Often, the Jews who inhabited during the last centuries the territory of modern Italy are considered Sephardi.  An analysis — based in part on the names used — reveals a very heterogeneous composition of local communities. Alongside the real Sephardim (a group of exiles from Iberian Peninsula who came at the turn of the 16th century, as well as the “ex-Crypto-Jews” who were coming during about 150 years starting with mid-16th century), we find families whose ancestors have never lived on the territory of modern Spain or Portugal: the largest group composed of descendants of Roman Jews who lived in continental Italy since Antiquity, numerous Ashkenazim who migrated from southern Germany to northern Italy during the 13th-16th centuries, Jews expelled from Sicily (1493) and France (1394, 1501), and migrants from North Africa. For many centuries, Italy served as a "hub" for Jewish migrations.