Discovery of loaves of bread baked 1800 years ago, at Pompeii
Pompeii was preserved, and not destroyed. To its inhabitant, on the day of the eruption it was destroyed; but for us who now look upon it, and study its history, it has been preserved. ... There was one oven which remained uninjured. It had two openings; the loaves went into one of these, in the shape of dough, and were taken out at the other opening baked. Everything seemed to be in a fine state of preservation, and the oven could be made use of again for a repetition of its work of eighteen centuries ago. The oven when found was full of bread. Some of the loaves were stamped to indicate that they were of wheat flour, and others to indicate that they were of bran flour. The oven had been carefully sealed, and there were no ashes in it. Eighty-one loaves were found in it, a little stale, to be sure, and very hard and black, but lying in the same order in which they were placed on the 23d of November in the year 79.