My Ancestry DNA arrived yesterday!

If that were the case growstuff these descendants living in the area in question would show up in my ‘matches’.

Btw, you realise you’ve identified your partner don’t you?

Cressida

Growstuff can I suggest you watch DNA Journey on ITVX

This article by Adam Rutherford, a geneticist, about the programme is worth reading:

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/12/ant-and-dec-dna-test-all-inbred-historical-connections

Germanshepherdsmum

Btw, you realise you’ve identified your partner don’t you?

Yes.

Germanshepherdsmum

If that were the case growstuff these descendants living in the area in question would show up in my ‘matches’.

No, they wouldn't necessarily.

How do you think Ancestry identifies DNA from a specific area? It uses results from a database of living people.

Be careful, growstuff. I’d remove it to be safe but maybe I’m just over - cautious.

Well I trust your partner will be happy with that. And people who know your partner well can also identify you.

growstuff

Germanshepherdsmum

No growstuff. The vast majority of my DNA links me to Essex and the Essex/Suffolk border, which is where my ancestors on both sides lived for centuries but have not lived for generations. Due to several generations of only children there are no relatives living in that area now, and the living people to whom the DNA test has linked me are spread throughout the world. Ancestry don’t know anything of my background and I haven’t created a family tree there. The DNA results, other than the tiny percentages of Scandinavian, Irish, Welsh and Scottish - so tiny that they obviously come from way back - ties in exactly with the results of my own research.

So how have they identified the DNA as coming from that area, unless there are living people in their database with DNA which matches?

Ancestry has no access to DNA from "way back" because they don't conduct tests on skeletons.

The matches must come from descendants of a common ancestor, who is before your research has uncovered. That's the way its database works.

My DNA kit was ordered in my married name, how would they ever be able to harvest all the information from that?
I am 75% Irish and my 23% English is all from Suffolk, an area where I have no known relations.

Chocolatelovinggran

I understand that 6% of English people have Viking ancestry. Can't think why....

Witzend
Quite a few of those must be Geordies I think! On the Newcastle metro we once saw Erik Bloodaxe to the life - very blue eyes, very ruddy, weatherbeaten face, long reddish-gold hair and beard.

A dd was at uni there and we often remarked on how hardy the young locals were - out on the town on freezing winter nights in skimpy little dresses, no coats or even cardis - boys in thin, short sleeved shirts.

Presumably anyone not hardy enough would never have made it across the North Sea in a longship…
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Strangely, when I first arrived in the UK from Zimbabwe in 1978 and heard a Geordie accent for the first time, I would not believe they were Brits and was convinced that they were really from one of the Scandinavian countries.

I’ve got 15 % Scandi- busy Vikings. My husband has a lot of Scottish but with his family names I’m not surprised at that. Fascinating stuff.

pennyhapenny

Chocolatelovinggran

I understand that 6% of English people have Viking ancestry. Can't think why....

Witzend
Quite a few of those must be Geordies I think! On the Newcastle metro we once saw Erik Bloodaxe to the life - very blue eyes, very ruddy, weatherbeaten face, long reddish-gold hair and beard.

A dd was at uni there and we often remarked on how hardy the young locals were - out on the town on freezing winter nights in skimpy little dresses, no coats or even cardis - boys in thin, short sleeved shirts.

Presumably anyone not hardy enough would never have made it across the North Sea in a longship…
---
Strangely, when I first arrived in the UK from Zimbabwe in 1978 and heard a Geordie accent for the first time, I would not believe they were Brits and was convinced that they were really from one of the Scandinavian countries.

A Geordie friend once told us that some of the local-dialect expressions - simple things like ‘I’m going home’ are apparently very similar to Danish - in other words, they’ve survived from the Vikings’ Old Norse.

Oh, and I just remembered - in a BBC R4 prog. called I think Routes of English, Melvyn Bragg related how he did a double take in a smart restaurant in Norway, on hearing some expression that was identical to the dialect in his home area of Cumbria. But he turned round to see that it was a smart Norwegian woman who’d said it.

I like finding out ancient surnames and if they are unusual,as some are, I always wonder if people with that name share ancestry. Going back many, many years to the 17 th century, so it is no longer confidential for me but just how many Cornthwaites can there be ? The one on my tree shares a first name with me,too. Intriguing.

