In this extended on-site study in Italy, students examine the public and private life of people of various socio-economic classes in classical antiquity. The focus is on the material culture of Rome and the towns of Pompeii and Herculaneum. From the grand aristocratic villas and urban imperial palaces to the more modest quarters of the poor and enslaved, students explore at first hand the settings of the private lives of individuals in both the capital city of the Empire as well as the towns covered by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD.