Photo: Flavio Russo

A team of Italian researchers has concluded that the upper portion of a skull found near Pompeii 100 years ago, may indeed belong to Pliny the Elder. 

In 79 AD, Roman Admiral Gaius Plinius Secundus, known as Pliny the Elder, was with the Imperia fleet in the Bay of Naples on an anti-piracy patrol, when he witnessed the eruption at Mount Vesuvius. He immediately sailed to the port town of Stabiae, about 4.5 km from Pompeii to lead a rescue party for those fleeing the eruption. As he was leading a group of survivors to safety, Pliny was overtaken by a cloud of poisonous gas, and died on the beach. 

In the early 1900s, an engineer named Gennaro Matrone discovered roughly 70 skeletons buried together dating from shortly after the devastation of Pompeii. One of the skeletons was found with a golden triple necklace chain, golden bracelets and a short sword decorated with ivory and seashells. Matrone thought that the body was a good candidate for the Roman admiral. He was, however, met with derision by the scientific community of his day. 

Dejected, Gennaro reburied most of the bones, sold the jewelry and donated the cranium and a jaw bone to Rome’s Museum of the History of the Art of Medicine, where they remained, mostly forgotten, until recently.

Smithsonian reports that a few years ago, researchers led by engineer and military historian Flavio Russo decided to use modern DNA sequencing technology to test Matrone’s original theory in earnest. Their preliminary results, reported last week at a conference in Rome, can’t identify the skull’s original owner conclusively. But its DNA and overall shape fit Pliny’s general profile: a man who could trace some of his lineage to Italy, and who likely died in his forties or fifties.

Also based on the Matrone’s drawings, the jewelry found on the mysterious skeleton as well as the ornate sword are compatible with decorations common among high-ranking Roman navy officers and members of the equestrian class, the second-tier nobility to which Pliny belonged.

The jawbone long associated with the skull, however, was determined to be from another person, possibly of African descent. Researchers speculated that the jaw might be from one of the sailors in the rescue party or from a servant or slave.

The question remains, is it Pliny’s skull?  No one will ever know for sure, but it appears increasingly possible.