GIVING DONNA NOBLE HER FIRST TASTE OF TIME travel, the Doctor sets the co-ordinates for Ancient Rome. A slight miscalculation instead takes the TARDIS to the market place in Pompeii, the day before its destruction by the volcanic Mount Vesuvius.
In Pompeii, the Doctor and Donna encounter the family of Caecilius, a marble trader who has purchased the TARDIS in the belief that it is “modern art”. The Doctor is horrified to discover that the Sibylline sisterhood and the city augur, Lucius, have genuine powers of prophecy and are slowly petrifying as they breathe the fumes issuing from the depths of Vesuvius.