Cities in Dust by SIOUXSIE AND THE BANSHEES

SONG FACTS

Cities in Dust is a song written by British band Siouxsie and the Banshees. It was released in 1986 as part of their album Tinderbox.

The song refers to the volcanic eruption of the Vesuvius on 24^th August, AD 79 with the subsequent disappearance of the nearby cities of Herculaneum and Pompeii under the lava as well as the suffering and death of the victims whose remains were discovered some centuries later.

Lyrics Video

YOUR FORMER GLORIES AND ALL THE STORIES

Historians have learned about the Vesuvius eruption from the account of Pliny the Younger, a Roman lawyer and magistrate, nephew of Pliny the Elder, the natural philosopher and navy commander who died near Pompeii on the day of the eruption while he was observing the natural disaster. This event is described in the two letters that he sent to the historian Tacitus who was interested in the details of the death of Pliny the Elder.

Eyewitness reports are great help to visualise what really happened but animation technology provides a more striking impression. Such is the case with the following.

A Day in Pompeii - Full-length animation

YOUR CITY LIES IN DUST

Vulcanologists found some relevant information in Pliny’s description and that’s the reason why this kind of eruption is known as Plinian.

The eruption of Mount Vesuvius was the most catastrophic in the European continent. The thermal energy released was 100,000 times bigger than the energy released by the Hiroshima-Nagasaki bombings.

In this video you have a brief guide of volcanoes and their different types.

WERE YOU PRAYING AT THE LARES SHRINE?

Roman religion was pantheistic. This means both that Romans adored a great number of deities and that their doctrine regarded the universe as a manifestation of God. God was thought to be everywhere, even in objects. This is exemplified by the cult of the Dii Familiaris or Lares. These protector spirits were assigned to different parts of the house such as the door, the threshold, even the hinge.

Some deities were related to nature like Ceres, goddess of agriculture or Neptune, god of freshwater and the sea. Vulcan was the god of the fire, including the fire of the volcanoes. An annual festival, the Vulcanalia, was held in his honour– by a strange coincidence on August 23, just a day before the eruption of the Vesuvius.

CAUGHT IN THE THROES

A death throe is an intense and violent pain accompanying death, in other words, the agony of death. Hundreds of years after the eruption archaeologists found cavities in the hardened ash were the decomposed bodies had lain for centuries. These cavities were filled with plaster to form figures of victims at the very moment of their deaths, that is to say, caught in the throes.

In the following video you can see how this work was made and what brought to light.

Reconstructing the Faces of Pompeii Victims

The cause of the death of most of the victims was presumably suffocation but in recent years a new theory has arisen.

Investigating How Mt. Vesuvius's Victims Died

ROBERT HARRIS’ POMPEII

The author Robert Harris published the book Pompeii in 2003. It tells the story of the aquarius Attillius trying to find the place where the Aqua Augusta, the aqueduct supplying water to the region, has broken and the reasons for his predecessor’s disappearance. On the way he discovers a corrupted Pompeii and the threat of an imminent disaster. 

The story shows historical credibility and is inspired by actual events, such as the previous earthquake that the city had endured seventeen years before; and people, describing the last hours of Pliny the Elder up to the time of his death.