Speaker 1: is a topic I'm excited to get into as well

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Speaker 1: because I definitely have strong childhood memories of of course

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Speaker 1: being fascinated with volcanoes. Volcanoes along with dinosaurs are just

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Speaker 1: part of being a child. But then also I remember

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Speaker 1: having a national copy of National Geographic that had all

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Speaker 1: these beautiful, haunting photographs of the remnants of Pompeii, Uh,

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Speaker 1: the the victims of Vesuvius. Yeah, it's funny you should

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Speaker 1: bring up dinosaurs, because I think this was sort of

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Speaker 1: in the back of my mind and I hadn't brought

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Speaker 1: it to the front until you said that there's a

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Speaker 1: weird way that in a lot of the paleo art

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Speaker 1: that I grew up with as a child. I think

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Speaker 1: we've actually mentioned this on the show before, that dinosaurs

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Speaker 1: are often depicted with volcanoes currently erupting in the background.

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Speaker 1: Do you know what I'm talking about? Yes, absolutely, you

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Speaker 1: see it all the time. And the thing is, sometimes

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Speaker 1: I feel like the artists, the paleo artist in question,

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Speaker 1: is definitely trying to get something across, like this is

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Speaker 1: a region in which they were volcanic eruptions, or perhaps

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Speaker 1: they're discussing the role of volcanoes, the role they may

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Speaker 1: have possibly played according to various theories regarding extinction events.

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Speaker 1: But other times I think it's this just idea of

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Speaker 1: this was this primal dangerous age in which the earth

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Speaker 1: is opening up, monsters are walking about, feasting on each other.

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Speaker 1: It's just that the world is alive with danger. I

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Speaker 1: think that's correct. But I think there's also something to

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Speaker 1: the thing you mentioned first, like the idea that volcanoes

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Speaker 1: are sometimes invoked as one of the explanatory mechanisms for

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Speaker 1: some of the extinction events that killed lots of the dinosaurs,

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Speaker 1: And because they're thought of this way, we think about

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Speaker 1: dinosaurs often, like as if we we mainly think of

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Speaker 1: them in like the last moments before they were wiped

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Speaker 1: from the face of the earth. That's like the defining

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Speaker 1: time of their existence. They're frozen and amber, uh in

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Speaker 1: the moment right before their doom. And in a strange way,

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Speaker 1: that is quite literally the case about the settlements surrounding

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Speaker 1: Mount Vesuvius. Absolutely. I mean, that's one of the things

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Speaker 1: about Pompei is it is it allows us to to

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Speaker 1: look into the path in ways that the remains of

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Speaker 1: other ancient cities do not. Yeah, it's for that reason

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Speaker 1: that at the same time that it's very grim to

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Speaker 1: look at, it's also kind of magical. Uh. So we're

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Speaker 1: gonna be talking about the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. This

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Speaker 1: this catastrophe in the year seventy nine CE that obliterated

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Speaker 1: several Roman settlements around the Bay of Naples, including the

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Speaker 1: city of Pompeii and the town of Herculaneum. And historians

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Speaker 1: studying the subject are very lucky because we actually have

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Speaker 1: access to historical documents describing the eruption of Mount Vesuvius

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Speaker 1: in seventy nine in extreme detail. Specifically, this is a

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Speaker 1: pair of letters written by the first century Roman politician

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Speaker 1: and author Plenty the Younger, who is in fact the

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Speaker 1: nephew of the great Roman author and encyclopedist Plenty the elder,

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Speaker 1: whose natural history we reference on the show all the

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Speaker 1: time for insights on what the ancient Romans thought they

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Speaker 1: knew about everything from sea monsters to the culinary virtues

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Speaker 1: of lead. That's right, I feel it. Scarcely a month

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Speaker 1: goes by that we don't reference plenty of the Elder.

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Speaker 1: So it's it's it's great and of course bitter sweet

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Speaker 1: to meet up with him again here, right, because this,

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Speaker 1: of course is the end of the story of plenty

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Speaker 1: of the Elder. He spent a lifetime collecting all of

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Speaker 1: this knowledge and pseudo knowledge about the world. But we've

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Speaker 1: never discussed before how plenty of the Elder died. It

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Speaker 1: was the mountain that killed him. So about these letters

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Speaker 1: describing the event. Sometime early in the second century CE,

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Speaker 1: I think I've seen it placed, maybe around the year

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Speaker 1: one oh four, one oh five, something like that. Around

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Speaker 1: this time, plenty Of the Younger wrote two letters to

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Speaker 1: the Roman historian Cornelius Tacitus to give his firsthand account

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Speaker 1: of the eruption and to explain the ultimate fate of

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Speaker 1: his uncle. Now, these two letters are famous for their

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Speaker 1: vivid description of the events, and so we wanted to

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Speaker 1: put you on the ground during the eruption of Vesuvius.

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Speaker 1: By reading some selections from these letters. Uh, these will

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Speaker 1: come from a couple of different England translations that you

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Speaker 1: can easily find online. I sort of made a composite

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Speaker 1: out of two different translations, trying to take some of

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Speaker 1: the best parts from each one. One is from a

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Speaker 1: book called Volcanoes of Europe from Dunedin Academic Press from

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Speaker 1: seventeen by Degal Jeram Alwyn Scarth and Jean Claude Tangai.

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Speaker 1: And then there's another widely used English translation by William Melmouth.

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Speaker 1: So those two came together to to create what you're

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Speaker 1: about to hear. Yes, these are are typically described as

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Speaker 1: the the oldest detailed accounts, detailed firsthand accounts of a

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Speaker 1: volcanic eruption. That's not to say that volcanic eruptions were

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Speaker 1: not known to to do ancient people's They were known,

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Speaker 1: um and then we have mentioned of them popping out.

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Speaker 1: There's even I read there's there's an argument that Virgils

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Speaker 1: mention of an eruption of Mount Etna in the in

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Speaker 1: Needed was actually generated via firsthand observation, But even that

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Speaker 1: would not be the level of detail that we're discussing here, right,

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Speaker 1: I have not found any evidence of a description of

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Speaker 1: a volcanic eruption in in literary history older than Plenty's

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Speaker 1: description here that contains nearly anywhere close to the amount

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Speaker 1: of detail we get right, certainly nothing that has survived,

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Speaker 1: and probably because a lot of the people who might

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Speaker 1: have been in a position to write such an account

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Speaker 1: themselves did not survive. Uh So, Plenty the Younger begins

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Speaker 1: his first letter by praising Tacitus's skills as a writer

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Speaker 1: of history and talking about his uncle, Plenty of the Elder,

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Speaker 1: and he he says, basically, you know, my uncle died

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Speaker 1: in a misfortune, but there's a chance to redeem his legacy,

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Speaker 1: because if you put him in your in your history,

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Speaker 1: if his name becomes associated with the eruption of Vesuvius,

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Speaker 1: it will render his name immortal. Uh So, I'm going

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Speaker 1: to pick up after that section of of introduction and

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Speaker 1: just read from Plenty's account within his first letter. At

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Speaker 1: the time of the great eruption, my uncle Plenty was

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Speaker 1: with the fleet under his command at mycene him on

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Speaker 1: the August about one in the afternoon. My mother desired

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Speaker 1: him to observe a cloud which appeared of a very

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Speaker 1: unusual size and shape. He had just taken a turn

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Speaker 1: in the sun, and after bathing himself in cold water

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Speaker 1: and making a light luncheon, he had gone back to

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Speaker 1: his books. He immediately arose and went out upon a promontory,

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Speaker 1: from whence he might get a better site of this

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Speaker 1: very uncommon appearance. From that distance, it was not clear

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Speaker 1: from which mountain the cloud was rising, although it was

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Speaker 1: found afterwards to be vesuvious. The cloud could best be

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Speaker 1: described as more like an umbrella pine than any other tree,

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Speaker 1: for it rose high up like a trunk, and then

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Speaker 1: divided into branches. I imagined that this was because it

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Speaker 1: was thrust up by the initial blast until its power weakened,

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Speaker 1: and it was left unsupported and spread out sideways under

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Speaker 1: its own weight. Sometimes it looked light colored, sometimes it

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Speaker 1: looked modeled and dirty, with the earth and cinders it

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Speaker 1: had carried up. This phenomenon seemed to a man of

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Speaker 1: such learning and research as my uncle, extraordinary and worth

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Speaker 1: further looking into. He ordered a light vessel to be

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Speaker 1: got ready and gave me leave if I liked it

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Speaker 1: to accompany him. I said, I had rather go on

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Speaker 1: with my work, and it so happened. He had himself

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Speaker 1: given me something to ride out. As he was coming

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Speaker 1: out of the house, he received a note from Retina,

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Speaker 1: the wife of Tascus, who was in the utmost alarm

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Speaker 1: at the immediate danger which threatened her for her villa.

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Speaker 1: Lying at the foot of Mount Vesuvius. There was no

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Speaker 1: way of escape but by boat. She was terrified by

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Speaker 1: the threatening danger and begged him to rescue her. He's

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Speaker 1: changed his plan at once, and what he had started

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Speaker 1: in a spirit of scientific curiosity, he ended as a hero.

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Speaker 1: You know. At this point I always stopped and I wonder, like,

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Speaker 1: how did he get the note? I imagine it must

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Speaker 1: have come to him across the water, right that maybe

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Speaker 1: in a smaller boat she was able to send a

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Speaker 1: noe doubt and to ask him to come back with

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Speaker 1: larger boats that she and her family could escape on.

