Around 2,000 years ago, the Roman city of Pompeii and its residents were buried in a volcanic eruption. DNA collected from the remains now reveals that the social and family life of the Pompeiians looked different than assumed based on later social constellations. For example, the DNA evidence shows that some of the individuals studied were not a “classic” family, making previous interpretations premature and incorrect. The genes also show that migrants from different regions lived in the Roman city.
In 79 AD, the active volcanic system known as Somma-Vesuvius erupted in southern Italy, burying, among other things, the small Roman city of Pompeii and everyone living there. The eruption of Pompeii covered everything with a layer of rock and ash that preserved many of the bodies. The city and the fate of its inhabitants were long forgotten before Pompeii was rediscovered south of Naples in the 1700s. The preserved houses, everyday objects and dead bodies now provide valuable and unique information about what social life in the city and in the Roman Empire once looked like.
To date, important clues have been provided by the excavated buildings and cultural objects as well as the appearance and position of the dead: although the soft tissue decayed, the outlines of the corpses remained; Centuries later, researchers filled the resulting cavities in the ash with plaster to create impressions. However, they also made artistic changes, so the finds should be viewed with reservations.
What were the family relationships of the Pompeiians like?
A team led by Elena Pilli from the University of Florence has now examined in more detail who the victims were and how they lived together. To do this, the biologists took samples from 14 skeletal remains mixed with plaster casts, which were found individually, in pairs or in small groups. In one room, for example, a mother with a gold bracelet and a small child on her lap and a man with an older child appeared to be lying together. Researchers have previously interpreted this ensemble as a family. Pilli and her colleagues have now checked whether this is true using DNA analyzes of the remains of these and other dead people from Pompeii. They analyzed the gender and family relationships of these people. They also used strontium isotopes to date the age of the people.
In several cases, the results refute long-held assumptions about the family relationships of Pompeii’s residents. According to DNA analysis, the alleged mother and child were a man with a child who was not related to him. The two people found in the same room, a man and a boy, were also not related. These four people were therefore not a biological family, as long thought. “Similarly, we genetically determined that another seemingly embracing couple, thought to be sisters or mother and daughter, included at least one man,” reports co-author David Reich of Harvard University .
“Our scientific data does not always agree with common assumptions and challenges these traditional gender and family assumptions,” says Reich. For example, jewelry has long been incorrectly associated with femininity and physical closeness has been interpreted as an indicator of biological relationship. “The study shows how unreliable narratives that are based on limited evidence and often reflect the worldview of researchers at the time can be,” says co-author David Caramelli from the University of Florence. “The results highlight the importance of integrating genetic data with archaeological and historical information to avoid misinterpretations based on modern assumptions,” adds senior author Alissa Mittnik from Harvard University.
Migrants from the east of the Roman Empire
In addition, the genetic data revealed that the Pompeiians studied were primarily descended from recent immigrants from various regions in the eastern Mediterranean and were not closely related to each other despite geographical proximity. Genetically diverse population groups once lived closely together in the Roman port city. “This study highlights the diverse and cosmopolitan nature of Pompeii’s population and reflects broader patterns of mobility and cultural exchange in the Roman Empire,” says Mittnik.
Source: Elena Pilli (University of Florence) et al.; Current Biology, doi: 10.1016/j.cub.2024.10.007