A new study has shattered historians' long-held assumptions about some of the people who died in Mount Vesuvius' eruption in 79 C.E.

When a volcanic eruption buried the ancient city of Pompeii, the last desperate moments of its citizens were preserved in stone for centuries. Observers see stories in the plaster casts later made of their bodies,

DNA evidence reshapes the story of Pompeii's 79 AD eruption victims, challenging old assumptions and revealing new insights into their lives.

In mere minutes, the giant cloud of ash and gases killed an estimated 2,000 people, many of whom were unearthed more than a thousand years later. Their decomposed bodies were preserved by the ash, and archaeologists were able to reconstruct their forms using plaster casts of the cavities they left behind. More than 100 casts have been made to date.

In 79 CE, the active volcanic system in southern Italy known as Somma-Vesuvius erupted, burying the small Roman town of Pompeii and everyone in it. The "Pompeii eruption" covered everything in a layer of ash that preserved many of the bodies.

DNA analysis of victims in Pompeii who died in Mount Vesuvius' eruption reveals some unusual relations between the people who died together.

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,