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Speaker 1: I imagine, I mean, the only ways it would be

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Speaker 1: that or by some manner of bird. Yeah, as long

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Speaker 1: as we're interjecting, I want to remind everyone here that

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Speaker 1: that Plenty of the Elder would have been about fifty

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Speaker 1: six years old at this point. If you're trying to

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Speaker 1: picture him in your head, and perhaps cast Um an

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Speaker 1: actor in the role. Yes, and the younger Plenty also

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Speaker 1: says of his uncle that he was that he was

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Speaker 1: like brave and stout, But he he also says, he

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Speaker 1: was a quite corpulent man, so like he wasn't necessarily,

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Speaker 1: you know, fit as a fiddle to be running out

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Speaker 1: into danger. But anyway, to go back to the account,

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Speaker 1: uh Plenty continues, he ordered the galleys to be put

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Speaker 1: to sea, and he went himself on board with an

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Speaker 1: intention of assisting not only Rectina, but the several other

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Speaker 1: towns which lay thickly strewn along that beautiful coast, hastening

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Speaker 1: then to the place from whence others fled with the

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Speaker 1: utmost terror. He steered his course direct to the point

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Speaker 1: of danger, and so much calmness and presence of mind

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Speaker 1: as to be able to make and dictate his observations

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Speaker 1: upon the motion and all the phenomena of that dreadful scene.

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Speaker 1: So he's taken notes as he goes. He was now

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Speaker 1: so close to the mountain that the cinders, which grew

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Speaker 1: thicker and hotter the nearer he approached, fell into the ships,

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Speaker 1: together with pumice stones and black pieces of burning rocks

200
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Speaker 1: shattered by the fire. They were in danger too, not

201
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Speaker 1: only of being a ground by the sudden retreat of

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Speaker 1: the sea, but also from the vast fragments which rolled

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Speaker 1: down from the mountain and obstructed all the shore. Can

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Speaker 1: you imagine that being out on a boat and so

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Speaker 1: like the sea is first of all pulling away from

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Speaker 1: the shore as you're trying to get into the shore

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Speaker 1: to rescue people from the villas along the shoreline, So

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Speaker 1: the seas retreating, and then also stuff from the mountain

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Speaker 1: is now coming down and making its way into the water, right,

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Speaker 1: I mean, it must have been like approaching a shore

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Speaker 1: upon which there was a battle. Only instead of two

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Speaker 1: human force is engaged in battle, it is a battle

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Speaker 1: between civilization and the elements of the earth itself. Unreal.

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Speaker 1: He continues. Here he stopped to consider whether he should

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Speaker 1: turn back, for the pilot was advising retreat. Fortune favors

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Speaker 1: the brave, he said, Steer to where Pomponius is from.

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Speaker 1: Ponianus lived at Testavia, a town across the Bay of Naples,

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Speaker 1: which was not yet in danger, but would be threatened

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Speaker 1: if the eruption spread. Pomponianus had already put his belongings

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Speaker 1: into a boat to escape as soon as the contrary

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Speaker 1: onshore wind changed, The wind, of course, was fully in

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Speaker 1: my uncle's favor, and quickly brought his boat to Stabia.

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Speaker 1: My uncle calmed and encouraged his terrified friend the more

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Speaker 1: effectually to soothe his fears by seeming unconcerned himself. He

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Speaker 1: ordered the drawing of a hot bath, and then, after

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Speaker 1: having bathed, sat down to supper with great cheerfulness, or

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Speaker 1: at least with every appearance of it, which is just

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Speaker 1: as brave. Is that? Just as I guess? So, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: if you're like trying to calm other people even though

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Speaker 1: you are yourself scared, Yeah, I mean, if there's only

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Speaker 1: so much you can do, calmness is going to help

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Speaker 1: and help to maintain a a proper retreat. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I guess to a certain extent one could again apply

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Speaker 1: to military metaphor here, you know, and the military backgrounds

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Speaker 1: of individuals involved. Yeah, So I guess what they're saying

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Speaker 1: here is that he's stuck at the house until the

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Speaker 1: winds change and they can get out by water, and

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Speaker 1: trying to encourage people not to panic while they're while

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Speaker 1: they're there, so plenty continues. Meanwhile, tall broad flames blazed

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Speaker 1: from several places on Vesuvious and glared out through the

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Speaker 1: darkness of the night. But my uncle, in order to

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00:13:42,160 --> 00:13:45,120
Speaker 1: soothe the apprehensions of his friend, assured him it was

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Speaker 1: only the burning of the villages which the country people

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Speaker 1: had abandoned to the flames. After this he retired to rest,

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Speaker 1: and it is most certain that he was so little

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Speaker 1: disquieted as to fall into a sound sleep, for his breathing,

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Speaker 1: which on account of his corpulence, was rather heavy and sonorous,

248
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Speaker 1: was heard by the attendants outside his door. But eventually

249
00:14:05,520 --> 00:14:09,040
Speaker 1: the courtyard outside began to fill with so much ash

250
00:14:09,120 --> 00:14:11,680
Speaker 1: and pummice that if he had stayed in his room,

251
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Speaker 1: he would never have been able to get out. So

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Speaker 1: he was awakened, and he went to Pompony Inis and

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Speaker 1: the rest of the company, who had stayed up all

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Speaker 1: night and were feeling too anxious to think of going

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Speaker 1: to bed. They consulted together whether it would be most

256
00:14:25,240 --> 00:14:28,920
Speaker 1: prudent to trust to the houses, which now rocked from

257
00:14:28,960 --> 00:14:32,320
Speaker 1: side to side with frequent and violent concussions, as though

258
00:14:32,400 --> 00:14:36,160
Speaker 1: shaken from their very foundations, or fly to the open fields,

259
00:14:36,200 --> 00:14:39,920
Speaker 1: where the stones and cinders, though light and porous, fell

260
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Speaker 1: in large showers and threatened destruction. In this choice of dangers,

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00:14:44,320 --> 00:14:47,600
Speaker 1: they resolved for the fields, a resolution which, while the

262
00:14:47,600 --> 00:14:50,560
Speaker 1: rest of the company were hurried into by their fears,

263
00:14:50,760 --> 00:14:54,840
Speaker 1: my uncle embraced upon cool and deliberate consideration. They went

264
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Speaker 1: out then having pillows tied upon their heads with napkins,

265
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Speaker 1: for this was their whole defense against the storm of

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Speaker 1: stones that fell around them. And I have to admit

267
00:15:04,280 --> 00:15:07,040
Speaker 1: that is that is a slightly comical mental image. Yes,

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00:15:07,080 --> 00:15:08,880
Speaker 1: it is put in your head. Well it's it's like

269
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Speaker 1: both at the same time. It's like funny, but it's

270
00:15:11,160 --> 00:15:14,720
Speaker 1: also so grim and so real, Like you can imagine like, Okay,

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Speaker 1: so the house you're you're afraid the house is going

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Speaker 1: to collapse. You've got to get away from the house.

273
00:15:19,120 --> 00:15:22,160
Speaker 1: But outside the house, stuff is, rocks are falling from

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Speaker 1: the sky. So what do you do? You know, like

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Speaker 1: it's not safe to be under a roof. So like

276
00:15:26,440 --> 00:15:30,440
Speaker 1: they literally were like, okay, we've got to improvise helmets, right, yeah,

277
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Speaker 1: So yeah, I agree, it is it is both a

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Speaker 1: little bit comic but also terrifying. I mean, this whole

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00:15:35,000 --> 00:15:38,200
Speaker 1: situation is terrifying. And I think one thing to keep

280
00:15:38,200 --> 00:15:40,480
Speaker 1: in mind too, is we read this account is again

281
00:15:40,560 --> 00:15:44,600
Speaker 1: thinking about to what extent Plenty is trying to manage

282
00:15:45,200 --> 00:15:49,160
Speaker 1: evacuation and to to to manage their response, a calm

283
00:15:49,240 --> 00:15:53,120
Speaker 1: response to this catastrophe that's taking place, because that is

284
00:15:53,120 --> 00:15:55,440
Speaker 1: going to be vital not only did this scenario, but

285
00:15:55,560 --> 00:16:01,280
Speaker 1: to other scenarios and even future scenarios regarding the clash

286
00:16:01,320 --> 00:16:05,080
Speaker 1: of human civilization and volcanic activity. Yes. Uh, And you

287
00:16:05,120 --> 00:16:07,680
Speaker 1: say he's having to manage in evacuation, he's not only

288
00:16:07,720 --> 00:16:10,440
Speaker 1: having to do that, he's having to improvise management of

289
00:16:10,480 --> 00:16:13,280
Speaker 1: an evacuation because they don't know what the best practices are.

290
00:16:13,960 --> 00:16:16,440
Speaker 1: So anyway goes on to the conclusion of the letter here.

291
00:16:16,880 --> 00:16:19,160
Speaker 1: So they've gone out with the pillows tied to their heads,

292
00:16:19,160 --> 00:16:21,480
Speaker 1: and then Plenty of the younger says it was now

293
00:16:21,640 --> 00:16:25,240
Speaker 1: daylight everywhere else, but they're a deeper darkness prevailed than

294
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Speaker 1: in the thickest night, and they were forced to light

295
00:16:27,920 --> 00:16:30,920
Speaker 1: their torches and lamps. My uncle went down to the

296
00:16:30,960 --> 00:16:33,080
Speaker 1: shore to see if there was any chance of escape

297
00:16:33,080 --> 00:16:36,240
Speaker 1: by sea, but the waves were still far too high.

