Fresco with a Landscape (detail), Roman, first century BC. Plaster and pigment, 65 x 84 cm. Museo Archeologico Nazionale di Napoli. Photo: Giorgio Albano
Buried by Vesuvius: Treasures from the Villa dei Papiri
GETTY VILLA
Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays, through October 28
The Getty Villa
Free | Advance Villa entry ticket required
Get free tickets to the Getty Villa
Get free tickets to the Getty Villa
The Getty Villa is modeled on the Villa dei Papiri at Herculaneum. Buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79, the ancient villa was rediscovered and explored by subterranean tunnels in the 1750s and '60s and was partially re-excavated in the 1990s and early 2000s. It has yielded colorful marble and mosaic floors, frescoed walls, a large collection of bronze and marble statuary, and a unique library of more than a thousand papyrus scrolls. This exhibition presents many of the most spectacular finds and examines attempts to unroll and decipher the carbonized papyri.
