Mount Vesuvius
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One of its earliest recorded eruptions, in a.d. 79, buried Pompeii, Herculaneum, and Stabiae under cinders, ash, and mud.
It is the only active volcano on the mainland of Europe. (Another, Mount Etna, is on the island of Sicily.)
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
When Mount Vesuvius erupted in 79 C.E., volcanic ash overwhelmed the city and transformed more than a thousand papyrus scrolls in a local library into fragile, charred remains.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 26, 2026
Plinian eruptions represent the most explosive class of volcanic eruptions and are named after Pliny the Elder, who described the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 A.D.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 14, 2026
And when it comes to the legacy of Mount Vesuvius — able to change the sky and move the earth — history encompasses all that’s above and plenty that’s subterranean, too.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 13, 2026
He writes in a wry, amicable style, skillfully layering on his chosen leitmotifs—the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in A.D.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 17, 2025
Newspapers launched crusades against pestilent alleys and excess smoke and identified the worst offenders in print—among them Burnham’s newly opened Masonic Temple, which the Chicago Tribune likened to Mount Vesuvius.
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
