Pompeii Casts. Victims 20, 21, 22 and 23 found in the Casa del Criptoportico in July 1914 in the garden area.

Victim number 20

I.6.2 Pompeii. 1914. Plaster cast of fourth victim, number 20, one of the victims found to the north of the other group of two females.

In his group were two other fugitives, but the skeletons were not made into plaster casts.

According to Osanna, Capurso, e Masseroli, the victim is a male over 20 years of age.

See Osanna, N., Capurso, A., e Masseroli, S. M., 2021. I Calchi di Pompei da Giuseppe Fiorelli ad oggi: Studi e Ricerche del PAP 46, p. 362-4.

I.6.2 Pompeii. May 2006. Victim number 20. Plaster cast of one of the fourth victim found to the north of the other group of two females.

Plaster-casts in display/exhibition kiosk near amphitheatre entrance. May 2018.

At the rear of the young woman plaster-cast numbered 10, is the cast of the fourth victim, number 20, from the garden of I.6.2.

Photo courtesy of Buzz Ferebee.

Victim 20 plaster-cast, at rear, is the fourth victim from the garden of I.6.2. May 2018. On display/exhibition kiosk near amphitheatre entrance.

Photo courtesy of Buzz Ferebee.

Plaster-casts in display/exhibition kiosk near amphitheatre entrance. May 2018.

At the rear is the fourth victim's cast from the garden of I.6.2. Courtesy of Buzz Ferebee.

Plaster-cast in display/exhibition kiosk near amphitheatre entrance. May 2018.

Detail of the head of the plaster-cast of victim 20 from the garden of I.6.2. Photo courtesy of Buzz Ferebee.

I.6.2 Pompeii. September 2015. Exhibit from the Summer 2015 exhibition in the amphitheatre.

Plaster-cast of victim number 20 found to the north of the other group of two females in the garden area.

I.6.2 Pompeii. September 2015. Exhibit from the Summer 2015 exhibition in the amphitheatre.

Plaster-cast of victim number 20 found to the north of the other group of two females in the garden area.

Victim numbers 21 and 22

Originally thought to be two females, recent DNA testing has established that they are two unrelated young males.

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 (rear) and 22 (front). 2015. Photo courtesy of Estelle Lazer.

According to Estelle Lazer, Cast Numbers 21 and 22 were embracing but, as they were cast separately, they could enter the gantry of the CT scanner individually.

These two victims have variously been interpreted as two lovers or two women, sometimes as sisters or as a mother and daughter.

The preliminary results of DNA analysis of skeletal samples from these casts indicate that they were two unrelated males.

Victim 21 has an age estimation of fourteen to sixteen years if the victim is a female, and fourteen to nineteen years if the victim is male.

Victim 22 must have been at least seventeen to eighteen years of age and the dentition suggested that this might be a younger adult as the surviving third molars had not erupted.

See Lazer E., et al. 2020. Inside the Casts of the Pompeian Victims: Results from the First Season of the Pompeii Cast Project In 2015. Papers of the British School at Rome.

I.6.2 Pompeii. March 2024. Resin plaster cast of victims 21 (right) and 22 (left) found above the garden area.

Photo courtesy of Giuseppe Ciaramella.

On display in exhibition in Palaestra entitled – “L’altra Pompei, vite comuni all’ombra del Vesuvio”.

I.6.2 Pompeii. March 2024. Resin plaster cast of two victims, 21 and 22, found above the garden area. Photo courtesy of Giuseppe Ciaramella.

On display in exhibition in Palaestra entitled – “L’altra Pompei, vite comuni all’ombra del Vesuvio”.

I.6.2 Pompeii. March 2024. Right hand side view of the cast of victims 21 and 22. Photo courtesy of Giuseppe Ciaramella.

On display in exhibition in Palaestra entitled – “L’altra Pompei, vite comuni all’ombra del Vesuvio”.

I.6.2 Casa del Criptoportico. Garden area. Four casts and skeletons at the excavations of 1914.

According to NdS, casts were made of two females, a young man/boy found to the right/east of the two females and behind to the north a fourth cast.

The fourth cast was in a group with two other victims, but the skeletons were not made into plaster casts.

See Notizie degli Scavi di Antichità, 1914, p.366, Fig. 1.

Originally thought to be two females, recent DNA testing has established that they are two unrelated young males.

