Weird Branches on the Family Tree
Woman in the Middle | November 6, 2014One of my various hobbies (which always seem to do with history) is genealogy. It is fun to look back at who you are descended from. I have been very surprised to find, as I go from family branch to family branch, that the first ancestor on each branch to come to America came a very long time ago, usually early 1700s, or, in some cases, even earlier. I haven’t found any pilgrims in my family tree but I have discovered quite a few men who fought in the Revolutionary war. Who would have thunk?
Recently, Hubby and I took the Ancestry DNA test. I just got the results. Hum…..It contained the stuff we expected, such as the fact that the majority of my ancestors were Europeans. Given that my skin is so white I practically glow in the dark, this is no surprise. According to this test, 35% of my DNA is from Ireland. Mom had red hair, so I shouldn’t be surprised. But I am still looking for an ancestor from Ireland, so obviously my Irish roots come from folks who left Ireland a long time ago and went somewhere else, before their descendants came to America.
31% of my DNA, the next largest portion that is me, came from Scandinavia. Now, that is a surprise. However, lots of vikings invaded England and settled there. My ancesters must have come from that group. Again, I have no known ancestors, dating back over 300 years, who came from Scandinavia.
Then my DNA results get funky, really funky. In spite of all my immigrant ancestors coming to the USA from Great Britain, only 8 percent of me, give or take, is actually from there. Ten percent of me is from western Europe (Germany, France). Maybe I will revisit my aversion to the French….. But the biggest shocker is that I have 6% of my DNA from Italy/Greece. What the heck????
Hubby has dark brown, almost black hair and tans better than I do. If his DNA said he had a measurable amount of Greek or Italian blood, I wouldn’t be surprised. He didn’t. He is almost all Scandinavian and British. So it must be some pretty ancient DNA from that region of the world floating around in my blood. In any case, it was pretty fascinating.
Oh, and by the way. If you have a family story (like Hubby and I do) about having a great grandmother who was Native American, don’t get your hopes up. In spite of the family stories, both Hubby and I had no Native American DNA what so ever. Nadda, ziltch, zip. So I guess Mom in law got her beautiful black hair from somewhere in Europe and my Dad’s high cheek bones, easy tan, and silver hair came from the vikings. But it was a great story……
Maybe the Ancestry DNA mixed up your and Hubby’s files, since you were quite sure you had more British in your blood, and he looks like he could have Italian or Greek blood.
I love genealogy and many years ago my dad traced the family tree back a number of generations, I am so glad he did that and I have added the new babies in the family to it
Your story is so fascinating with all the mixed relationships you never suspected. I know my own background is similar and so it goes for us melting pot Americans. It’s fun to try to find windows back as far as we can go. I got as far as Denmark. I do love Denmark so that was pleasing news, but I had dark hair once and tanned easily. Go figure.