On August 24, 79 AD, the town of Herculaneum was destroyed in a cataclysmic volcanic eruption of Mt. Vesuvius, along with the neighboring town of Pompeii. Herculaneum has been preserved like no other site in the world, not even nearby Pompeii. The city was buried beneath 16 meters of ash and mud during the eruption and when the ancient site was rediscovered in the 18th century, it was found that the layer of rock had preserved the remains of Herculaneum incredibly well over the last two millennia.