One of the many inscriptions preserved in Pompeii, the Roman city buried by the eruption of Vesuvius in 79 AD, announces that the nearby amphitheater at Cumae will offer “cruciarri ven(atio) et vela,” crucifixions and venatio — hunting shows, in which sometimes humans hunted animals and sometimes animals hunted humans — and canopies, indicating that the killing would be watched in comfortable shade. With its frescoes, mansions, thermal baths, restaurants, laundries, and temples, Pompeii reflects the sophistication and beauty of the Roman world, which in the southern Italian city seems strangely close to the present. But at the same time, as in graffiti number CIL IV 9983a, it also conceals a brutal world, marked by the cruelty of slavery and the violence that permeated many aspects of daily life.
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