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 CHAPTE R 8

Herculaneum
Christopher W. Schmidt Ph.D.1, Elizabeth Oakley B.A.1, Ruggero D’Anastasio
Ph.D.2, Rebecca Brower B.A.1, Ashley Remy B.A.1 and Joan Viciano Ph.D.2
1
Department of Anthropology, Indiana Prehistory Laboratory, University of Indianapolis, Indianapolis,
IN, USA, 2Museo Universitario, Università degli Studi ‘G. d’Annunzio’ di Chieti-Pescara, Italy

The patterning of osseous thermal damage records the history of an individual’s exposure
to extreme heat in terms of temperature, atmosphere and duration (DeHaan, 2015; Symes
et al., 2015). Research has shown that bone changes colour and fractures as it increases in
temperature. When it exceeds 300°C, it changes from a brown to a charred black appearance
and may have microfractures (Schmidt and Uhlig, 2012). As it nears 600°C, the bone
transitions from black to bluish grey and fractures primarily longitudinally and transversely;
as it approaches 900°C, it transitions from grey to a calcined white and is reduced to
fragments with intersecting heat-related fractures (e.g., Symes et al., 2015; Walker et al.,
2008). These changes in colour and their associated fracture patterns are well-known and
help analysts reconstruct temperatures and history of the fires that have intentionally or
unintentionally consumed humans.
In the current study, patterning of thermal alterations in human bone is used to understand
the circumstances of the thermal exposure suffered by the victims of Mount Vesuvius, which
erupted in ad 79, killing thousands of people in villages and towns near its base, including
Pompeii and Herculaneum. The people of the latter site experienced a wave of extremely
hot gas and ash, called a pyroclastic surge, that rushed from the volcano’s vent to the town
in just a matter of minutes. Most of the recovered victims were found on the beach and in
adjacent boathouses where presumably they were waiting for boats to take them to safety.
Interestingly, although most skeletons have evidence of thermal alteration (mostly lightly
burned and brown areas), only a few have evidence of calcination. In fact, the degree of
burning on many of the victims is highly variable and fracturing is nearly absent. It is argued
here that soft tissue shielding, the huddled nature of the victims at the time of the surge and
the complex nature of the surge itself led to a distribution of thermal damage on the skeletons
that belied the surge’s maximum temperature.

The Analysis of Burned Human Remains.

© 2015
2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. 149
150  Chapter 8

Background
Located on the Campanian volcanic arc near Italy’s Bay of Naples, Herculaneum was a
small coastal town of a few thousand people (Figure 8.1). It was in the shadow of a large
stratovolcano, Vesuvius, sitting only 7 km from its vent. The town’s nearly instantaneous
destruction provides a remarkable view into the daily lives of Roman people as well
as an amazing opportunity to study the human remains of a group of people who died
simultaneously. The eruption of ad 79, which not only devastated Herculaneum and
Pompeii but also a number of small villages between the two, was not the first deadly
eruption to impact the Bay of Naples. Pumice and ash deposits around Mt. Vesuvius indicate
that an eruption occurred sometime between 1500 and 1000 bc, preserving a Bronze Age
settlement near Nola in a similar manner to Pompeii. This eruption is known as the Avellino
eruption and volcanologists and archaeoanthropologists believe it was more devastating
than the one that buried Herculaneum (Mastrolorenzo et al., 2006). The area was abandoned
for centuries, but eventually was repopulated and in 89 bc, Herculaneum became a
Roman city. In ad 62, a major earthquake caused significant damage. Seventeen years