298
00:16:36,440 --> 00:16:39,560
Speaker 1: There my uncle, laying himself down upon a sail cloth

299
00:16:39,680 --> 00:16:43,000
Speaker 1: which was spread for him, called twice for some cold water,

300
00:16:43,280 --> 00:16:46,840
Speaker 1: which he drank. Then immediately the flames, preceded by a

301
00:16:46,920 --> 00:16:50,280
Speaker 1: strong whift of sulfur, dispersed the rest of the party

302
00:16:50,440 --> 00:16:53,560
Speaker 1: and obliged him to rise. He raised himself up with

303
00:16:53,600 --> 00:16:58,520
Speaker 1: the assistance of his two servants, and instantly fell down dead, suffocated,

304
00:16:58,560 --> 00:17:02,600
Speaker 1: as I conjecture, by gross and noxious vapor, having always

305
00:17:02,680 --> 00:17:06,080
Speaker 1: had a weak throat which was often inflamed as soon

306
00:17:06,119 --> 00:17:08,040
Speaker 1: as it was light again, which was not till the

307
00:17:08,119 --> 00:17:11,760
Speaker 1: third day after this melancholy accident. His body was found

308
00:17:11,960 --> 00:17:15,080
Speaker 1: entire and without any marks of violence upon it, in

309
00:17:15,119 --> 00:17:17,679
Speaker 1: the dress in which he fell, and looking more like

310
00:17:17,760 --> 00:17:20,840
Speaker 1: a man asleep than dead. So plenty of the elder

311
00:17:20,960 --> 00:17:23,480
Speaker 1: dies here on the shore, but not everybody in his

312
00:17:23,560 --> 00:17:25,840
Speaker 1: party does, because, of course, like the servants and friends,

313
00:17:25,840 --> 00:17:28,240
Speaker 1: are later able to report back to plenty of the

314
00:17:28,240 --> 00:17:31,520
Speaker 1: younger what happened to his uncle right, and and of

315
00:17:31,560 --> 00:17:35,160
Speaker 1: course plenty of the younger mentions his his ailing lungs

316
00:17:35,240 --> 00:17:39,360
Speaker 1: as being a possible reason that he succumbed to these fumes.

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Speaker 1: It has also been hypothesized that he could have actually

318
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Speaker 1: even though by all appearances it might have had something

319
00:17:45,560 --> 00:17:48,399
Speaker 1: to do with the fumes it also could have simply

320
00:17:48,440 --> 00:17:51,520
Speaker 1: been a stroke or heart attack. Yeah, I mean, obviously

321
00:17:51,560 --> 00:17:55,399
Speaker 1: this is a high stress, high exertion situation, um, and

322
00:17:55,680 --> 00:17:58,680
Speaker 1: he wasn't a young man anymore. But so Plenty then

323
00:17:58,760 --> 00:18:01,480
Speaker 1: ends his letter by saying he witnessed a lot of

324
00:18:01,480 --> 00:18:03,440
Speaker 1: other stuff, but he didn't include it in the letter

325
00:18:03,440 --> 00:18:06,960
Speaker 1: because Tacitus originally had only asked how his uncle had died.

326
00:18:07,400 --> 00:18:10,680
Speaker 1: And apparently Tacitus wrote back and wanted to know more.

327
00:18:10,760 --> 00:18:13,359
Speaker 1: He wanted to know details about what the younger Plenty

328
00:18:13,359 --> 00:18:16,399
Speaker 1: and his mother had encountered when they stayed behind it

329
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Speaker 1: Mycene him. And that makes for the content of the

330
00:18:19,400 --> 00:18:21,560
Speaker 1: second letter. So maybe we should take a break, and

331
00:18:21,600 --> 00:18:24,000
Speaker 1: then when we come back we can read from plenty

332
00:18:24,040 --> 00:18:30,760
Speaker 1: second letter about the eruption. Than alright, we're back. So

333
00:18:31,040 --> 00:18:34,560
Speaker 1: before the break we were discussing how Plenty the elder died,

334
00:18:34,960 --> 00:18:37,439
Speaker 1: and now we are essentially going to explore how Plenty

335
00:18:37,440 --> 00:18:40,639
Speaker 1: of the younger lived. Yes, so now remember in the

336
00:18:40,680 --> 00:18:43,280
Speaker 1: first letter, Plenty of the younger and his mother stayed

337
00:18:43,320 --> 00:18:45,919
Speaker 1: behind at Mycene him while the elder took the fleet

338
00:18:45,960 --> 00:18:48,440
Speaker 1: out to help people who were further along the shore.

339
00:18:49,119 --> 00:18:51,920
Speaker 1: And so plenty picks up his narrative like this. He says,

340
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Speaker 1: after my uncle left us, I studied, dined, and went

341
00:18:55,680 --> 00:18:58,800
Speaker 1: to bed, but slept only fitfully. We had had earth

342
00:18:58,840 --> 00:19:02,160
Speaker 1: tremors for several days, which were not especially alarming because

343
00:19:02,200 --> 00:19:05,560
Speaker 1: they happened so often in Campania. But that night they

344
00:19:05,560 --> 00:19:08,000
Speaker 1: were so violent that everything felt as if it were

345
00:19:08,000 --> 00:19:11,320
Speaker 1: being shaken and turned over. My mother came hurrying to

346
00:19:11,400 --> 00:19:14,080
Speaker 1: my room, and we sat together in the forecourt facing

347
00:19:14,080 --> 00:19:16,760
Speaker 1: the sea. As I was at that time but eighteen

348
00:19:16,840 --> 00:19:19,240
Speaker 1: years of age. I know not whether I should call

349
00:19:19,320 --> 00:19:23,359
Speaker 1: my behavior in this dangerous juncture courage or folly. But

350
00:19:23,440 --> 00:19:26,760
Speaker 1: I looked up to Livy and amused myself with turning

351
00:19:26,840 --> 00:19:30,680
Speaker 1: over that author and even making extracts from him, as

352
00:19:30,680 --> 00:19:33,800
Speaker 1: if I had been perfectly at my leisure. Though it

353
00:19:33,880 --> 00:19:37,280
Speaker 1: was now morning, the light was still exceedingly faint and doubtful,

354
00:19:37,560 --> 00:19:41,080
Speaker 1: The buildings around were already tottering, and we would have

355
00:19:41,160 --> 00:19:44,040
Speaker 1: been in danger in our confined space if our house

356
00:19:44,080 --> 00:19:47,040
Speaker 1: had fallen down. This made us decide to leave town.

357
00:19:47,480 --> 00:19:50,480
Speaker 1: We were chased after by a panic stricken crowd that

358
00:19:50,640 --> 00:19:54,200
Speaker 1: chose to follow someone else's judgment rather than decide anything

359
00:19:54,240 --> 00:19:57,600
Speaker 1: for themselves. I love that detail that he's like he's

360
00:19:57,640 --> 00:19:59,679
Speaker 1: trying to act like he's not afraid, so he's just

361
00:19:59,720 --> 00:20:01,960
Speaker 1: going on with his studies. Is like, I'll just keep

362
00:20:01,960 --> 00:20:05,720
Speaker 1: reading Livy and make some notes. And then again this

363
00:20:05,800 --> 00:20:07,840
Speaker 1: is terrifying scene of like every no one knows what

364
00:20:07,960 --> 00:20:10,159
Speaker 1: to do, and so like, of course they're going to

365
00:20:10,240 --> 00:20:14,800
Speaker 1: follow uh cliny here, just like like somebody who looks

366
00:20:14,840 --> 00:20:17,120
Speaker 1: like they know what needs to be done, it knows

367
00:20:17,520 --> 00:20:19,399
Speaker 1: no where they need to go. They're going to fall

368
00:20:19,480 --> 00:20:22,080
Speaker 1: in behind them. We Also, he was the of a

369
00:20:22,200 --> 00:20:25,040
Speaker 1: family of military command, so his uncle would have been

370
00:20:25,080 --> 00:20:27,200
Speaker 1: known as the commander of the fleet there at the bay.

371
00:20:27,760 --> 00:20:31,000
Speaker 1: So I think if the relatives of the commanders suddenly

372
00:20:31,000 --> 00:20:33,439
Speaker 1: start leaving town, everybody is going to see that and

373
00:20:33,480 --> 00:20:35,680
Speaker 1: be like, we probably need to get out to Yeah,

374
00:20:35,880 --> 00:20:38,800
Speaker 1: I would. I would say, you know, the comeback here

375
00:20:38,800 --> 00:20:41,359
Speaker 1: would be of course we're following you and not thinking

376
00:20:41,359 --> 00:20:45,040
Speaker 1: for ourselves. You're the military, like you're you're a are

377
00:20:45,440 --> 00:20:47,280
Speaker 1: you're the one to follow you. We're not going to

378
00:20:47,320 --> 00:20:50,000
Speaker 1: trust your own judgment here you are the Navy. But again,

379
00:20:50,200 --> 00:20:51,840
Speaker 1: this would not have been a time when people had

380
00:20:51,880 --> 00:20:54,399
Speaker 1: like a list of safety procedures they could look up

381
00:20:54,400 --> 00:20:57,400
Speaker 1: for a volcanic eruption. I mean you, you have no precedent,

382
00:20:57,440 --> 00:20:59,359
Speaker 1: You have no idea what to do, right, because as

383
00:20:59,400 --> 00:21:02,600
Speaker 1: will as we'll discuss as we get into this topic more.

