Herculaneum. That beach overlooking the sea and where about three hundred fugitives were unable to escape death in the eruption of 79 AD. C., undermined over the years by corrosion and rainwater, today comes back to new life thanks to a recovery project, implemented by the Herculaneum Archaeological Park, in a public-private partnership with the Packard Humanities Institute and with a CIS loan (Contract institutional development) Vesuvius.
Among large groups of tourists and visitors, today, the ribbon cutting of a fundamental and strategic work of the archaeological park: the ancient Herculaneum beach, precisely. In the medium term, the reunification of a stretch of beach with the Villa dei Papiri is expected, in order to expand the offer to tourists for the next few years.
The area has recently been affected by corrosion and decay, due to natural factors linked to rainwater and rising water, which had made the beach a sort of swamp. The works have returned an image as close as possible to the original one, prior to the eruption of 79 AD
From today, in fact, the area is open to visitors who can look out over the arches where there are the skeletons of around 300 fugitives who, despite the civil protection operation directed by the Roman admiral and scholar Pliny the Elder, were unable to save themselves sea. “Herculaneum, Pompeii, Oplontis: we are working on many projects,” said the Minister of Culture, Gennaro Sangiuliano.
“At this moment, in the budget law, we have refinanced the excavations and there are construction sites that are active like never before and are revealing new treasures, which fuel the activity of scholars”. “We – he continued – believe in all of this: in creating, connecting and strengthening this area which UNESCO has also recognized as being of great value and which is one of the most important archaeological areas in the world. Because we are convinced that this will represent an opportunity for socio-economic development.”
A concept, the latter, which the mayor of Ercolano, Ciro Buonajuto, focused on: “Today the tourist offer of our city increases, the archaeological park is an extraordinary reality, a place that attracts visitors from all over the world” . “It was not only a restoration work – the words of the director of the Herculaneum archaeological park, Francesco Sirano – but also a great research work because we know that re-presenting a site, in an open-air archaeological place, also means being able delve into scientific aspects: we carried out excavations and found remains and the passage of pyroclastic flows that hit the city in 79 AD with materials of all kinds”.
The most important discovery was that of the ‘last fugitive’ which occurred in 2021: a skeleton of a man of around 40 years old who was probably trying to escape by sea and who was carrying a bag with his most precious objects inside.
