Your annual reminder that although it is claimed, today probably wasn’t the day that Vesuvius erupted in AD 79 burying the landscape in volcanic debris and covering the Roman cities of #Pompeii and #Herculaneum as well as other settlements and rural villas in the area.

Pliny the Younger wrote letters to Tacitus, detailing his eye-witness account of the AD79 eruption and it is from this that the 24th August is known.
However, we only have later transcribed copies of these letters & the eruption date on each version varies.

The 9th century copy of Pliny’s letter, the Codex Laurentianus Mediceus 47.36, which includes the 24th Aug date became canon in academia as it was deemed the most complete version. However, other copies carry dates such as 23rd November and 30th October.
Image: Pappalardo 1990.

A charcoal inscription uncovered in #Pompeii contains the date ‘XVI K Nov’—16 days before the Kalends of Nov—equating to 17th Oct. Though no year is mentioned, the impermanence of charcoal suggests this could have been written close to the time of eruption.
Image: @MassimoOsanna

However, the most persuasive archaeological evidence we have to indicate the eruption may have been later in the year, are ripe pomegranates. These generally ripen & are harvested in autumn not August pointing to an eruption in October.

Evidence from the Vesuvian sites also suggests that the Autumn grape harvest had just taken place as the remnants of fruit from a recent wine pressing were found & some of the dolia—the large sunken terracotta storage jars—were supposedly full of wine at the time of the eruption.

This series of blog posts by Pedar Foss are wonderful for understanding how we came to have multiple copies of Pliny the Younger’s letters to Tacitus and what he actually wrote in them.
https://quemdixerechaos.com/2012/11/19/translatingplinypt1/amp/?__twitter_impression=true

So I think we can all regroup in Autumn on any number of days to commemorate the still unknown exact anniversary eruption of Vesuvius in AD 79.

One thing we can be sure of regarding the 24th August and Pompeii is that during WW2 in 1944 this was the day the first Allied bombs were dropped on the ancient site hitting and damaging the Roman Forum.