DNA from Thomas Jefferson's hair delivers compelling new evidence in centuries-old paternity mystery

A centuries-old question over Thomas Jefferson's relationship with Sally Hemings, a woman he enslaved, is back in the spotlight — and new DNA evidence reinforces what historians have long concluded.

The Thomas Jefferson Foundation, which owns and operates Monticello , addressed the new findings in a recent statement ahead of the publication of anthropologist Richard Kurin's book, "History by a Hair." The book details an effort to analyze strands of hair linked to Jefferson, including hair discovered between the pages of an unpublished manuscript associated with him.

DISCOVERY AT MONTICELLO REVEALS CONSTRUCTION SECRETS THOMAS JEFFERSON LEFT OUT OF MAPS AND LETTERS Using those genetic comparisons, researchers modeled competing paternity scenarios involving Jefferson, plus his brother Randolph and Randolph's sons.

The analysis found the odds that Jefferson fathered neither Madison Hemings nor Eston Hemings were less than one in 1,000.

In a statement, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation said the findings reinforce, rather than rewrite, the historical record.

"The study doesn't change what we know about Thomas Jefferson, Sally Hemings, their children or their world," the foundation said.

"But it offers occasion to reflect on how we came to know it, and why we share that knowledge." DNA CRACKS CENTURIES-OLD MURDER MYSTERY INVOLVING ONE OF HISTORY'S MOST FAMOUS FAMILIES "Together, these histories give us a fuller picture of Monticello, of Jefferson and his world, and of the generations of Americans who have worked to realize the Declaration's promise ," the foundation added.

Fox News Digital reached out to the Thomas Jefferson Foundation for further comment.

Leigh Fought, professor emerita of history at Le Moyne College in DeWitt, New York, and author of the book "Sally Hemings: Given Her Time," also said the new evidence reinforces what historians had already known.

"This should close the case with a lock," Fought, who was not involved in the study, told Fox News Digital.

REVOLUTIONARY WAR ARTIFACTS UNEARTHED AT SITE OF INFAMOUS COLONIAL AMERICAN HEIST: 'VERY SURPRISED' "I was already positive that the case should have been closed.

No other historical event , especially of that time, has had to amass this much evidence to say it happened." Rumors that Jefferson fathered children with Hemings circulated during his lifetime and persisted for generations, Fought said, while a 1998 DNA study largely settled the question for historians.

The 1998 study found a genetic link between a male-line descendant of Hemings' son Eston and the Jefferson male line.

Fought said skeptics continued to advance alternative theories, including that Jefferson's brother, Randolph, could have been the father of Hemings' children — an explanation she said the new evidence rules out.