Figure 8.1
Relative locations of Herculaneum, Vesuvius and Pompeii on the Bay of Naples.
 Herculaneum 151

later, in ad 79, Vesuvius erupted again. That eruption made history, in part, because Pliny the
Younger witnessed and documented the events as they unfolded.
After a series of powerful earthquakes the day before, on August 24, the volcano erupted
and filled the sky with gas and ash. The ejected material, however, at times led to pyroclastic
surges, which is what devastated Herculaneum. Surges form in many ways, but a common
manner for their occurrence is when gases and accompanying debris lose their vertical
buoyancy and fall to earth, where they skim across the ground, at times, in excess of
160 km/h (Branney and Kokelaar, 2002). Pyroclastic surges are less dense than pyroclastic
flows but, nonetheless, are capable of transporting debris and trees. At least six pyroclastic
surges hit Herculaneum the day after the eruption began (Capasso, 2001). Surge temperatures
in general range between 300°C and 900°C (Branney and Kokelaar, 2002). Estimates for
the surge that hit Herculaneum usually center around 450°C (e.g., Kent et al., 1981;
Capasso, 2001).
The first surge to roll through Herculaneum hit around midnight at an estimated speed of
162 km/h (Mastrolorenzo et al., 2001). It killed everyone who had not yet fled, including
those huddled inside boathouses (Figure 8.2). Because surges are fast and light, it likely
continued unabated through the town and into the Bay of Naples. The power of the surge
was enough to damage but not topple buildings. Fragments of statuary and building materials
were found among the surge debris and many of the victims looked as if they were knocked
flat (Capasso, 2000, 2001).

Figure 8.2
Boathouses where people of Herculaneum took refuge just prior to the pyroclastic surge
that killed them.
152  Chapter 8

At least 300 people were still waiting to escape by boat when the first surge engulfed
Herculaneum. By then, the people must have been aware of the seriousness of the eruption
because most of the town had been evacuated. Subsequent surges rolled through Herculaneum
but the population was already dead. In the end, more than 20 m of ash and debris covered the
site. It is not possible to detect or distinguish osseous damage caused by any surge other than
the first one to hit the people. Perhaps the later surges served to maintain or insulate the heat
that surrounded the remains for some time (see Capasso, 2001).
Although archaeological evidence shows Romans returned to the city of Pompeii to loot the
town’s remnants, Herculaneum was forgotten. Major excavations began in the 1980s after
human remains were discovered during the construction of a drainage tunnel in the modern
city of Ercolano, which was built directly over Herculaneum. The excavations were led by Dr
Sara Bisel, who uncovered approximately 150 individuals. The remains unearthed by Bisel
are currently housed at the University Museum, State University ‘G. d’Annunzio’, Chieti-
Pescara. Additional excavations years after Bisel’s work led to the recovery of an additional
approximately 150 skeletons (e.g., Mastrolorenzo et al., 2001).

Objective
The current study seeks to understand the circumstances of the pyroclastic surge as it is
indicated on the skeletons. Although it is clear the people died virtually instantly, it is not
clear what effect the surge had on them as it moved across the beach and into the boathouses.
Specifically, this project seeks to determine the bones that were most thermally altered,
the percentage of people with thermal damage, the role, if any, of tissue shielding and the
maximum temperature of the event as indicated by the bone.

Materials
The study includes all of the crania and 98 complete skeletons of the 150 individuals
housed in Chieti (it is hoped that the remaining postcrania will be studied in the near future,
although for the current study the existing sample size is sufficient). The sample includes
people found in the boathouses as well as on the beach. Unfortunately, the location of the
original archaeology notes is unknown, so we are aware of the specific locations of only
seven individuals. Therefore, emphasis is placed on the patterning of thermal damage among
the population as a whole. The study group includes infants through old adults and males
(n = 74) and females (n = 63) (Table 8.1).

Table 8.1 Herculaneum population (n = 150) by age group.

Subadult Young Adult Middle Adult Old Adult
55 49 34 12
Ages from Capasso (2001).
 Herculaneum 153

Methods
Analysis involved using heat-related changes in colour and fracturing following guidelines
discussed by Symes and colleagues (2015) and Walker et al. (2008) to document the location
and size of all burned and unburned areas on all bones. However, the Herculaneum people
exhibited a colour not usually described by analysts. The new colour, called ‘mottled’, is a
white tan with brown and grey spots (Figure 8.3). It was associated with areas presumably
exposed to low temperatures and precedes brown on our colour scale (see Table 8.2). The
other heat-related colours were brown, black, blue-grey and white.
Thermally induced fractures we documented included longitudinal, transverse, curvilinear
transverse and step. We also documented delamination (the loss of the cranial outer
table) and warping. In addition to thermally related changes, we documented taphonomic
damage, including staining caused by iron from the surge debris, staining from the ash,
fusion of clothing and metals to the bone and staining caused by adhesives used for cranial
reconstructions in the 1980s and 1990s. Finally, we documented nonthermal fractures
including those that occurred at or around the time of death as well as those that occurred
well after the bodies were buried.

