Estelle Lazer is an Australian/independent archaeologist and physical anthropologist who is independent and notorious for her archaeology work in Italy, Antarctica, the Middle East, Australia and countries across Europe. Whose work has heavily contributed and impacted our greater insight of Pompeii and Herculaneum. She has invested her work through lectures at the University of Sydney and Oxford. For more than 20 years, Lazer has based her work in Pompeii as of discovering human remains with scientific methods from the eruption of 79 AD of Mount Vesuvius. Lazer has published books, articles, contributed to documentaries and blogs that outline the significant and important fundamental aspects of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Lazer is more publicly acknowledge through her discovery of undertaking the systematic study of bones with human skeletal remains. Lazer also examines remains of teeth that she can undercover whether the remains were male or female, eating deities and traits of diseases. In 1994, Lazer was granted permission by the Italian authority to be allowed to partake in examining a body cast. Lazer analyzed the body through high-tech X-rays and examination to determine age of death, gender, height, etc. Lazer has approximately founded and restored 86 body casts.
Lazer's work has contributed to society since the discovery of Pompeii and Herculaneum, and has influenced 20th century archaeological technology. Lazer performed the first X-ray analyze on Pompeian body casts in Sydney 1994, as the body cast have hardened over time revealing information of the Pompeian became difficult. Estelle Lazer uses a deeper understanding of body casts in Pompeii. Lazer uses the exclusive method of Giuseppe Fiorelli with modern technology of using resin to prevent damages toward the body casts rather than using plaster casts. With the original method of Fiorelli, Lazer can effectively protect skeletal remains without dissolving any fragile remains. She explains her method an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald in her advancement of modern technology.
The ‘Academy Travel’ article evaluates Estelle Lazer’s early work/career and the fundamental aspects of how she introduced new technology to gain a better understanding human remains and life in Pompeii and Herculaneum. Many of Lazer's projects involve X-ray and computer scans of Pompeian victims' bodies, revealing the skeleton of individual bones that have deteriorated over time and the skeletal elements that remain. Lazer represents as using the first scientific research in uncovering amazing finds that was once lost because of the disaster that destroyed most of Pompeii and Herculaneum. Lazer evident the management of body casts and the concerning mistreatment but she states through an interview with BBC, that the highly developed science is used to carefully to analyze bodies and skeletons and medical unitizes.
However, through many of her discoveries and works, scholars and activists have raised ethical and moral issues that are related to discovering human remains. That is the handling and display of human remains which many find morally wrong to be touching and dealing with remains from the past as they should be ethically stay undiscovered in Pompeii and Herculaneum. Though, Lazer argues that through her works she manages the remains carefully through new technologies that with using 19th century technology would completely the archaeology world. She exclaims about this in the Positive.News article ‘Archaeology as a Science Didn’t Exist’, “bones had no value when excavation began in 1748”. With more advanced technology being used today, Lazer is able to use hologram display and 3D print which was new technology development by Lazer herself. Lazer is able to prevail over the ethical issues of dealing with human remains with ensuring that many of the plaster cast bodies that are found are displayed in secured locations such as museums and protective glass cases that are displayed areas of Pompeii.
In conclusion, Estelle Lazer has greater improve our modern understanding of Pompeii and Herculaneum through her advanced methods of developing new modern technology, managing human remains with ethical issues in order to gain a further understanding in her exclusive discovering. Without Estelle Lazer’s extensive knowledge and contribution in Pompeii and Herculaneum, our understanding of these cities and the values that we are continuingly uncovering would be limited.