Stunning works of art have been discovered during the latest excavations at Pompeii, the ancient Roman city that was buried in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79.
Archaeologists say that these frescoes are among the most beautiful that have been found in the ruins of the ancient city.
Characters from Greek mythology, such as the beautiful Helen of Troy, are depicted on the high black walls of the large banquet hall.
The floor of the room is covered with a large mosaic made of more than a million white tiles.
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A third of the lost city has yet to be cleared.
The goal of the current extensive excavations is to emphasize Pompeii's position as the world's greatest window into the life of the people and the culture of the Roman Empire.
On April 11, the director of the areological park Dr. Gabriel Cuhtrigel presented the "black room" exclusively to the BBC.
The dark color of the walls was probably chosen to hide the smoke deposits created by the lamps used during the parties after sunset.
"Under the twinkling light, the pictures would almost come alive," he says.
Two frescoes dominate.
On one, the god Apollo tries to seduce the prophetess Cassandra, who according to tradition rejected him, which is why her later prophecies were neglected.
The tragic consequence is told in the second picture, in which Prince Paris meets the beautiful Jelena, and Cassandra knows that this love will doom them all in the Trojan War that then broke out.
A large residential and business block, known as "Area 9", is being cleaned of a several meter thick layer of pumice and ash thrown out by Mount Vesuvius almost 2.000 years ago.
The team working on the excavation has to do all the work quickly to protect possible new discoveries, and everything they find is transferred to storage.
The frescoes, which must not be moved, are attached to the wall with plaster glue.
Scaffolding was installed to carry out the necessary work, and a temporary roof was erected.
Chief restorer Dr. Roberta Prisko spent the whole day trying to prevent the arch from collapsing.
"The responsibility is huge; look at me," she says, emphasizing that she is under a lot of stress.
"We have passion and great love for what we do, because what we discover and protect is for the joy of future generations."
Area 9 is a detective story for archaeologists to solve.
During excavations at the end of the 19th century, a laundry was discovered.
The latest excavations revealed a bakery right next to the laundry, as well as a large residential building with a black room.
The team of archaeologists is convinced that the three areas are physically connected by water supply and certain passages, but also that they had the same owner.
The identity of that person is indicated by the initials "ARV" on numerous inscriptions.
The letters were found on the walls and even on the millstone in the bakery.
"We know who ARV is: he is Aulus Rustius Verus," explains archaeologist Sophie Hay.
"We know about him from other materials related to political life in Pompeii.
"He is a politician and extremely rich.
"We think he was the owner of the fancy house behind the bakery and laundromat."
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What is obvious is that at the time of the eruption of the volcano, renovation works were being carried out on all the buildings.
The workers who fled the city left neatly laid roof tiles, buckets full of mortar, as well as trowels and picks, although the wooden handles had long since rotted away.
Dr. Lia Trapani records all the excavation data.
From one of the thousand or more artifact boxes in her storage, she pulls out a turquoise coupe-shaped object.
"It's a plumb bob."
As it is today, builders in the Roman Empire used it to level vertical surfaces.
Holding a weight in his hands, he says: "If you look closely, you can see a piece of string."
Dr. Alessandro Russo is the second lead archaeologist on the dig.
He wants to show us a fresco on the ceiling of a room.
The discovered parts of the fresco that were broken during the eruption are arranged on a large table like a puzzle.
After he sprinkled a little water on the pieces of plaster, the details and colors came to life.
There are scenes with Egyptian characters, food and flowers, and some striking theatrical masks.
"This is my favorite find during this dig, because it is complex and rare.
"It is a high-quality work done for a man of high status," he explains.
But if the fresco on the ceiling of the great building can be described as exceptional, the knowledge about the bakery so far speaks of the brutality of life in Pompeii - slavery.
It is obvious that the workers were kept locked up in horrible conditions, and that they lived like the donkeys that turned the millstones.
It seems that their room had only one window with iron bars to prevent escape.
Also, the only skeletons discovered during this excavation were found in the bakery.
These are the skeletons of two adults and a child crushed by rocks.
It is assumed that they may have been slaves who were captured and could not escape the eruption.
But that's just a guess.
"When we excavate, we think about what we found," explains one of the leading archaeologists, Dr. Gennaro Jovino.
"It's similar to a theater stage - you have the scenery, the scenery and the culprit, and in this case it's Vesuvius.
"An archeologist must be skilled at filling in the gaps - piecing together a story about missing roles, families and children, people who are no longer there."
Additional reporting: Tony Jolliffe
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