Italian archaeologist Giovanni Girella held a plaster cast of a child in his arms. (Photo: Chinadaily.com) Photo Gallery>>>

¡¡  BEIJING, Feb. 7 -- Pompeii, the Roman city ruined in the first century AD during a volcanic eruption, displayed Tuesday in Beijing how striking the power of tragedy can be.

    Everyone present held their breath as Italian archaeologist Giovanni Girella knelt to lift a plaster cast of a child out of a wooden box before holding it in his arms.

    It was one of the relics that arrived in Beijing yesterday for the first exhibition of its kind in the Chinese capital.

    The 6-year-old child had been buried beneath meters of volcano ash with his brother and parents in his family house for 1,800 years. He was dug out in the 19th century during an excavation that started in 1748 the year of the city's accidental discovery and continues till now.

    Casts were made of the family of four by filling the cavities in the ashes with liquid chalk, like the other 2,000 of the 20,000 victims of the eruption of Mount Vesuvius on August 24, 79 AD.

    Now, they will be displayed along with another family of eight and a dog, and more than 480 pieces of artworks at the Millennium Art Museum of the China Millennium Monument.

    The exhibition, The End of Pompeii: Stories from a Volcano Eruption, will be open from Feb. 15 to May 7; and "provide an extraordinarily detailed insight into the life of a city at the height of the Roman Empire," said Wang Limei, curator of the museum.

    It is also "the first time that relics from Pompeii will be seen in China," said Stefania Giudice, fresco conservationist with the Naples National Archaeological Museum, who accompanied the first batch of the relics.

    The Pompeian art on display is on loans from the Naples museum and the Pompeii Archaeological Administration in Italy. They include Roman sculptures, jewels and well-preserved frescos.

    The frescos, which shed light on everyday life of Pompeii, have been hailed as a major advance in art history with the innovation of the Pompeian Styles, featuring luxury and eroticism.

    One example is a 610-gram gold bracelet, which used to be worn on the upper arm of the child's mother. Snake shaped, it has at the mouth a gold plate delicately carved with the image of Selene, the Roman Goddess of Moon, and embedded with seven jewels symbolizing stars above her head.