384
00:21:03,240 --> 00:21:06,919
Speaker 1: This volcano had not erupted in quite a while. It

385
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:09,920
Speaker 1: had at the very least been centuries. Yeah. Now Plenty

386
00:21:09,960 --> 00:21:12,159
Speaker 1: picks up of this narrative. He says, being at a

387
00:21:12,200 --> 00:21:15,639
Speaker 1: convenient distance from the houses, we stood still in the

388
00:21:15,640 --> 00:21:19,200
Speaker 1: midst of a most dangerous and dreadful scene. The carriages

389
00:21:19,280 --> 00:21:22,600
Speaker 1: we had ordered began to lurch to and fro, although

390
00:21:22,640 --> 00:21:25,679
Speaker 1: the ground was flat, and we could not keep them still,

391
00:21:25,760 --> 00:21:29,359
Speaker 1: even when we wedged their wheels with stones. Then we

392
00:21:29,440 --> 00:21:33,240
Speaker 1: saw the sea sucked back, apparently by a convulsion of

393
00:21:33,280 --> 00:21:36,439
Speaker 1: the earth, and many sea creatures were left stranded on

394
00:21:36,480 --> 00:21:39,960
Speaker 1: the dry sand. From the other direction, over the land,

395
00:21:40,200 --> 00:21:44,000
Speaker 1: a dreadful black cloud was torn by gushing flames and

396
00:21:44,119 --> 00:21:48,840
Speaker 1: great tongues of fire, like much magnified lightning. Soon afterwards,

397
00:21:48,880 --> 00:21:52,000
Speaker 1: the cloud began to descend and cover the sea it

398
00:21:52,040 --> 00:21:55,480
Speaker 1: had already surrounded and concealed the island of Capri and

399
00:21:55,560 --> 00:21:58,840
Speaker 1: the promontory of my Sine Him, my mother begged me

400
00:21:58,880 --> 00:22:00,879
Speaker 1: to leave her and escape as best I could, but

401
00:22:00,920 --> 00:22:04,679
Speaker 1: I absolutely refused, taking her by the hand and making

402
00:22:04,720 --> 00:22:08,080
Speaker 1: her to hurry along with me. Ash was already falling

403
00:22:08,119 --> 00:22:11,280
Speaker 1: by now, though in no great quantity. Then I turned

404
00:22:11,320 --> 00:22:14,200
Speaker 1: and saw a thick black cloud advancing over the land

405
00:22:14,200 --> 00:22:17,000
Speaker 1: behind us like a flood. Let us leave the road

406
00:22:17,040 --> 00:22:19,479
Speaker 1: while we still can see, I said, or we will

407
00:22:19,520 --> 00:22:22,119
Speaker 1: be knocked down and trampled by the crowd. We had

408
00:22:22,160 --> 00:22:25,399
Speaker 1: scarcely sat down when darkness came upon us, Not such

409
00:22:25,440 --> 00:22:27,880
Speaker 1: as we have when the sky is cloudy or when

410
00:22:27,920 --> 00:22:30,200
Speaker 1: there is no moon, but that of a room when

411
00:22:30,240 --> 00:22:32,959
Speaker 1: it is shut up and all the lamps put out.

412
00:22:33,359 --> 00:22:36,360
Speaker 1: Can you imagine that? So this is daytime now, but

413
00:22:36,560 --> 00:22:38,679
Speaker 1: the it is not only dark like a night, it

414
00:22:38,800 --> 00:22:41,800
Speaker 1: is darker than night. Yeah, this is this is the

415
00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:45,199
Speaker 1: darkness at noon type situation exactly. So he goes on

416
00:22:45,280 --> 00:22:48,159
Speaker 1: to describe the terror of the scene. He says, you

417
00:22:48,240 --> 00:22:51,240
Speaker 1: might hear the shrieks of women, the screams of children,

418
00:22:51,240 --> 00:22:54,200
Speaker 1: and the shouts of men, some calling for their children,

419
00:22:54,280 --> 00:22:57,600
Speaker 1: others for their parents, others for their husbands, and seeking

420
00:22:57,640 --> 00:23:00,280
Speaker 1: to recognize each other by the voices that were led.

421
00:23:00,760 --> 00:23:04,000
Speaker 1: One lamenting his own fate, another that of his family,

422
00:23:04,400 --> 00:23:07,760
Speaker 1: Some praying to die from the very fear of dying,

423
00:23:08,320 --> 00:23:11,080
Speaker 1: some lifting their hands to the gods. But the greater

424
00:23:11,119 --> 00:23:14,240
Speaker 1: part convinced that there were now no gods at all,

425
00:23:14,560 --> 00:23:17,000
Speaker 1: and that the final, endless night of which we had

426
00:23:17,080 --> 00:23:20,320
Speaker 1: heard had come upon the world. Among these there were

427
00:23:20,400 --> 00:23:24,119
Speaker 1: some who augmented the real terrors by others imaginary or

428
00:23:24,160 --> 00:23:27,720
Speaker 1: willfully invented. I remember some who declared that one part

429
00:23:27,720 --> 00:23:30,600
Speaker 1: of my snum had fallen, that another was on fire.

430
00:23:31,040 --> 00:23:34,159
Speaker 1: It was false, but they found people to believe them.

431
00:23:34,240 --> 00:23:39,159
Speaker 1: So just chaos is reigning, misinformation is flying. The world

432
00:23:39,280 --> 00:23:42,520
Speaker 1: is dark and full of terror. The day is dark

433
00:23:42,560 --> 00:23:46,960
Speaker 1: and full of terrors. All right, he continues, It now

434
00:23:47,040 --> 00:23:50,520
Speaker 1: grew rather lighter, which we imagined to be the forerunner

435
00:23:50,560 --> 00:23:53,159
Speaker 1: of an approaching burst of flames, as in truth it

436
00:23:53,359 --> 00:23:56,680
Speaker 1: was rather than the return of day. However, the fire

437
00:23:56,760 --> 00:23:59,680
Speaker 1: fell at a distance from us. Then again we were

438
00:23:59,680 --> 00:24:02,800
Speaker 1: inst in a thick darkness, and a heavy shower of

439
00:24:02,880 --> 00:24:06,160
Speaker 1: ashes rained upon us, which we were obliged every now

440
00:24:06,200 --> 00:24:09,520
Speaker 1: and then to stand up to shake off. Otherwise we

441
00:24:09,560 --> 00:24:12,240
Speaker 1: should have been crushed and buried in the heap. I

442
00:24:12,359 --> 00:24:15,240
Speaker 1: matt it might have boasted that during all this scene

443
00:24:15,240 --> 00:24:18,439
Speaker 1: of horror, not a sigh or expression of fear escaped me.

444
00:24:18,480 --> 00:24:21,720
Speaker 1: But in truth my support was grounded in that miserable

445
00:24:21,840 --> 00:24:25,679
Speaker 1: though mighty consolation that all mankind were involved in the

446
00:24:25,760 --> 00:24:29,800
Speaker 1: same calamity, and that I was perishing with the world itself.

447
00:24:29,840 --> 00:24:33,119
Speaker 1: That line has haunted me ever since I first read it.

448
00:24:33,160 --> 00:24:36,680
Speaker 1: That he says he's not afraid because he knew it

449
00:24:36,760 --> 00:24:39,040
Speaker 1: wasn't just him dying, it was the end of the

450
00:24:39,280 --> 00:24:43,320
Speaker 1: entire world. And finally he concludes the letters, saying, at

451
00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:47,239
Speaker 1: last the darkness paled into smoke or cloud, and the

452
00:24:47,280 --> 00:24:51,240
Speaker 1: real daylight returned, But the sun shone with a lurid light,

453
00:24:51,400 --> 00:24:55,399
Speaker 1: as during an eclipse. Every object that presented itself to

454
00:24:55,440 --> 00:24:59,119
Speaker 1: our weakened eyes seemed to change, being covered deep with

455
00:24:59,240 --> 00:25:03,080
Speaker 1: ashes as with snow. We returned to mycene Him, where

456
00:25:03,119 --> 00:25:06,240
Speaker 1: we refreshed ourselves as well as we could, and passed

457
00:25:06,280 --> 00:25:09,960
Speaker 1: an anxious night between hope and fear, though indeed with

458
00:25:10,000 --> 00:25:12,960
Speaker 1: a much larger share of the latter, for the earthquake

459
00:25:13,080 --> 00:25:17,000
Speaker 1: still continued, while many frenzied persons ran up and down,

460
00:25:17,359 --> 00:25:21,880
Speaker 1: heightening their own and their friends calamities. By terrible predictions. So,

461
00:25:22,080 --> 00:25:25,120
Speaker 1: first of all, I think those letters are just amazing

462
00:25:25,200 --> 00:25:28,600
Speaker 1: literary documents. But also I wanted to say, there is

463
00:25:28,640 --> 00:25:32,920
Speaker 1: a painting that I've seen online several times that captures

464
00:25:33,000 --> 00:25:35,320
Speaker 1: the spirit of those letters pretty well for me. It's

465
00:25:35,359 --> 00:25:38,879
Speaker 1: called The Destruction of Pompeii and Herculaneum by the English

466
00:25:39,000 --> 00:25:43,520
Speaker 1: romantic painter John Martin. Yeah. All right, so we've presented

467
00:25:43,560 --> 00:25:47,600
Speaker 1: you with the drama of what is happening. Let's provide

468
00:25:47,640 --> 00:25:52,320
Speaker 1: a little background just about this region, about Pompeii and

469
00:25:52,359 --> 00:25:55,160
Speaker 1: some of these other cities that we were name dropping, right,

470
00:25:55,720 --> 00:25:58,159
Speaker 1: what was going on in the area before the seventy

471
00:25:58,240 --> 00:26:03,200
Speaker 1: nine eruption of Vesuvius. So the part of Italy immediately

472
00:26:03,280 --> 00:26:06,640
Speaker 1: surrounding Mount Vesuvius. The the larger region here is known

473
00:26:06,640 --> 00:26:09,960
Speaker 1: as Campania, which Plenty makes reference to because he says,

474
00:26:10,000 --> 00:26:13,000
Speaker 1: you know, we were used to earthquakes in Campania. It's

475
00:26:13,080 --> 00:26:15,760
Speaker 1: kind of a geologically active region. So when the little

476
00:26:15,800 --> 00:26:18,640
Speaker 1: earthquakes began, we weren't too worried at first, and still,

477
00:26:19,119 --> 00:26:22,600
Speaker 1: you know, until it started rocking the house back and forth. Um,

478
00:26:22,720 --> 00:26:26,879
Speaker 1: and so Campania translates into I think roughly into the

479
00:26:26,920 --> 00:26:30,720
Speaker 1: word countryside. Apparently it was once known as the Campania

480
00:26:30,840 --> 00:26:34,879
Speaker 1: Felix or the Happy countryside. And it's this region in

481
00:26:34,920 --> 00:26:39,840
Speaker 1: the southwestern part of the Italian peninsula along the Tyrannian Sea,

482
00:26:39,960 --> 00:26:42,240
Speaker 1: and its capital is, of course, the coastal city of

483
00:26:42,359 --> 00:26:45,280
Speaker 1: Naples or Napoly in Italian. This is where the pizza

484
00:26:45,320 --> 00:26:47,560
Speaker 1: comes from, is it? I think maybe it is a

485
00:26:48,200 --> 00:26:52,080
Speaker 1: famous variety of pizza that comes from Here's Nepolitan and Neapolitan.