I.6.2 Pompeii. May 2006. Summer loggia, looking west towards three display cases containing plaster-casts.  

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 and 22. May 2006. Plaster cast of two victims 21 and 22 found above the garden area.

According to NdS, when excavated, one of the fallen lay on their left side, their head was to the east and their legs were to the west, slightly contracted.

The other lay on their right side with their head on the bosom of the first, with their arms entwined around each other.

See Notizie degli Scavi di Antichità, 1914, Vol. XI, p.262.

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 and 22. December 2019. Victims 21 (rear) and 22 (front).

On display in exhibition “Pompei e Santorini” in Rome, 2019. Photo courtesy of Giuseppe Ciaramella.

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 and 22. December 2019.

On display in exhibition “Pompei e Santorini” in Rome, 2019. Photo courtesy of Giuseppe Ciaramella.

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 and 22. September 2015. Exhibit from the Summer 2015 exhibition in the amphitheatre.

Plaster casts of two victims found in the lapilli above the garden area level.

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 and 22. September 2009. Plaster-cast of two victims from the garden area.

Photographed at “A Day in Pompeii” exhibition at Melbourne Museum. 

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 and 22. September 2009. Rear view of plaster cast of two victims from the garden area.

Originally thought to be two females, recent DNA testing has established that they are two unrelated young males.

Photographed at “A Day in Pompeii” exhibition at Melbourne Museum. 

I.6.2 Pompeii. Victims 21 and 22. Plaster cast of two victims, found in the garden, between 2nd and 21st July 1914.

The casts were formed “with the long and patient work of two valued workmen, Umberto Borelli and Armando Mancini”.

See Notizie degli Scavi di Antichità, 1914, Vol. XI, p. 261. (Fig.5)

I.6.2 Pompeii. 1940. Plaster cast of two victims found in the garden area in 1914. Photo courtesy of Rick Bauer.

Victim number 23

I.6.2 Pompeii. 1914. Plaster-cast of third victim, number 23, a young man/boy, photographed in the garden at time of excavation.

According to Spinazzola, he advanced his companions of misfortune a few steps (no more than 90 cm).

He was a young boy in about fifteen years, with agile and delicate limbs, with elegant and fine ends.

Death had caught him, while, first of all, he hurried south-west to get to the nearest city gate, that of Stabia, both to reach the sea and to flee further to Stabiae or Surrentum.

The heavy rain of ashes, meanwhile, which had taken his breath away, brought him down, and covered him; and he fell as he was on his way, with his right foot forward.

His knees were bent, and as he fell, they crossed each other, while the hands, automatically brought in front of the face in falling face downwards, seem to still grasp in the hot bed of ash.

The body does not show shock, and only the stomach appears a little swollen.

The hands, which are contracted, have short fingers: the joints are very thin.

The feet are small, which, for the first time, have preserved the image of an ancient shoe, as it was in the costume of the 1st century of the Empire.

See Notizie degli Scavi di Antichità, 1914, p. 367-8, fig. 2.

According to Osanna, Capurso, e Masseroli, this victim was a male aged over 20.

See Osanna, N., Capurso, A., e Masseroli, S. M., 2021. I Calchi di Pompei da Giuseppe Fiorelli ad oggi: Studi e Ricerche del PAP 46, p. 371-3.

I.6.2 Pompeii. 1914. Plaster-cast of sole of an ancient shoe on third victim, number 23, a young man.

According to Spinazzola this was in the costume of the 1st century of the Empire.

See Notizie degli Scavi di Antichità, 1914, p. 367-8, fig. 3.

Victim number 23. Piazza Anfiteatro exhibition building. May 2010. Exhibit from the Pompei e il Vesuvio exhibition.

Plaster cast of a young man found in the garden of the House of the Cryptoporticus.

Traces of leather shoes can be seen on the feet of this young man, who was about 15 years old.

Iron nails that reinforced the sole of the shoe were also found in the plaster.

Photo courtesy of Rick Bauer.

Victim number 23. Plaster-cast of young man from garden area of I.6.2. February 2011. Photo courtesy of Michael Binns.

I.6.2 Pompeii. 1940. Victim number 23. Plaster cast of a young man found in the garden of the House of the Cryptoporticus.

Photo courtesy of Rick Bauer.