Figure 8.3
Lightly thermally altered bone termed ‘mottled’ because of the splotchy nature of the colour
changes (subadult femur).

Table 8.2 Heat-related colours in bone.

Colour Temperature Source
a
Mottled 0–100°C This chapter
Brown 100–300°C Walker et al. (2008)
Black ~300°C Walker et al. (2008)
Blue-grey ~600°C Walker et al. (2008)
White ~900°C Walker et al. (2008)
a
Estimate by the authors.
154  Chapter 8

Results
Colour

Nearly every individual had some evidence of thermal exposure (96.6%, 114 of 149 [one
skull was too covered with consolidant for colour determination]). For most adults, their
bones were either unburned or mottled, meaning for much of the population only a few bones
were exposed to high temperatures for a period of time long enough to remove soft tissues.
Mottled bones suggest the bones only reached a temperature of, at best, 100–200°C.
The next most common colour was brown. Fifty-four of 149 (36.2%) individuals exhibited
at least some brown bones. It was common for brown bones to have superficial charring.
At first, this superficial charring was thought to be blackened bone, which would indicate
burning beyond the colour brown. In some places the superficial charring had flaked off the
bones, exposing brown bone underneath (Figure 8.4A). Thus, superficial charring was not
burned bone, but instead burned soft tissue that formed a thin film over the bone. The most
common places for the superficial charring were the skull, both inside and out, and the ventral
aspect of the pelvis and thorax. Numerous people had superficial charring inside their crania,
even though their external crania were only brown. Endocranial black stains often covered
approximately half of the internal surface and usually the boundary of the stain was abrupt
like a coffee stain inside a mug. It became clear that these dark stains were the result of soft
tissues liquefying and settling inside the skulls, with the stains indicating each skull’s position
soon after death (Figure 8.4B). Thus, if a skull had its occipital down, then the pooling filled

Figure 8.4
(A) Charred soft tissue on brown bone. Notice the evidence of tissue pooling in the low spots of the
ilium and sacrum and no charring of trabeculae (arrow). (B) Individual E32 cranium viewed from
its base with a stark dark line on the endocranial surface possibly indicating pooled fluids within the
skull.
 Herculaneum 155

the back of the cranium. If the skull was on its side, then the down side was stained black.
The soft tissues pooled inside complete crania, but there are examples of the dark staining
‘exuding’ from sutures, indicating that it drained out of some crania while the tissues were
still hot.
Just over one-quarter (28.0%) of the skeletons had evidence of charring, where the bones
were truly blackened (Figure 8.5A). Of those, none had their entire skeleton charred. In
fact, of the 42 people with some evidence of charring, only one had it present throughout
his skeleton. This individual, E121, had charred arms and legs that looked as if they were
exposed to an open flame; there is no doubt his bones reached at least 300°C. Interestingly,
there is no evidence that his remains got hotter than 300°C, implying the fire was short-lived.
Other skeletons with charring tended to have it limited to the cranium and/or extremities.
Skeleton E133 has a charred skull as well as charred soft tissues present on and around the
teeth. The incisors had small enamel cracks, which is further evidence that his skull reached
300°C. In contrast, most of the skulls at Herculaneum lack thermal damage to the teeth.
Bones with blue-grey colouration were rare and were usually cranial. Five adult and three
subadult crania had patches of blue-grey (5.3%). No skull was entirely blue-grey. In fact,
blue-grey areas were localised, usually on the side or the top of the cranium or appeared
as small patches on long bones (Figure 8.5B). A few subadult crania had some grey areas
on their inner surfaces. This implies that the unfused bones collapsed during the surge and
exposed endocranial surfaces directly to the surge heat. Blue-grey bones are thought to have
reached temperatures of approximately 600°C.

