Bodies From Ashes: Life and Death of Ancient Pompeii

How does the author best develop the idea that Giuseppe Fiorelli would be successful in preserving Pompeii?

• by stating that Fiorelli led a skillful team of treasure-hunting excavators

• by describing the steps Fiorelli took to chip away volcanic debris from the plaster people

• by revealing that Fiorelli was an accomplished excavator in the middle of the nineteenth century

• by explaining how Fiorelli had filled spaces of decayed furniture and tree stumps with plaster in the past

What does the author most likely mean when he writes that the victims of Pompeii could be brought back to life?

• Writers added extra details to stories of the victims to make the casts more personal.

• Archaeologists sometimes sculpted a nose or ear to make the casts look more realistic.

• Filling hollow openings with plaster allowed the features of the body to be more easily seen.

• Photographers took creative pictures of the plaster people to evoke strong emotions from viewers.

According to the passage, what determined whether a person’s body left behind a cavity in volcanic material or only a skeleton?

• age and health

• time and location

• distance and shelter

• property and wealth

How does the section “Lives from the Ash” develop the content of the passage?

• It tells stories of the lives of the victims based on details from their casts.

• It reveals eyewitness accounts of the destructive volcanic eruption.

• It shows how the layout of the cryptoporticus protected people.

• It explains that people took their fortunes when escaping.

What is the central idea of the passage?

• The casts of Mount Vesuvius’s victims helped to increase tourism in Pompeii.

• Many people make the journey to the top of Mount Vesuvius even though it is still active

• Around 1,150 human remains have been found at Pompeii as a result of a volcanic explosion.

• Filling hollow spaces with plaster allowed archaeologists to learn more about Pompeii life in AD 79.

How do the photographs and captions give you a better understanding of the plaster casts Fiorelli created in Pompeii.