Petrified Remains Of 2,000-Year-Old Military Horse Unearthed At Pompeii
Cesare Abbate/ANSA Via APThe remains of a military official’s horse, discovered in Pompeii.
When Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 A.D., there was little anyone in its vicinity could do but run and pray to the gods. The choking, toxic cloud of gas and the searing, white-hot ash of the eruption spared neither slave nor Roman military officer — Vesuvius even took the officer’s horses now left behind in Pompeii.
According to the Associated Press, the petrified remains of a harnessed horse and an accompanying saddle were found lying in a stable in the Villa of the Mysteries. The ancient homestead in the suburbs of Pompeii overlooks the Bay of Naples and formerly belonged to a high-ranking military officer, possibly even a general. Excavated in the early 1900s, the site had previously been re-buried.
Director of the dig site, Massimo Osanna, was confident this horse was a military steed. Saddled in a wooden and bronze harness, archaeologists believe that the horse was being prepared for the officer who would be needed to help evacuate the citizens of the city.
The animal was also well-groomed and decorated with rich metals, further suggesting this was not just anyone’s horse. It was also found alongside several other horses who died in the stable.
And its method of death was nothing if not gruesome: Either the horses suffocated from the endless cloud of volcanic ash that blanketed the city and its surroundings, or it was essentially boiled alive from the inside-out from the extreme temperatures of the volcanic gases that would have accompanied the ash cloud.