Figure 8.5
(A) Charred pedal bones. Notice the trabecular bone is charred. (B) Grey area on distal long bone
fragment. (C) Localised calcined area with longitudinal fracture on distal tibia.
156  Chapter 8

Table 8.3 Percentage of people achieving each colour (the total

percentages exceed 100 because people with higher temperatures also
exhibited lower temperatures).
Colour % of Individuals Exhibiting Colour
Mottled 96.0
Brown 36.2
Black 28.0
Blue-grey 5.3
White 15.3

We found white, or calcined, bones in just 4 adults and 19 subadults (15.3%). Like blue-
grey, white was found in small, local patches; no single bone was fully calcined. In fact,
white bone was limited to the crania and tibiae (Table 8.3). The location of the white patches
is significant because they only occur on the bones that are the shallowest in the body. In
places, the cranium and tibia are covered with only approximately 1 cm of soft tissues; this
means that it would not take long for very high temperatures to expose the underlying bone.
Calcined bone was confirmed only when blue-grey colouration also was present and at least
some heat-related fracturing accompanied the calcined area (Figure 8.5C). It is important
to note that the calcined patches were rather superficial; they only extended 1 mm or so into
the bone. Deep to the calcined area, the bone was less thermally altered. Nonetheless, these
calcined bones may have reached temperatures at or above 700°C, which is the minimum
temperature at which bone turns white according to Walker et al. (2008). A future publication
will list the colour reached for each bone of every person studied.

Fractures
Heat-related fracturing was rare. In just a few instances was it documented and it
accompanied bones that were brown, black, blue-grey or white. Fractures tended to be
shallow and jagged. Large longitudinal and transverse fractures were nearly absent; instead,
fractures appeared as small ephemeral longitudinal cracks and minor checking. Delamination
and warping were more common; cranial delamination occurred on 11 skulls. The heat
was enough to boil fluids and some skulls have delamination of their external tables, but
most crania remained intact during the surge. In fact, most crania were fractured more
by the weight of the ash well after the event than by the surge itself. The exceptions are
a small number of crania that may have fractured directly as a result of the surge. Recall
that the surge could have hit speeds around 162 km/h (100 mi/h). By the time it reached
the beach, it would have contained rock and ash from the volcano as well as bricks, stones,
ceramics, glass, cement and other cultural items from the town (see Capasso, 2001). It is no
surprise then to find that some individuals suffered broken bones and perhaps even some
 Herculaneum 157

Figure 8.6
(A) Endocranial orange staining. (B) Ectocranial iron staining.

disarticulation as a direct result of the surge. The few individuals who suffered perimortem
trauma presumably were at the beach at the time of the eruption. It is not clear at this time if
some people were transported to the beach by the surge.

Taphonomy
Most taphonomic changes in colour were thermally related. One colour that appeared frequently
was orange. It is not an indicator of bone temperature but its ubiquity made us consider its
origin, nonetheless. Currently, the belief is that the orange resulted from staining related to iron
present in the surge debris, although some thermally related orange staining is present. For
example, individual E9 has an endocranial orange stain in the same orientation as seen in skulls
having black stains (Figure 8.6A). It may be that the endocranial orange resulted from pooling
of endocranial fluids and soft tissue that did not reach a temperature high enough to experience
charring. The taphonomic ectocranial and postcranial orange stains are somewhat darker
158  Chapter 8

than the endocranial orange; it is often speckled and gives the appearance that millimetre- to
centimetre-scale particles were packed against the bone (Figure 8.6B). Larger iron fragments
have been recovered from the ash that came from the town of Herculaneum. Chemical studies
are underway and it appears the ash contained high levels of iron.

