Fourteen miles southeast of modern Naples lies Pompeii, a city frozen in time by the catastrophic eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. What was once a bustling Roman town became a sprawling graveyard,

Shocking DNA evidence finds that the identities of bodies at Pompeii are completely different than what scientists have thought for year.

In 79 AD, Italy’s Mount Vesuvius exploded, raining ash and volcanic debris down on the city of Pompeii and its tens of thousands of residents.

DNA analysis at Pompeii did more than challenge assumptions about family ties; it also revealed the diverse ancestry of Pompeii’s residents.

The results, published Nov. 7 in Current Biology, reveal that some of the stories told for decades about the individuals’ sexes and family relationships, which were based on the casts’ physical appearance and other archaeological evidence, are either not correct or not as simple as believed. For example:

New DNA studies of those victims tell a different tale than what experts had previously speculated. Common interpretations of three well-known relationships were proven false by the scientific study.

New DNA evidence from Pompeii’s body casts reveals that traditional assumptions about residents’ relationships and origins were often incorrect, showing instead a diverse population with roots in the eastern Mediterranean.

A recent DNA study has upended long-held theories about the people who died in the ancient Roman city of Pompeii, revealing unexpected details about the demographics and connections among the victims.