486
00:26:52,200 --> 00:26:55,240
Speaker 1: I'm not sure. I don't know what the relationship between

487
00:26:55,240 --> 00:26:58,199
Speaker 1: those two works. You thinking about ice cream? Maybe, I

488
00:26:58,200 --> 00:26:59,600
Speaker 1: don't know. We'll have to get this. We'll have to

489
00:26:59,600 --> 00:27:02,040
Speaker 1: come back to it on our other show Invention. Just

490
00:27:02,240 --> 00:27:06,320
Speaker 1: right in and shame us. Go ahead, Okay. So today,

491
00:27:06,480 --> 00:27:10,960
Speaker 1: Campania is a highly sought after tourist destination, in large

492
00:27:10,960 --> 00:27:13,960
Speaker 1: part due to the natural beauty of its coastline, including

493
00:27:14,000 --> 00:27:18,240
Speaker 1: stretches like the famous Amalfi Coast. If you've seen these

494
00:27:18,280 --> 00:27:22,359
Speaker 1: gorgeous photos of like little antique towns nestled into the

495
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:27,120
Speaker 1: steeply descending hillsides between looming cliffs, sull covered in trees

496
00:27:27,200 --> 00:27:30,520
Speaker 1: and lush greenery. This kind of stuff along the waterfront

497
00:27:30,520 --> 00:27:32,480
Speaker 1: in Italy, I think there's a very good chance that

498
00:27:32,520 --> 00:27:35,240
Speaker 1: you are looking at images of the Amalfi coast. But

499
00:27:35,480 --> 00:27:38,480
Speaker 1: it turns out that the tourism industry is not new

500
00:27:38,520 --> 00:27:42,640
Speaker 1: in Campania. Even in the first century during the Roman Empire,

501
00:27:43,000 --> 00:27:47,080
Speaker 1: places especially around the Bay of Naples, were extremely fashionable

502
00:27:47,119 --> 00:27:50,679
Speaker 1: as vacation resorts for the rich elite of Rome and

503
00:27:50,720 --> 00:27:53,520
Speaker 1: other capitals of the Empire. And again you just look

504
00:27:53,560 --> 00:27:56,280
Speaker 1: up pictures of this place and you instantly understand why

505
00:27:56,480 --> 00:27:59,959
Speaker 1: it is a place of of of absolutely gorgeous natural

506
00:28:00,160 --> 00:28:04,760
Speaker 1: formations and vegetation. The coastline is pristine and striking. I mean,

507
00:28:04,840 --> 00:28:07,200
Speaker 1: I want to go there right now. Yes, yes, looking

508
00:28:07,200 --> 00:28:09,800
Speaker 1: at a photos of this region, which which is still

509
00:28:09,840 --> 00:28:14,200
Speaker 1: a vacation destination. Like you said, it looks very inviting.

510
00:28:14,680 --> 00:28:16,919
Speaker 1: But that's not all. Of course, Campania also has a

511
00:28:16,960 --> 00:28:21,480
Speaker 1: reputation as a rich and fertile farmland, both then and now,

512
00:28:21,640 --> 00:28:25,240
Speaker 1: and it's even today. It's very densely populated. But it's

513
00:28:25,280 --> 00:28:28,880
Speaker 1: also a center of agricultural food production for Italy. Yes,

514
00:28:28,960 --> 00:28:33,280
Speaker 1: lots of orchards, lots of vineyards. Uh. Now, probably the

515
00:28:33,320 --> 00:28:37,600
Speaker 1: most famous point of destruction within this this sort of

516
00:28:37,840 --> 00:28:41,880
Speaker 1: broad cone of destruction from the vesuvious eruption is the

517
00:28:41,880 --> 00:28:44,160
Speaker 1: city of Pompeii. It was a city that had been

518
00:28:44,200 --> 00:28:48,160
Speaker 1: settled by seafaring Greeks almost a thousand years before, like

519
00:28:48,200 --> 00:28:51,120
Speaker 1: in the eighth century b C. And then for several

520
00:28:51,160 --> 00:28:54,280
Speaker 1: centuries after that was a city controlled variously by the

521
00:28:54,560 --> 00:28:58,360
Speaker 1: Greeks and the Etruscans, sometimes trading off. It only fell

522
00:28:58,440 --> 00:29:01,440
Speaker 1: under Roman control during the second century b C. E

523
00:29:01,840 --> 00:29:04,040
Speaker 1: Before the Empire. This would have been during the period

524
00:29:04,080 --> 00:29:07,560
Speaker 1: of the Roman Republic. UH. And then by seventy nine c.

525
00:29:08,040 --> 00:29:12,600
Speaker 1: Pompeii had somewhere between like ten thousand and twenty thousand inhabitants.

526
00:29:13,040 --> 00:29:16,800
Speaker 1: It was wealthy, it was thriving. Like other places in Campania,

527
00:29:17,120 --> 00:29:19,880
Speaker 1: Pompeii was a resort for the famous and the powerful

528
00:29:19,920 --> 00:29:25,800
Speaker 1: families of Rome, with expensive villas, bath houses, restaurants, brothels,

529
00:29:25,840 --> 00:29:27,760
Speaker 1: you know, kind of a kind of an aspen of

530
00:29:27,800 --> 00:29:31,240
Speaker 1: ancient Rome, all right. Uh. The one problem, of course,

531
00:29:31,280 --> 00:29:33,520
Speaker 1: that is that all of this was built up in

532
00:29:33,560 --> 00:29:38,040
Speaker 1: the region surrounding Vesuvius and uh and of course Vesuvius

533
00:29:38,080 --> 00:29:41,720
Speaker 1: at the time was slumbering, or seemed to be slumbering,

534
00:29:42,120 --> 00:29:45,920
Speaker 1: But then in seventy nine it awakens and you know

535
00:29:46,000 --> 00:29:47,840
Speaker 1: I would say it's not. We can come back to

536
00:29:47,880 --> 00:29:50,479
Speaker 1: this later if you want, but it's not necessarily just

537
00:29:50,560 --> 00:29:53,440
Speaker 1: a coincidence that like, this is a place of great

538
00:29:53,520 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 1: beauty and agricultural production, so it draws a lot of

539
00:29:56,640 --> 00:30:00,920
Speaker 1: people and just happens to be near a dangerous active volcano.

540
00:30:01,440 --> 00:30:03,960
Speaker 1: There might be some reasons that both of these things

541
00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:06,200
Speaker 1: are true. Oh yeah, I mean yeah, we can go

542
00:30:06,240 --> 00:30:09,600
Speaker 1: and touch on these facts really quickly, because first of all,

543
00:30:09,640 --> 00:30:12,240
Speaker 1: we mentioned how fertile, uh, the the area is, how

544
00:30:12,280 --> 00:30:16,480
Speaker 1: well things grow even on the slopes of Vesuvius itself,

545
00:30:16,800 --> 00:30:19,600
Speaker 1: and that is because of this rich volcanic soil. Yes,

546
00:30:19,600 --> 00:30:21,440
Speaker 1: and I think it's also possible to argue that some

547
00:30:21,480 --> 00:30:24,600
Speaker 1: of the geologic features that make it kind of risky

548
00:30:24,640 --> 00:30:28,000
Speaker 1: in terms of volcanic activity also contribute to the beauty

549
00:30:28,040 --> 00:30:31,440
Speaker 1: of its coastline. Absolutely. I mean the the the volcanic

550
00:30:31,480 --> 00:30:35,000
Speaker 1: activity is the the the engine that formed the land

551
00:30:35,200 --> 00:30:40,480
Speaker 1: that people are occupying, that people are growing crops upon, etcetera. Now,

552
00:30:40,520 --> 00:30:43,600
Speaker 1: on the day of the eruption, it's estimated that of

553
00:30:43,680 --> 00:30:46,880
Speaker 1: the between ten thousand and twenty thousand inhabitants of Pompeii,

554
00:30:47,240 --> 00:30:51,360
Speaker 1: about two thousand inhabitants were probably killed, and when you

555
00:30:51,400 --> 00:30:55,080
Speaker 1: add up all those who perished in other Vesuvian settlements

556
00:30:55,120 --> 00:30:59,200
Speaker 1: like the towns of Herculaneum, Oplontis and Stabbia, Stabia was

557
00:30:59,240 --> 00:31:01,920
Speaker 1: where plenty of the elder sale to help his friend,

558
00:31:02,480 --> 00:31:06,200
Speaker 1: somewhere close to maybe like sixteen thousand people died in total,

559
00:31:06,280 --> 00:31:09,160
Speaker 1: though it's very difficult to have accurate numbers. But one

560
00:31:09,200 --> 00:31:12,840
Speaker 1: thing that makes Pompey special is because of the way

561
00:31:12,880 --> 00:31:16,320
Speaker 1: it was buried under the ash and ejecta of the eruption,

562
00:31:16,760 --> 00:31:21,680
Speaker 1: Pompeii became at once both obscure and illuminating. Obscure of course,

563
00:31:21,720 --> 00:31:25,160
Speaker 1: because it was literally hidden from investigation. It's sort of

564
00:31:25,560 --> 00:31:28,240
Speaker 1: vanished from history, as if wiped off the face of

565
00:31:28,240 --> 00:31:31,680
Speaker 1: the earth because it had been paved over by the volcano.