Maximum Temperature and Tissue Shielding

In any burning event one must consider the manners in which soft tissues, structures like walls
and floors, and debris protect bones from the heat. Based upon the relationship between bone
colour and temperature, the highest temperature suggested by the Herculaneum bones was
at least 700°C and perhaps as high as 900°C (e.g., Walker et al., 2008). This determination
stems from the few instances of calcined crania and tibiae. Bones will not calcine unless these
temperatures are reached (see Beach et al., Chapter 7 of this volume; Devlin and Herrmann,
2015; Walker et al., 2008). The localised nature and rarity of the calcined elements indicate
that, although the surge had high temperatures, the duration of that heat was only long enough
to burn through the thinnest areas of soft tissue. The underlying bone calcined, but even in
these instances only the outermost layers of bone were affected. Thus, the heat did not last long
enough to burn the bone through. Had the temperature of the surge been far lower, perhaps 300–
400°C, then the bones would not have turned blue-grey or white at all. Therefore, the maximum
surge temperature estimates of 600–900°C appear consistent with the thermal damage on the
Herculaneum skeletons. (Capasso, 2001, noted the temperature did not exceed 1000°C, which
is the approximate melting point of gold and silver, both of which were found among the dead.)
This estimate, however, is only for the surge (or surges) that immediately impacted the people.
At first, it appears the maximum temperature estimate herein is inconsistent with an earlier
estimate based upon paleomagnetism, where Kent et al. (1981) determined the maximum
surge temperature was no greater than 450°C. Their study focused on signatures in the
ash itself rather than the human remains. Another study, also looking at skeletons from
Herculaneum (but not the same ones we studied), agrees with our findings that the bones
must have been exposed to temperatures above Kent et al.’s estimate. Mastrolorenzo et al.
(2001, 2006) found blue-grey and calcined bones, just as we did, but they also documented
breakdown of the bone microstructure and DNA destruction. They noted the skeletons in the
boathouses were fully articulated and in natural positions, indicating the victims died before
they could react to the heat; overall, they determined the temperature must have approached
600°C (Mastrolorenzo et al., 2001).
It is possible, however, to reconcile the lower temperature estimate coming from the ash and
the higher temperatures indicated by the human remains. The leading edge of a pyroclastic
surge tends to contain very hot gases from the volcano and these gases are the first aspects of
the surge to make impact. As the surge continues, the ambient temperature drops somewhat
from the initial rush of gas as ash and debris settles to the ground. This scenario is recorded in
 Herculaneum 159

the people of Herculaneum who indicate a brief exposure to temperatures hot enough to calcine
bone. After several minutes the temperature dropped so that it no longer was possible for bones
to calcine, although the insulating nature of the ash fall likely maintained temperatures hot
enough to char tissues and bones for some time. In this light, Kent et al.’s (1981) maximum
temperature estimate of 450°C for the ash layers is not contradictory to our findings.
The scenario described here also matches models currently proposed that estimate eruption
potentials for Vesuvius. Surges tend to lose energy as they roll down volcano slopes and
across the landscape, but maintaining a high temperature a long distance from the vent is
possible. In their modelling of damage scenarios, Zuccaro et al. (2008) determined that
pyroclastic flows with temperatures ranging from 600°C to 820°C are possible 7 km or more
from Vesuvius’ vent.
An alternative explanation for the higher osteology-based temperature estimates is that the
surge ignited the people’s clothing and, therefore, did not need to be extremely hot because
most fibres catch fire at approximately 400°C. However, recall that most of the calcined
elements were on skulls, whereas the clothing presumably covered the torsos. The calcined
elements are more associated with areas of body covered by thin layers of soft tissue than
with areas covered by clothing; thus, the most parsimonious explanation, based upon
patterning of the thermal damage, is that the surge itself provided the temperatures necessary
to calcine the human bones.
While our study agrees in many ways with that of Mastrolorenzo et al. (2001, 2006), we
disagree on two particular points. First, they noted that skulls exploded. This does not appear
to be the case in this sample, and it has been shown that crania do not explode when exposed
to high heat (see Symes et al., 2015, for a detailed discussion). Fire and heat are destructive
and will fracture skulls and, as expected, a small number of people at Herculaneum suffered
perimortem cranial injury. In general, the Herculaneum crania either are complete or are
fractured in such a way that it is clear the fractures occurred postmortem from the weight of
the ash. There is no instance where skull fragments were found widely scattered. In burning
bodies, rapidly expanding fluids in the skull will increase intracranial pressure as thermal
energy increases. The skull, however, will eventually vent gases and fluids through various
openings, or through cranial areas compromised by heat since much of the upper cranial vault
burns away long before the rest of the skull bone becomes exposed directly to heat. Modern
commercial cremations have been observed numerous times and even though those bodies are
exposed to temperatures two- to three-times as high as what was experienced at Herculaneum,
there are no accounts of skulls exploding (e.g., Bohnert et al., 1998; Symes et al., 2015).
Moreover, recall that the Herculaneum skulls had intracranial fluid stains. Clearly the fluids
pooled because the crania were complete well after death.
Mastrolorenzo et al. (2001) also stated that the people of Herculaneum suffered vaporisation
of their soft tissues. If the term vaporise is meant to indicate a nearly instantaneous removal of
160  Chapter 8

