The Buried City

'The best book on Pompeii I've ever read' STEPHEN FRY 'Brilliant' TOM HOLLAND A vast area of Pompeii is being excavated for the first time, revealing astonishing insights into how people really lived. In this revelatory new history, Director of Pompeii Gabriel Zuchtriegel shares the untold stories that are at last emerging. Pompeii is a world frozen in time. There are unmade beds, dishes left drying, tools abandoned by workmen, bodies embracing with love and fear. And alongside the remnants of everyday life, there are captivating works of art: lifelike portraits, exquisite frescos and mosaics, and the extraordinary sculpture of a sleeping boy, curled up under a blanket that's too small. The Buried City reconstructs the catastrophe that destroyed Pompeii on 24 August 79 CE, and offers a behind-the-scenes tour of the city as it was before: who lived here, what mattered to them, and what happened in their final hours. It gives us a vivid sense of Pompeii's continuing relevance, and proves that ancient history is much closer to us than we think.

Gabriel Zuchtriegel is Director General of the archaeological park in Pompeii. He studied classical archaeology at the Humboldt University in Berlin and received his PhD from the University of Bonn. In 2015, he became director of the Paestum archaeological park and museum, before being appointed at Pompeii in February 2021. He became an Italian citizen in 2020 and is currently overseeing the biggest dig of the site of Pompeii in a generation.