pompeii - past continuous

Pompeii: The Lost City

Pompeii was an ancient city in southern Italy. The remains of the settlement are located near to Naples. The city of Pompeii was built at the foot of the volcano,Mount Vesuvius. Mt Vesuvius (erupt) August 24th, 79 AD. The eruption .(burry) the city under volcanic ashes and cinders and (expose) the citys 20,000 inhabitants to blasts of hot air with temperatures of up to 250 degrees C. The eruption of Vesuvius was quite sudden, and many of Pompeiis inhabitants (lose ) their lives while going about their daily work. In the tavern, a young man . (drink) a glass of wine at the bar. In the bakery, two women .(buy) loaves and honey cakes. ln the road a crowd of children (play) a game with stones. In one of the houses, a woman.(write) a letter. The workmen .(paint) pictures of the countryside on the walls and a dog (sleep) in the corner.Pliny the Younger, a Roman writer, witnessed the eruption of Mount Vesuvius. He .. (hear) an explosion and the sky .. (go) dark. After 800 years, Mount Vesuvius had woken up. The ground . (shake) violently and everybody .. (think) it ..(be) an earthquake, but they (be) wrong. It ..(be) the volcano. Fire and lava .. (burst) out of the top. Black clouds of hot ash (fill) the sky and the wind .(take) them over Pompeii. Pliny .. (see) how people were trying to escape. The children (cry) for their parents. Men, women, children and animals .. (run) through the streets. Most of them . (escape) but two thousand die.The city was hidden for almost 1700 years. In 1748, a man digging in his garden . (find) one of the old walls of Pompeii. At last, Pompeii had been rediscovered. All the stones and dust were carefully removed and the remains of Pompeii were revealed. Underneath the ash, everything in Pompeii (remain) as it was at the time of the eruption. Many of the buildings were preserved. It was as if the city had been frozen in time for almost 2000 years. As a result, archaeologists (find) clues as to how people .. (live) in the past. Even though it . (be) a terrible disaster for the people of Pompeii, the remains of their city provide us with important information about life in ancient Rome.