A peer-reviewed article titled The Tower of the House of the Tiaso: A New Research Project for the Documentation and Digital Reconstruction of the ‘Lost’ Pompeii went online in the official e-journal of the Pompeii excavations, ANSA reported. The study presented the first results of Pompeii Reset, a non-invasive program that used three-dimensional recording and modeling to re-examine the House of the Tiaso.
Researchers placed the project within the rising field of digital archaeology, which sought to recreate the upper stories of Pompeian buildings that collapsed under volcanic ash in 79 CE. Through laser scans, photogrammetry, and archival drawings, the team recorded every surviving fragment of the house, then generated precise digital twins to serve as foundations for virtual reconstructions of vanished balconies, rooms, and towers.
Inside the House of the Tiaso, a monumental staircase ended abruptly. That feature inspired a new hypothesis: it once reached a rooftop tower offering views of the city, the Bay of Naples, and the night sky. Ancient writers described similar platforms, such as the Tower of Maecenas from which Emperor Nero allegedly watched Rome burn, while Pompeian wall paintings routinely showed countryside villas topped by towers, suggesting the motif was familiar to Roman viewers.
“Archaeological research in Pompeii is very complex. Besides field excavations that reveal intact contexts of ancient life, there is also non-invasive research, formed by study and reconstructive hypotheses of what has not been preserved but still completes our knowledge of the site,” said Gabriel Zuchtriegel, director of the Archaeological Park of Pompeii, according to ANSA.
The digital approach also assisted conservation. The same datasets that allowed scholars to imagine missing towers enabled engineers to track subtle shifts in existing walls. “By putting together the data in a 3D digital model, we can develop reconstructive hypotheses that help us understand the experience, spaces, and society of the time,” said Zuchtriegel, according to Adnkronos.
Recent excavations funded by the Archaeological Park supplied new measurements, pottery groups, and plaster impressions now folded into the study. Insula 10 of Regio IX, the block containing the House of the Tiaso, served as a laboratory for the method, engaging park staff, senior scholars, and dozens of students from Humboldt University of Berlin under the coordination of Professor Susanne Muth.
In Roman Campania, upwardly mobile families often built towers as public statements of influence and prosperity. Restoring those vertical elements in virtual form revealed both how far the owners could see and how far they wished to be seen, offering modern audiences a clearer sense of daily life in Pompeii’s lost upper floors.
The preparation of this article relied on a news-analysis system.