Harden Hardin Harding yDNA Project
Ethnic Origin
Whether you are just starting with a Surname Project, or
have just ordered a test for you to learn about DNA testing for genealogy,
everyone experiences the situation of receiving the first test result, and what
now? You have one test result, and what do you do with a string of 12, 25
or 37 numbers? Can they tell you anything?
In the situation of the one or first test result, most likely you will not find others to whom you are related. The odds of a random match to someone to whom you are related when you are the first of your surname to test are slim. However, you might find some clues to your ethnic origin.
To find clues about your ethnic origin, log into FamilyTreeDna.com,
and at your Personal Page click on Recent Ethnic Origins to search this data
base. The results show others whom you match, or who are a near match,
and their ancestor's ethnic origin.
The information on an individual’s ethnic origin is
provided by each test participant. The information provided for ethnic origin
is only as accurate as the knowledge held by the testee regarding their
ancestors. Participants in a Surname Project are instructed to answer
unknown for ethnic origin when their ancestor's origin is not known, or not
certain. Sometimes the origin the participant provided is
incorrect. Incorrect origins provided by testers may lead to search
results that do not seem logical. For example: Assume your ancestors are
from England, but your search results show the ethnic origin of your matches as
England, France, AND one match shows an origin of Native American. Does
that mean that your ancestor’s relatives may have lived in England and
France? Yes.
Does it mean that your ancestor was also a Native
American? No. It means that a settler in America had a child with a
Native American woman, the child was brought up as a Native American, and that,
over time, the family has "forgotten" the European ancestor, and
believes their ancestry to be Native American.
Over the span of generations people tend to move, as do
borders, so nationality or ethnicticity becomes subjective. For example,
a test participant may enter Germany for ethnic origin, because the land of
their ancestors is in Germany today, but the land had been held by Denmark for
many centuries.
Your search should return via the FTDNA database should
show at least one match, namely yourself. If your results show 3 matches
from Ireland and 1 from Scotland, and you have reported to FTDNA that your
ancestors came from Scotland, then you are the Scotland result. The other
3 matches are either from the Family Tree DNA database or from the databases we
have been supplied by the University of Arizona.
To see how your ethnic origin is recorded in the FTDNA
database, click on the link titled Update Contact Information on your Personal
Page. You can also update your paternal and maternal ethnic origin on
this Update Contact Information page.
Exact matches show people who are the closest to you
genetically. The Ethnic origin shows where they have been reported to
have lived. Since many persons migrated since the beginning of time, you
will typically see matches in more than one country.
For information purposes, the Recent Ethnic Origin search
also displays results for those who are not exact matches, but are 'near
matches'. A near match is either one step or two steps from your
result. An exact match is 12/12 25/25 or 37/37. A one step match is 11/12
24/25 or 36/37. A two step match is 10/12 23/25 or 35/37. The value of
the near matches is to see where those who may be related migrated over time.