Every October, we celebrate Italian-American Heritage Month, which honors the accomplishments of Italian immigrants and Italian-Americans, who comprise the fifth-largest ethnic group in the United States. In celebration, 23andMe+ Premium members, using the Historical MatchesSM feature, “Historical Matches,” can now discover how they are genetically connected to the ancient inhabitants of one of Italy’s most famous cities: Rome.
The Ancient City of Rome
Rome was founded in the 8th century BCE. At the time, it was one of many independently governed city-states on the Italian Peninsula. By its peak, during the Imperial Period (27 BCE–476 CE), Rome had grown into a major cosmopolitan city with over one million inhabitants. It served as a center of commerce that linked people and goods from throughout the Mediterranean, the Near East, North Africa, and beyond.
The city of Rome served as the capital of the Roman Empire from its founding in 27 BCE until 330 CE when Emperor Constantine moved the capital to Byzantium (renaming it Constantinople in his honor). After losing its status as a capital city, Rome gradually lost its political prominence and experienced a dramatic decline in population size. Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century CE, Rome’s population fell to less than 100,000 people. It wasn’t until around the 14th century CE that the population size began to increase again.
Despite its fluctuating political status, Rome endures as a cultural and religious center to the present day.
Ancient Roman Genomes Throughout History
In 2019, scientists sequenced the genomes of 127 individuals from 29 archaeological sites in and around the ancient city of Rome. To learn how the genetics of people living in the region changed over time, they sampled individuals who lived in the region over the past 12,000 years, from hunter-gatherers during the Mesolithic period (10,000–6,000 BCE) to the city’s inhabitants during the Medieval and Early Modern periods (700–1800 CE).
The majority of the individuals that they studied lived in Rome during three key periods:
- The Roman Republic (509–27 BCE): Following the overthrow of the last Roman king (Lucius Tarquinius Superbus) in 509 BCE, the ancient Romans established the first republic–a system of governance in which power was shared through a complex system of checks and balances, giving members of the public increasing rights over time. During this period, the ancestry of the ancient inhabitants of Rome started to appear similar to that of many present-day Mediterranean populations.
- Imperial Rome (27 BCE–300 CE): This period spans the height of the Roman Empire, beginning when Augustus declared himself the first emperor of Rome and ending around the time when Emperor Diocletian established the Tetrarchy, dividing the rule of the Roman Empire among two emperors and their successors. This division paved the way for the eventual split of the empire into the Eastern and Western Roman Empires.
During this period, ancient Rome’s inhabitants had highly variable ancestry, exhibiting strong connections to populations from the eastern Mediterranean and the Near East. - Late Antiquity (300–700 CE): During the Late Antique Period, Rome experienced a dramatic decline in its political influence and population size. The inhabitants of Rome continued to be highly diverse, but Central and Northern European-related ancestry started to become more common, possibly as a result of contact with invading populations, including the Visigoths, Vandals, and Lombards.
Learn More
In honor of Italian-American Heritage Month, we have added 25 historical individuals from these three critical periods in Roman history to our Historical Matches feature.
If you are a 23andMe+ Premium member, you can check it out to learn more about the ancient Romans and find out if you are distantly related to them or hundreds of other historical individuals.
Not yet a member? Learn more about all that 23andMe+ offers here.