soft tissues by the heat, this is not supported by the current study. The burn patterning indicates
that soft tissues remained after the surge hit and protected bones from thermal damage, in some
instances, almost completely. Significant thermal damage to the bones is absent where tissues
are deepest and is found most often in areas where tissues are shallow. Clearly, soft tissues
eventually burned away, but this took some time and followed predictable patterns (see Symes
et al., 2015). How long it took is unknown, but some recent experimental work sheds light on
tissue shielding. Using chickens, Brower et al. (2013) exposed soft tissues of known depth to an
open fire for 1 h at temperatures between 600°C and 700°C. They documented thermal changes
at specific locations at 5-min intervals. On average, it took around 15 min to burn through 1 cm
of tissue. This rate is probably somewhat slower than what has been reported for commercial
cremations where high temperatures completely surround the subject. In their study, Bohnert
et al. (1998) found that at 600–800°C, a human body reduces to calcined bones in about 2 h.
Yet, Brower and Bohnert et al. both demonstrate that several minutes will pass before all soft
tissues are burned away, even in circumstances and at temperatures intended to rapidly and
fully consume a person. Thus, it likely took several minutes for the people of Herculaneum to
have their soft tissues consumed by the heat; they were not instantly skeletonised.
Tissue shielding is not the only shielding agent present in a catastrophic fire (e.g., Symes
et al., 2015). At Herculaneum, additional shielding agents would have been body positions,
bodies on top of bodies, the boathouse walls and roofs and debris from the surge. A follow-
up publication will provide detailed study of these elements, but it is clear these additional
shielding agents were factors in the osseous burn patterning. For example, people in the
boathouses were found grouped tightly together and some people were found atop others.

Conclusion
A pyroclastic surge with probable temperatures of at least 700°C or higher killed the people
of Herculaneum. Overall, 96.6% of the people had thermal damage, but only 15.3% had
calcined bones; most of those were children. Most skeletons were burned only partially
because their soft tissues took the brunt of the heat and their bodies were positioned so
that some skeletal elements were shielded from the highest temperatures. Calcined bones
were limited to those elements covered by very little soft tissue (e.g., adult tibiae and adult
and subadult crania). It appears the surge instantly killed everyone on the beach and in the
boathouses. As the ash and debris covered the people, the temperatures surrounding the
bodies steadily dropped but remained hot enough to burn through soft tissues and expose
bone. Eventually, temperatures dropped to a point where bones mottled as if being slow-
cooked. There is no evidence for exploding skulls or instantaneous tissue vaporisation. The
evidence from the patterning of the osseous thermal damage indicates the ad 79 eruption of
Vesuvius was at the high end of previous estimates but the damage to the bodies was less
dramatic than what was anticipated or previously described.
 Herculaneum 161

Acknowledgements
We thank Luigi Capasso, Gregory Reinhardt and Giuseppe Vercellotti. Support for travel to Italy came via a
University of Indianapolis Summer Research Grant (to C.W.S.).

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