Friday, April 29, 2016

X Chromosone

I am very new to using DNA in Genealogy and don't yet understand it.  However, from my naive perspective, my mother's DNA revealed some potentially interesting things.  Providing me me with questions than answers.

The ethnicity results (as per pictures below) show a diverse mixture of backgrounds.

Source:  Ancestry DNA


The thing that stood out to me initially was the 4% African and 2 % Asian as none of my research shows African or Asian descent.

One of the brick-walls in my mothers family is Samuel Drayton, who is listed on many certificates as being born in Philadelphia, United States.  Therefore I wonder if he was of African origin?
If Samuel Drayton was 50% African then
his daughter would be 25% African
his granddaughter would be 12.5% African
his great granddaughter would be 6.25% African
his great great granddaughter (my mother) would be 3.12% African.
The African portion in the DNA results is 4% so this works!
Now I need to prove it!  I hope that I can link to another family member in America from the same family!

Another brick-wall is the Foy family, which is the only Irish family in my mothers ancestry.  Richard Foy was born in Galway according to his marriage certificate.  The name "Foy" does sound Asian so maybe the Asian showing in the DNA is from  Richard's grandparents?

And then recently, I completed a chart showing places of birth, which has totally confused me and made me wonder if there was some hanky panky at some stage?

In the chart, the dark green (at the top of the chart) represents the Irish ancestry.  It is very likely that the parents are also of Irish origin but this has not been positively verified.  The Irish percentage of my ancestry is a very low percentage according to the chart.  However the ethnicity chart above indicates that my mother is 34% Irish!

I don't know enough about the DNA testing to know exactly how the percentages are calculated.  My Christmas present to myself will likely be a more comprehensive DNA test, which tells me additional details.

DNA testing has not yielded any additional details to date, but has instead given me more questions than answers!




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6 comments:

  1. Foy is definitely a Gaelic Irish name. I checked MacLysaght's The Surnames of Ireland and he says it's the anglicized form of Ó Fiaich, from Fiach meaning Raven. Foy was most numerous in Co. Cavan and in north Connacht.

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    1. Oh WOW! Thank you so much Dara for the information. That is excellent. I really appreciate it!

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  2. Like you I am a trifle baffled. I have so many Scandanavian matches on FTDNA.

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  3. Like you I am a trifle baffled. I have so many Scandanavian matches on FTDNA.

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  4. I have had DNA analysis done and I'm currently waiting for maternal DNA analysis results. I wish I had a brother so I can find out what my father's DNA would show. Unfortunately I am not sure if old family rumors are true or not. He does not look anything like his siblings.

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  5. I did the mtDNA on myself and YDNA on my dad. I have learned nothing from the matrilineal results. I need to take the time to figure it out because it is way over my head. I'm impressed that you can formulate theories based on your results.

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