I have wanted to do one of these for years now but always had a dread that I would end up being related to some serial killer or complete and utter nutter lol.
I think I will do it though and sooner now rather than later to be honest. I know I have a lot of Irish and some Welsh but god only knows what else I have. It will be interesting to find out, although not sure I want any more family popping up ha ha

As a Geordie working in Sweden for 3 years back in the late 80's, I was struck by the similarities between many Swedish words/expressions and my home vernacular. "Gan yem" (Go home) is exactly the same in both. A child is a "Barn/Bairn", Bounce is "Stot" (both), etc. I also found the "music/cadences" of the speech similar in both. The Viking influence extends well beyond Geordieland, though. When describing something that is good, Scots say that it's "braw". So do the Swedes.. same pronunciation but no W. In North Yorkshire dialect, "Riggwelted" describes a sheep that is stuck on its back. Rigg=back, Weltern= to turn over in Swedish. So many other examples of what a complex mixture we are, and constantly becoming moreso.

A first cousin I didn’t know I had found me and his birth father, (not the father who reared him), his brothers and all his other cousins. We’re irish but he was so diligent he traced our family back to English ancestry in the 16th century!

Cressida

According to a few trees on Ancestry my great-grandfather died before I was born! As I remember him well I've set his profile image as one with me.

On my maternal side the family tradition was to name the first son after their father, eg William. Therefore, when the family has seven surviving sons, there were seven Williams with the same surname and so on. This may be the reason that someone has logged it in wrongly.

Unfortunately some people just latch on to a name and add it to their family tree without actually thinking about it. Name found, end of search. I find this is particularly the case with American family trees.

My daughter did a DNA test and asked me about our Eastern European ancestry about which I know nothing .

Years ago , I spent weeks trying to find out about my father's parents and they cannot be traced .

I think that they changed their name .

So I'm wondering .....

Witzend

mokryna

It’s illegal for the ordinary person to have a DNA test, which is not for medical reasons, as it could cause problems in the family.

That reminds me of the calypso which starts with IIRC, ‘Woe is me, shame and scandal in the family!’
and ends with
‘Your daddy ain’t your daddy but your daddy don’t know!’ 😂

In France people cannot disinherit their bloodline, therefore even if a child was born outside wedlock or adopted they have a strong case using DNA to claim their inheritance.

My DNA came back as mainly Irish, Scottish, a bit of Devon and Cornwall, and some Southern England. In other words mainly Celtic, which fits in with what I know of the family history. My oldest grandson had his done recently. He had an Italian great grandfather but his DNA has come back as mainly Scandinavian. There's nothing in my family but his father is American so we suspect that the Scandinavian ancestry must come from his side.

If you have a percentage of say Italian in your DNA profile, it doesn't mean that you have or had any Italian relations. It simply means that 24 pc of your DNA matches people who now live in Italy.

mokryna

Witzend

mokryna

It’s illegal for the ordinary person to have a DNA test, which is not for medical reasons, as it could cause problems in the family.

That reminds me of the calypso which starts with IIRC, ‘Woe is me, shame and scandal in the family!’
and ends with
‘Your daddy ain’t your daddy but your daddy don’t know!’ 😂

In France people cannot disinherit their bloodline, therefore even if a child was born outside wedlock or adopted they have a strong case using DNA to claim their inheritance.

No wonder non medical DNA tests are illegal, then.

I know of a French woman (married to a Brit) who is so adamant about assets staying within the ‘blood’ family, that it’s caused a rift between her and her half-French dd, who can’t see why she shouldn’t state in her will that her own assets should pass to her dh.

There is 30% off Ancestry DNA testing at the moment . I am really glad I did it it pinned down the part of Scotland I come from exactly so no real surprises and proved the name on my father's birth certificate and of all his siblings was not his real mother . I had worked this out already from census results ( another woman down as his mother ) but I think they did this to make the children legitimate . The one on his birth certificate was an Irish first generation imigrant and I have no Irish DNA at all on my father's side . She died in the workhouse .

Seadragon seeing your post about your grandfather made me think we may be related! There’s a similar marriage in my own Aberdeen family. I think it’s more common than people realise.