The Buried City: Unearthing the Real Pompeii

Description

The director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park offers a vivid view of daily life in the lost city, shares the latest discoveries, and reflects on preserving heritage.

In The Buried City, Gabriel Zuchtriegel takes us on a behind-the-scenes tour of Pompeii and reveals new archaeological finds that are being unearthed at the site’s biggest dig in a generation. As director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park, Zuchtriegel presents a uniquely intimate perspective on this city that was tragically destroyed and frozen in time by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. Among the ruins, we find unmade beds, dishes left drying, and bodies of victims encased in ash, but Zuchtriegel shows that we’ve only begun to understand this fascinating place, as a third of the site remains unexcavated.

Zuchtriegel leads us into the heart of the city, reconstructing Pompeii as it would have been, showing us who lived there, what mattered to them, and what happened in their final hours. The Buried City reveals the latest discoveries unearthed at Pompeii–including a banquet hall with murals of Greek gods, a fresco of what appears to be a pizza, and the remains of individuals crushed by debris–all buried for almost two thousand years. Zuchtriegel offers a vivid portrait of this World Heritage site as a vibrant and diverse city, connecting us to a past that is much closer than we think and inviting us to reflect on our role as keepers of the site and its history.

Binding Type: Hardcover
Contributors: Gabriel Zuchtriegel, Jamie Bulloch (Translator)
Published: 05/15/2025
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 9780226839608
Pages: 256
Weight: 1.19lbs
Size: 1.10″ H x 9.13″ L x 6.06″ W

About the Author
Gabriel Zuchtriegel is director of the Pompeii Archaeological Park. Prior to being appointed to oversee Pompeii in 2021, he was director of the archaeological parks of Paestum and Velia, both UNESCO World Heritage sites. Zuchtriegel is the author of numerous articles and books, including Colonization and Subalternity in Classical Greece and The Making of the Doric Temple. Jamie Bulloch has translated over fifty titles from German, including works by Arno Geiger, Robert Menasse, Birgit Vanderbeke, Daniela Krien, and Sebastian Fitzek. He has twice won the Schlegel-Tieck prize and is also the author of Karl Renner: Austria. Jamie lives in London with his wife and three daughters.