The Buried City

'The best book on Pompeii I've ever read' STEPHEN FRY

This is Pompeii, as you've never seen it before.

In this revelatory history, Gabriel Zuchtriegel shares the new secrets of Pompeii. Over the last few years, a vast stretch of the city has been excavated for the first time. Now, drawing on these astonishing discoveries, The Buried City reveals the untold human 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, but it also 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 offers us a vivid sense of Pompeii's continuing relevance, and proves that ancient history is much closer to us than we think.

'This is not just the best book on Pompeii I've ever read - it's the best book on the glorious realities of archaeology itself. Gabriel Zuchtriegel will surely inspire a whole new generation in the field with his blend of knowledge, experience and boundless passion. For this reader ... well, it has left me panting to revisit Pompeii with the new, excited eyes that this magnificent book has given me.' -- Stephen Fry
'Zuchtriegel makes the familiar magical. He challenges us to transform our relationship with the past, and shows us a new, far more satisfying, way to think about Pompeii and its people.' -- Dan Snow
Fantastic! Hugely informative, clever, thoughtful and playful (like all my favourite archaeologists). -- Natalie Haynes, author of DIVINE MIGHT and PANDORA'S JAR
'A thoughtful, revelatory and above all deeply human account of life - and death - by the director of the most awe-inspiring archaeological site on the planet.' -- Daisy Dunn, author of IN THE SHADOW OF VESUVIUS: A LIFE OF PLINY
'A brilliant book. A learned guide to life in Pompeii both in the Roman past and the twenty-first century, deftly weaving the ancient with the modern, the personal with the historical. The end result is a fascinating, affable and constantly illuminating exploration of Pompeii as an idea and as an archaeological site but also as a home for thousands of Roman people from all walks of life.' -- Emma Southon, author of A FATAL THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM

'Archaeology has never been told so vividly.'

Die Zeit
'Gabriel Zuchtriegel's book is as fabulous as it is unusual.' Süddeutsche Zeitung
'The Buried City tells the story of Zuchtriegel's memorable personal journey to taking charge at Pompeii, along the way revealing how he's righting the wrongs of his predecessors and presiding over the new and remarkable discoveries at this greatest of archaeological sites.' -- Guy de la Bédoyère, author of POPULUS
'Zuchtriegel has brought us an experimental, personal, moving, engaging account of Pompeii. He courageously shows that archaeology is not a dry science, but rather one driven by the personal experience and passions of the archeologist. This book reveals the excitement of new excavations at Pompeii while serving as a deeply personal testament to Zuchtriegel's background and upbringing, his love of music, his path to becoming an archaeologist.' -- Andrew Wallace-Hadrill, author of HERCULANEUM:

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.

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