566
00:31:31,800 --> 00:31:34,680
Speaker 1: But at the same time, uh it kind of became

567
00:31:34,720 --> 00:31:38,400
Speaker 1: a bright and transparent window into life in ancient Roman

568
00:31:38,480 --> 00:31:41,840
Speaker 1: times because under all of that dust, the city was

569
00:31:41,880 --> 00:31:45,920
Speaker 1: almost perfectly preserved. Since it had been buried and erased

570
00:31:45,960 --> 00:31:48,400
Speaker 1: from history, there's no way for the remains of the

571
00:31:48,400 --> 00:31:52,680
Speaker 1: city to be disturbed. And it was also very democratic

572
00:31:52,720 --> 00:31:56,480
Speaker 1: in its preservation of the dead. Uh So it's one

573
00:31:56,520 --> 00:31:58,400
Speaker 1: of these great examples where we we get a little

574
00:31:58,400 --> 00:32:02,520
Speaker 1: inside into just how daily life worked in this city

575
00:32:02,560 --> 00:32:06,880
Speaker 1: before the eruption. Yeah, many people are just found, presumably

576
00:32:06,960 --> 00:32:10,160
Speaker 1: lying dead, exactly where they were when the calamity hit,

577
00:32:10,640 --> 00:32:14,360
Speaker 1: and so the city basically stayed that way until amateur

578
00:32:14,400 --> 00:32:19,520
Speaker 1: excavation of the of this geologically paved oversight began around

579
00:32:20,160 --> 00:32:22,520
Speaker 1: an event that is sometimes referred to as the birth

580
00:32:22,560 --> 00:32:25,360
Speaker 1: of modern archaeology. All right, on that note, we're going

581
00:32:25,440 --> 00:32:27,360
Speaker 1: to take one more break, but when we come back,

582
00:32:27,560 --> 00:32:30,680
Speaker 1: we're going to continue our exploration by looking at the

583
00:32:30,760 --> 00:32:38,360
Speaker 1: volcanic eruption itself. Than alright, we're back. Okay, so we've

584
00:32:38,360 --> 00:32:41,280
Speaker 1: gotten the ground level view of what was happening on

585
00:32:41,320 --> 00:32:45,560
Speaker 1: the day of the eruption of Vesuvius in but what

586
00:32:45,640 --> 00:32:48,680
Speaker 1: do we know now looking back with the scientific lens.

587
00:32:48,760 --> 00:32:51,160
Speaker 1: What what do we think probably happened on that day

588
00:32:51,200 --> 00:32:54,280
Speaker 1: in geological terms? All right, well, let's let's back up

589
00:32:54,280 --> 00:32:57,000
Speaker 1: a little bit and just talk about the basic idea

590
00:32:57,000 --> 00:33:00,400
Speaker 1: of volcano. Of volcano, of course, is just a upture

591
00:33:00,480 --> 00:33:03,520
Speaker 1: in a planet's crust, but there are are various types

592
00:33:03,560 --> 00:33:06,720
Speaker 1: of volcanoes, depending on their location, their history, and the

593
00:33:06,720 --> 00:33:11,680
Speaker 1: the underlying activity. Fun fact, though the word volcano derives

594
00:33:12,040 --> 00:33:15,880
Speaker 1: from the volcanic isle of Volcano, named for Vulcan, the

595
00:33:15,960 --> 00:33:19,640
Speaker 1: Roman god of fire. The Greeks knew this island by

596
00:33:19,680 --> 00:33:22,840
Speaker 1: other names, but they also considered it the foundry of Hephaestus,

597
00:33:23,120 --> 00:33:26,360
Speaker 1: basically the equivalent of Vulcan. Yeah, they're like the forge,

598
00:33:26,360 --> 00:33:30,000
Speaker 1: god of sparks and banging. Yeah. So so again, you know,

599
00:33:30,040 --> 00:33:33,720
Speaker 1: the ancient people's definitely knew of volcanoes, and they were

600
00:33:33,840 --> 00:33:36,920
Speaker 1: remembered at least in the in the construction of myths

601
00:33:36,960 --> 00:33:41,920
Speaker 1: and the naming of places. Now, Vesuvius itself is considered

602
00:33:42,040 --> 00:33:48,920
Speaker 1: a soma stratovolcano. Um. It's also considered a complex volcano.

603
00:33:49,520 --> 00:33:51,600
Speaker 1: So let's talk about what this means. First, we'll talk

604
00:33:51,640 --> 00:33:54,240
Speaker 1: about the soma part. So, if you were to travel

605
00:33:54,320 --> 00:33:58,200
Speaker 1: back four hundred thousand years or so, you would not

606
00:33:58,360 --> 00:34:02,440
Speaker 1: find Mount Vesuvia, said all. Rather, you'd find Mount Soma.

607
00:34:03,160 --> 00:34:07,760
Speaker 1: So Mount Soma underwent various eruptions, and we have to

608
00:34:07,760 --> 00:34:11,600
Speaker 1: remember that volcanoes are places of violent change, and due

609
00:34:11,600 --> 00:34:16,239
Speaker 1: to these violent eruptions, Mount Soma eventually collapse into what

610
00:34:16,440 --> 00:34:19,719
Speaker 1: is known as a caldera. So this occurs when a

611
00:34:19,760 --> 00:34:25,160
Speaker 1: particularly violent eruption empties the underlying magma chamber of a volcano,

612
00:34:25,239 --> 00:34:29,320
Speaker 1: making it impossible for it to support its own weight. Alright,

613
00:34:29,360 --> 00:34:32,800
Speaker 1: so um again, it's like the volcano just has erupted

614
00:34:32,840 --> 00:34:35,919
Speaker 1: so much, and it grew so much, erupted so much

615
00:34:36,040 --> 00:34:39,440
Speaker 1: that it's just caved in on itself. It's just destroyed itself.

616
00:34:39,600 --> 00:34:41,560
Speaker 1: It's like if you you were too empty out all

617
00:34:41,600 --> 00:34:43,840
Speaker 1: of the molten lava from your molten lava cake and

618
00:34:43,880 --> 00:34:45,880
Speaker 1: then the cake just collapses. Right. All you have with

619
00:34:46,000 --> 00:34:48,759
Speaker 1: like the edges of the cake that form like like

620
00:34:49,000 --> 00:34:52,360
Speaker 1: ring mountain around a center. It's like a crater um.

621
00:34:52,520 --> 00:34:54,319
Speaker 1: And this is where we get that classic image of

622
00:34:54,360 --> 00:34:56,399
Speaker 1: what a volcano you usually looks like. If you draw

623
00:34:56,440 --> 00:34:59,759
Speaker 1: a cartoon volcano, you're probably drawing a ring shaped called

624
00:35:00,239 --> 00:35:02,920
Speaker 1: where the top of the mountain has collapsed after some

625
00:35:03,040 --> 00:35:06,040
Speaker 1: eruption in the past. But even though the the the

626
00:35:06,040 --> 00:35:11,240
Speaker 1: the mountain itself has collapsed, the underlying volcanic avict activity

627
00:35:11,280 --> 00:35:15,080
Speaker 1: is still there. So magma and volcanic gases continue to build,

628
00:35:15,400 --> 00:35:18,200
Speaker 1: and this can result in a few different varieties of caldera.

629
00:35:18,360 --> 00:35:20,440
Speaker 1: The center can swell back up into what is known

630
00:35:20,480 --> 00:35:23,759
Speaker 1: as a resurgent dome like with the yellow Stone, and

631
00:35:23,840 --> 00:35:26,960
Speaker 1: it's you know, it's so called supervolcano. But in the

632
00:35:27,000 --> 00:35:30,880
Speaker 1: case of Vesuvius, another volcanic cone and this is the

633
00:35:30,880 --> 00:35:34,120
Speaker 1: Mount of Vesuvius, rises up in the center of the

634
00:35:34,160 --> 00:35:37,600
Speaker 1: Soma Caldera. And this is why we call this type

635
00:35:37,600 --> 00:35:42,000
Speaker 1: of volcano a Soma volcano. So the remnants again of

636
00:35:42,400 --> 00:35:45,319
Speaker 1: the old mountain, the caldera, are still around it, and

637
00:35:45,520 --> 00:35:48,000
Speaker 1: the Soma Caldera is also sometimes referred to it's just

638
00:35:48,040 --> 00:35:51,040
Speaker 1: Mount Soma today. But again it is the remnant of

639
00:35:51,080 --> 00:35:54,200
Speaker 1: the old mountain and in the center is Vesuvius. That's

640
00:35:54,239 --> 00:35:57,040
Speaker 1: hard I mean volcano inside a volcano, right, and again

641
00:35:57,160 --> 00:35:59,879
Speaker 1: it's important to know, yeah, Vesuvia is certainly in geologic time,

642
00:35:59,920 --> 00:36:03,680
Speaker 1: is is a young volcano. Okay, So what sort of

643
00:36:03,760 --> 00:36:07,200
Speaker 1: volcano is Vesuvius itself. We'll remember we used the the

644
00:36:07,239 --> 00:36:10,880
Speaker 1: description a Soma strato volcano. So a strato volcano is

645
00:36:10,920 --> 00:36:14,720
Speaker 1: a steep conical volcano built from many layers of lava

646
00:36:14,840 --> 00:36:20,040
Speaker 1: ash pomis and tefra tefra that's a pyroclass or rejected

647
00:36:20,080 --> 00:36:22,600
Speaker 1: fragments from the volcano that have fallen to the ground.

