Pompeii  

"Classical archaeology the excavation and analysis of ancient Greek and Roman sites was born on Wednesday, October 22, 1738. It was on that day, a Wednesday, that an engineer in the army of the Bourbon royal family in Naples, named Roque Joaquín de Alcubierre (1702-1780), had himself lowered by ropes, down a great square well shaft, cut through volcanic material that had formed on the great volcano."--Sholem Stein

"At length, in 1748, in the reign of Charles III, the first Bourbon king of Naples, a Spanish colonel of engineers, named Don Rocco Alcubierre, was employed to examine the subterranean canal before mentioned; and having heard from the inhabitants of Torre Annunziata that the remains of a house, with ancient statues and other objects, had been discovered at a distance of about two miles, he was led to conjecture that some ancient city lay buried there, overwhelmed by the great eruption of Vesuvius in 79. The discovery of Herculaneum early in the 18th century had now drawn the attention of the learned and scientific world to this subject. Colonel Alcubierre obtained permission to undertake some excavations at the spot where the ruined house had been discovered, and early in April, 1748, he commenced his researches, in the street afterwards called the Strada della Fortuna."--Pompeii, its History, Buildings and Antiquities (1867) by Thomas Henry Dyer