648
00:36:23,320 --> 00:36:26,799
Speaker 1: All of this from various eruptions, building up, building up

649
00:36:26,840 --> 00:36:30,799
Speaker 1: this volcano. Now you mentioned it was a young volcano. Yes,

650
00:36:30,880 --> 00:36:35,720
Speaker 1: relatively young again in terms of geologic time. Uh, certainly

651
00:36:36,280 --> 00:36:39,080
Speaker 1: human time is a different matter, which we'll get into. Uh.

652
00:36:39,320 --> 00:36:42,600
Speaker 1: During its life, it's had periods of activity and inactivity.

653
00:36:42,960 --> 00:36:46,239
Speaker 1: Its most recent period of activity as of this recording

654
00:36:46,719 --> 00:36:51,160
Speaker 1: was between nineteen thirteen and nineteen forty four CE. And

655
00:36:51,200 --> 00:36:53,920
Speaker 1: today it's uh, you know it's it's it's inactive. You

656
00:36:54,120 --> 00:36:57,080
Speaker 1: rather inactive. You can actually hike up to the top. Uh.

657
00:36:57,120 --> 00:37:00,440
Speaker 1: It's eruptions, however, we're known in ancient times. But at

658
00:37:00,440 --> 00:37:03,520
Speaker 1: the time of its eruption in seventy nine C, it

659
00:37:03,600 --> 00:37:06,840
Speaker 1: had been inactive for at least two hundred and ninety

660
00:37:06,880 --> 00:37:11,640
Speaker 1: five years. It was reputed to have erupted into seventeen

661
00:37:11,719 --> 00:37:15,759
Speaker 1: b c E based on the writings of Solicitaicus, but

662
00:37:15,800 --> 00:37:18,960
Speaker 1: a great many modern writers have rejected this. We know

663
00:37:19,120 --> 00:37:23,680
Speaker 1: it sustained a particularly powerful eruption during the second millennium

664
00:37:23,719 --> 00:37:27,520
Speaker 1: b c E. This is the Avellino eruption, which decimated

665
00:37:27,560 --> 00:37:32,120
Speaker 1: the Bronze Age settlements in the area. Uh. But again

666
00:37:32,239 --> 00:37:34,680
Speaker 1: we it's ultimately a situation where we don't have a

667
00:37:34,800 --> 00:37:37,680
Speaker 1: lot of information about its pre about its activity in

668
00:37:37,760 --> 00:37:40,760
Speaker 1: pre seventy nine c e UH in that time period,

669
00:37:41,000 --> 00:37:43,920
Speaker 1: but we can presume that it had been centuries since

670
00:37:43,920 --> 00:37:47,520
Speaker 1: its last eruption. Avelino is the name of another town

671
00:37:47,880 --> 00:37:50,719
Speaker 1: nearby Naples, so it's actually I remember that because it's

672
00:37:50,760 --> 00:37:54,799
Speaker 1: the town that Tony Soprano's family comes from. Okay. At

673
00:37:54,840 --> 00:37:57,279
Speaker 1: any rate, enough time had passed for humans in this

674
00:37:57,360 --> 00:38:01,880
Speaker 1: region to lose their immediate fear the mountain um, and

675
00:38:01,920 --> 00:38:06,240
Speaker 1: so cities encroached upon its domain, gardens and vineyards popped

676
00:38:06,280 --> 00:38:09,560
Speaker 1: up around it. The children of Prometheus grew bold in

677
00:38:09,600 --> 00:38:13,040
Speaker 1: the silence of Vesuvius. But again it's it's clear that

678
00:38:13,080 --> 00:38:17,480
Speaker 1: they had not really completely forgotten what Vesuvius had been

679
00:38:17,520 --> 00:38:22,839
Speaker 1: capable of in the past. Myths of giants battling Hercules, uh,

680
00:38:22,880 --> 00:38:25,799
Speaker 1: you know, still remained about the mountain. Uh. There were

681
00:38:25,800 --> 00:38:30,160
Speaker 1: geologic connections that linked that clearly linked Vesuvius to Mount Etna,

682
00:38:30,520 --> 00:38:34,000
Speaker 1: which was certainly active and was described erupting again in

683
00:38:34,120 --> 00:38:36,600
Speaker 1: Virgils and need, which I referred to earlier. So it's

684
00:38:36,640 --> 00:38:41,399
Speaker 1: not like people did not know what had happened here

685
00:38:41,400 --> 00:38:44,440
Speaker 1: in the past, or what a volcano looked like, I mean,

686
00:38:44,480 --> 00:38:47,279
Speaker 1: there was it was the world wasn't completely ignorant of

687
00:38:47,320 --> 00:38:49,680
Speaker 1: what it could do. You know, it's kind of weird.

688
00:38:49,840 --> 00:38:53,319
Speaker 1: It's it's one of these tragedies of time scales that

689
00:38:53,719 --> 00:38:57,200
Speaker 1: humans are I feel like, almost constantly facing off against,

690
00:38:57,320 --> 00:39:01,120
Speaker 1: where if you look at the activity of a volcano

691
00:39:01,239 --> 00:39:05,239
Speaker 1: across geologic time, you just see it's pretty regular, you know,

692
00:39:05,320 --> 00:39:08,120
Speaker 1: pretty frequently this thing is going to erupt. But then

693
00:39:08,160 --> 00:39:12,000
Speaker 1: you zoom into human historical time and the eruptions are

694
00:39:12,040 --> 00:39:15,920
Speaker 1: not quite frequent enough to discourage settlement because our memories

695
00:39:15,960 --> 00:39:19,120
Speaker 1: are not that long, like a few hundred years. Seems like,

696
00:39:19,320 --> 00:39:22,680
Speaker 1: you know, an eternity to an individual person. Yeah, yeah,

697
00:39:22,719 --> 00:39:25,840
Speaker 1: I mean the whole whole lives will pass during the

698
00:39:26,120 --> 00:39:30,600
Speaker 1: periods of relative inactivity of a volcano, uh in many

699
00:39:30,600 --> 00:39:33,640
Speaker 1: of these cases. So you know, we don't know everything

700
00:39:33,680 --> 00:39:37,239
Speaker 1: about the seventy nine CE eruption a k a. The

701
00:39:37,719 --> 00:39:40,759
Speaker 1: plan a plan a in eruption named for plenty, but

702
00:39:40,760 --> 00:39:43,160
Speaker 1: but we still know quite a bit, as it was

703
00:39:43,239 --> 00:39:45,920
Speaker 1: again the first volcanic eruption to be described in detail.

704
00:39:46,320 --> 00:39:49,719
Speaker 1: We have plenty of the Younger's excellent descriptions of the

705
00:39:49,760 --> 00:39:54,160
Speaker 1: pre eruption, quakes, the eruption itself, the ash fall, pyroclastic flows,

706
00:39:54,239 --> 00:39:57,000
Speaker 1: and the resulting mild tsunami in the Bay of Naples.

707
00:39:58,160 --> 00:40:00,879
Speaker 1: It is estimated that the column of ash that rose

708
00:40:00,960 --> 00:40:03,800
Speaker 1: up into the sky towered some twenty miles or thirty

709
00:40:03,840 --> 00:40:07,319
Speaker 1: two kilometers, and then it ejected one cubic mile or

710
00:40:07,360 --> 00:40:11,440
Speaker 1: four cubic kilometers of ash in just something like nineteen hours.

711
00:40:11,880 --> 00:40:17,080
Speaker 1: Ten ft of tephra fell on Pompeii, pyroclastic flow buried

712
00:40:17,120 --> 00:40:21,000
Speaker 1: herculaneum under seventy five ft or twenty three ms of ash,

713
00:40:21,080 --> 00:40:23,680
Speaker 1: and will eventually look at what all of this meant

714
00:40:23,680 --> 00:40:26,520
Speaker 1: for the humans who resided in the impacted cities as well,

715
00:40:26,600 --> 00:40:28,600
Speaker 1: like on a biological level. I think we'll have to

716
00:40:28,640 --> 00:40:31,479
Speaker 1: get into that in the next episode. Yeah, it's also

717
00:40:31,520 --> 00:40:36,080
Speaker 1: been estimated that the eruption itself would have carried the

718
00:40:36,080 --> 00:40:41,000
Speaker 1: thermal energy of a hundred thousand Hiroshima atomic bombs, and

719
00:40:41,239 --> 00:40:44,600
Speaker 1: all of this would have lasted roughly two days. Vesuvius

720
00:40:44,640 --> 00:40:48,080
Speaker 1: has erupted some three dozen times since uh, sometimes with

721
00:40:48,120 --> 00:40:51,400
Speaker 1: deadly results. Mud flows and lava flows from a sixt

722
00:40:51,560 --> 00:40:55,120
Speaker 1: thirty one eruption killed, but some three thousand, five hundred people,

723
00:40:55,719 --> 00:41:01,000
Speaker 1: and today, as before the seventy nine CE eruption, vineyards

724
00:41:01,000 --> 00:41:03,839
Speaker 1: and orchards cover the slopes of the mountain. Uh, there's

725
00:41:03,880 --> 00:41:08,800
Speaker 1: an there's an enormous population surrounding the volcano today. I

726
00:41:08,880 --> 00:41:12,080
Speaker 1: believe the area is like the most densely populated part

727
00:41:12,120 --> 00:41:15,000
Speaker 1: of Italy. Right. I've also seen it described as the

728
00:41:15,360 --> 00:41:20,040
Speaker 1: as the most densely populated area surrounding a volcano on Earth.

729
00:41:20,440 --> 00:41:22,719
Speaker 1: But again, the yeah, people, but it's beautiful. You look

730
00:41:22,719 --> 00:41:25,120
Speaker 1: at these pictures, it's beautiful. There's an actually tremendous amount

731
00:41:25,160 --> 00:41:28,440
Speaker 1: of growth there. Again, the soil is very fertile um

732
00:41:28,560 --> 00:41:31,360
Speaker 1: and before the eruption of six thirty one, during a

733
00:41:31,440 --> 00:41:34,759
Speaker 1: very long period of inactivity, forests are actually said to

734
00:41:34,800 --> 00:41:36,520
Speaker 1: have grown in the crater, and you would have found

735
00:41:36,520 --> 00:41:39,920
Speaker 1: three lakes there as well. So yeah, given the the

736
00:41:40,000 --> 00:41:43,759
Speaker 1: amount of time, the great amount of time relative to

737
00:41:43,800 --> 00:41:47,600
Speaker 1: the human experience and even the lives of plants that

738
00:41:47,680 --> 00:41:52,080
Speaker 1: transpires between eruptions, I mean, you can have a great

739
00:41:52,160 --> 00:41:54,680
Speaker 1: greening of the mountain occur. Oh man, I wish I

740
00:41:54,680 --> 00:41:56,520
Speaker 1: could see what that was like to have the forests

741
00:41:56,560 --> 00:41:58,560
Speaker 1: and the lakes down in there, because I love that

742
00:41:58,640 --> 00:42:00,080
Speaker 1: kind of thing. I don't know if you've been the

743
00:42:00,160 --> 00:42:03,800
Speaker 1: Crater Lake in Oregon. I have not, Well, you've probably

744
00:42:03,800 --> 00:42:06,319
Speaker 1: seen images of it. At least it's absolutely gorgeous, one

745
00:42:06,320 --> 00:42:09,000
Speaker 1: of the most amazing beautiful places I've ever been. But

746
00:42:09,080 --> 00:42:12,399
Speaker 1: I think it's exactly that contrast of like of uh,

747
00:42:12,400 --> 00:42:16,400
Speaker 1: this clear still water and all these forests in life

748
00:42:16,560 --> 00:42:21,200
Speaker 1: just flooding in to this place where there was catastrophic destruction,

749
00:42:21,440 --> 00:42:24,000
Speaker 1: you know, some number of centuries ago, right, and then

750
00:42:24,200 --> 00:42:26,160
Speaker 1: that and then the humans come in as well, And

751
00:42:26,200 --> 00:42:28,200
Speaker 1: there's probably something elegant to be said about just like

752
00:42:28,239 --> 00:42:31,480
Speaker 1: the nature of of the human experience too, you know,

753
00:42:31,520 --> 00:42:35,200
Speaker 1: like even though something terrible happened here, humans have a

754
00:42:35,239 --> 00:42:38,720
Speaker 1: way in many cases of moving forward through it and

755
00:42:38,719 --> 00:42:41,160
Speaker 1: and finding a way to make a life there. I

756
00:42:41,239 --> 00:42:43,880
Speaker 1: know it's not this way, but it almost it seems

757
00:42:43,920 --> 00:42:47,960
Speaker 1: almost malicious, like the the the volcano with this fertile

758
00:42:48,040 --> 00:42:51,440
Speaker 1: volcanic soil is just sort of like baiting you. It

759
00:42:51,800 --> 00:42:54,760
Speaker 1: is like leaving out this bait to attract you into

760
00:42:54,840 --> 00:42:59,319
Speaker 1: the geologic trap. Sorry, I know that's anthropomorphizing. It's it's

761
00:42:59,360 --> 00:43:01,480
Speaker 1: not the volcane know, it's fault. It doesn't mean to

762
00:43:01,560 --> 00:43:05,000
Speaker 1: hurt you. Yeah, I think even Tolkien didn't say Mount

763
00:43:05,000 --> 00:43:08,440
Speaker 1: Doom itself was evil, right, it was just but Mount

764
00:43:08,480 --> 00:43:10,600
Speaker 1: Doom is more what you'd expect. It's in more door,

765
00:43:10,719 --> 00:43:12,680
Speaker 1: which is a place where even the air, the very

766
00:43:12,719 --> 00:43:15,479
Speaker 1: air you breathe as a toxic fume and nothing grows there.

767
00:43:15,560 --> 00:43:18,799
Speaker 1: And you know, it's just like it's just this blasted landscape.

768
00:43:19,000 --> 00:43:20,600
Speaker 1: I mean no, that this is the case where the

769
00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:24,360
Speaker 1: area right around this volcano that could erupt again is

770
00:43:24,960 --> 00:43:29,239
Speaker 1: extremely beautiful and fertile and inviting to life. All right,

771
00:43:29,360 --> 00:43:30,960
Speaker 1: On that note, we're gonna go ahead and call it

772
00:43:31,000 --> 00:43:33,080
Speaker 1: for this episode, but we will be back in the

773
00:43:33,120 --> 00:43:35,440
Speaker 1: next episode of Stuff to Blow your Mind to continue

774
00:43:35,520 --> 00:43:40,200
Speaker 1: our discussions regarding Vesuvious. We're gonna get into some of

775
00:43:40,239 --> 00:43:43,440
Speaker 1: the sort of forensic evidence of what happened to the

776
00:43:43,480 --> 00:43:47,640
Speaker 1: people in Pompeii. We're gonna get into We're gonna discuss

777
00:43:47,680 --> 00:43:51,799
Speaker 1: the possible remains of Plenty the Elder, and will also

778
00:43:51,880 --> 00:43:55,280
Speaker 1: just discuss the continued threat posed by volcanoes to settled

779
00:43:55,320 --> 00:43:58,640
Speaker 1: regions today and you know, and some some about you know,

780
00:43:58,680 --> 00:44:01,239
Speaker 1: what we what we're prepared to do or unprepared to

781
00:44:01,280 --> 00:44:04,439
Speaker 1: do about their eruptions. I can't wait. I've been wanting

782
00:44:04,480 --> 00:44:06,399
Speaker 1: to talk about this for so long. I'm so glad

783
00:44:06,440 --> 00:44:08,440
Speaker 1: we finally got here. Yeah, and I think it may

784
00:44:08,520 --> 00:44:13,160
Speaker 1: kick off even further UM further episodes that deal with

785
00:44:13,680 --> 00:44:17,239
Speaker 1: volcanoes and UH and human history. There's a there's a

786
00:44:17,280 --> 00:44:20,640
Speaker 1: lot of rich there's a lot of rich soil UH

787
00:44:21,080 --> 00:44:23,920
Speaker 1: that that is left behind by these UH. These often

788
00:44:24,000 --> 00:44:27,560
Speaker 1: cata cataclysmic events. In the meantime, if you want to

789
00:44:27,640 --> 00:44:29,759
Speaker 1: check out other episodes of Stuff to Blow your Mind,

790
00:44:30,080 --> 00:44:33,680
Speaker 1: you can find our show wherever you get your podcasts UM.

791
00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:35,439
Speaker 1: If you go to Stuff to Build your Mind dot com,

792
00:44:35,480 --> 00:44:37,920
Speaker 1: that will definitely redirect you to the I Heart page

793
00:44:37,960 --> 00:44:42,319
Speaker 1: for our show, where you can subscribe, you can download, etcetera,

794
00:44:42,640 --> 00:44:44,640
Speaker 1: and wherever you get the show. We encourage you to

795
00:44:44,680 --> 00:44:50,080
Speaker 1: do those things. Rate, review, subscribe. These are the things

796
00:44:50,120 --> 00:44:51,520
Speaker 1: you can do to help the show, as well as

797
00:44:51,560 --> 00:44:55,319
Speaker 1: just telling a a friend in the real world UH.

798
00:44:55,440 --> 00:44:58,160
Speaker 1: Just spread the word huge thanks as always to our

799
00:44:58,200 --> 00:45:01,480
Speaker 1: excellent audio producers sethnic Wis Johnson. If you would like

800
00:45:01,520 --> 00:45:03,400
Speaker 1: to get in touch with us with feedback on this

801
00:45:03,440 --> 00:45:05,920
Speaker 1: episode or any other to suggest topic for the future

802
00:45:06,000 --> 00:45:08,080
Speaker 1: or just to say hi. You can email us at

803
00:45:08,200 --> 00:45:19,479
Speaker 1: contact at stuff to blow your Mind dot com. Stuff

804
00:45:19,520 --> 00:45:21,440
Speaker 1: to Blow Your Mind is a production of iHeart Radios.

805
00:45:21,440 --> 00:45:23,799
Speaker 1: How stuff Works. For more podcasts from my heart Radio

806
00:45:23,920 --> 00:45:26,520
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807
00:45:26,560 --> 00:45:31,000
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows radi