Richard III of England - DNA Contribution...

I almost forgot, I am currently working on the MacDonald line of descent from Angus Og on down. Some of them escaped the Jacobite uprisings and ended up in Canada, Oregon, Montana and Washington first starting out working for the Hudson Bay Fur Company and marrying the Daughter's of Nez Pearce Chief's and other Chief's Daughters' in the area. What I am getting at is those MacDonalds/McDonalds are direct YDNA descendants of Clan Donald which is kicking around the Colla debate:

http://dna-project.clan-donald-usa.org/DNAmain2.htm

One of the reason's I have been working on that family is I found a DNA match to another Person who shared that same line at the point of Angus Og. No one is telling me how my mystery Grandfather on my Mother's side ended up matching the Linn's of Loch Linnhe or Castle Stalker, the MacDonalds/McDonalds of Anus og forward and back and the Plante's of Antoine Plante and possible Sweeney's of Clan Sweeny or Suibne but they all seem to be buried in the St. Ignatius Cemetery in Flathead County Montana. I don't know if they are simply long ago ancestors' or more recent one's but the coincidence is killing me. lol, as in who are my mystery Grandparents for the past 4 generations on my Mother's side?
I may never know and it could all be circumstantial.

I do have a question for the more knowledgeable . How does Cameron fit into the MacDonalds? I ran across them while adding MacDonald's.

Wanda, you asked if everyone thinks the Collas are mythical or relevant.

That gets into a fierce debate. There are extremists on both sides. My personal opinion is somewhere in the middle. My eyes glaze over whenever this debate erupts ;)

On one side are the people who think nothing from an oral tradition can ever be trusted. If it's not written in a contemporary document it's false.

On the other side are the people who thinking everything from an oral tradition has to be true, because our ancestors kept careful track and were never tempted to lie.

I think what we really know is that oral traditions are almost never any good after a culture makes the transition to writing, but in an oral culture they are often very, very good.

I think most historians would agree that Irish genealogies are generally reliable back to the 6th century, and some would say they're reliable back to about the 4th or 5th centuries. St. Patrick came in the 5th century, so these dates aren't arbitrary. They're the point at which the church started being involved, and the published lives of saints start being an alternative to oral tradition.

On the other hand, one of the features of Irish culture was that chieftains had bards, who belonged to a professional class that was responsible, among other things, for memorizing genealogies, historical poems, and religious lore. At the coronation of an Irish king, a bard declaimed the king's genealogy as part of the ceremony. Under Brehon law a man could not be a king unless he belonged to the derbfine of a king. A derbfine was a particular kinship group composed of all the male line descendants of a common great grandfather.

So, many historians think that the old Irish genealogies are possibly reliable much further back than written records. Possibly accurate, but not absolutely. How far back? No one knows. As far back as the Collas in the 4th century? Maybe, maybe not. As far back as Míl Espáine in the 18th century BCE? Almost certainly not ;)

Thank you for explaining that Justin. You always have great information and sound opinions.

This is the MacDonalds I have been working on who are direct descendants of Gille-Brigte and orally said...Fergus. lol
http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/history/scottishroots/histories/glenc...

I saw it somewhere after the Glencoe Massacre something about them being associated with the Clan Cameron and that part confuses me because I always think the Clan name is the surname but perhaps it is just another branch or a marriage. I think it occurs somewhere around Dubh or Allan MacDonald.

Well, if I understood the sources that you sited G & I-1 came out of sub-Clade F 30,000 years ago. You say it's later, and emerged same time as R1b or within a couple thousand years. Im not the one suggesting that, that would be you. The logic I follow is that we all came from the same place : Africa and I-1 got here long before R1b emerged. To me that suggests that I-2 in Eastern Europe derived from the rebound you described due to glaciation. Not making anything up...tying to understand the double speak.

I'll move my (when did we arrive) part of discussion since I don't know of any Colla's in my I-1 / J1a mt history. DCR

Dale, I think part of your confusion is that you often say R1b when you have to mean R, or you say I1 when you have to mean I. I might not always succeed, but I try to answer exactly what you say instead of trying to rearrange into what I think you mean -- which also would be wrong, but in a different way ;)

For example, you have I1 in Europe before R1b even emerges. I1 is 4 to 5 thousand years old, and R1b is a bit less than 18 thousand years old, so it's hard to see how I1 could be anywhere before R1b emerged. R1b was dominating Europe before I1 even emerged.

What you might mean is that I (the parent group of I1 and I2) was in Europe before R1b emerged. The parent group is 25 to 30 thousand years old, so it's genuinely older than R1b. But, the parent group of R1b is R, and it is 27 to 34 thousand years old, so older than I.

All of the European groups ultimately came out of F, but they all belong to different branches of the tree and separated at different times.

Look at the chart on this page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haplogroup_I-M253

You can see the relationships among the different groups. If you click on the links you'll see information about the currently accepted age and geographic origin.

There is also a chart on this page:
http://www.eupedia.com/europe/origins_haplogroups_europe.shtml

It shows the different groups set against a time scale that makes it easy to understand. It also has a handy little chart just below that gives a quick view of the geographic origin of each group. The problem is that the 2nd page doesn't get updated as frequently with new information as the 1st, but it's still a good resource. Notice particularly where I1 falls in relation to R1b.

Really though, you should be consider this -- if you don't accept scientific evidence there isn't much point to discussing your theories on Geni.

Wanda, the clans were effectively just little countries. Lots of wars and alliances and dependencies. Under tribal custom all land belonged to the chief, who allocated portions to his clansmen and relatives. In practice, though, the chief held the land under a feudal system, or just by tolerance of the legal, feudal owner. The MacDonalds of Glencoe held Glencoe from the Campbells, who were trying to get their hands on it.

The Camerons and MacDonalds are separate clans, but in this period they were allies against the Campbells and particularly against the Campbells acting as government officers and demanding that the clans submit to the Crown.

Hi Dale, In response to your request to have my markers for the Stewarts, I agree to do this. In order to be accurate, please send the DYS marker numbers associated with the first four, middle four and last four of the first 37 markers. I don't want to make a mistake. Thanks.

According to Geni.com, Colla da Chrioch is my 44th great grandfather. This is a coincidental lineage. If true, I have two paths to Colla da Chrioch, yDNA and coincidental.

Ulf, We're cousins. YEA!!!

Thank you once again Justin, you are the best! :) So was it the Cambell's who instigated the whole Glencoe massacre?

There is a great book called "Glencoe" by John Prebble. He also wrote "Lion of the North" (about Kenneth mac Alpin) and "Culloden". Fantastic books. I can't praise them enough. I never lend my copies to anyone ;)

Prebble describes a very long, drawn-out prelude to Glencoe, where the government is worried about the gaining control over the clans, using the Campbells as their agents, and not really understanding the politics of the clans.

Some of the clans had been loyal to Bonnie Prince Charlie, so the government required them to take an oath of allegiance. Still actually loyal, they sent abroad for Prince Charles' permission to take the oath. That caused some delays and general stalling created other delays.

The Campbells exploited the situation for their own ends. They wanted Glencoe, so they took advantage of MacIain MacDonald's stalling to paint him as a rebel. MacIain tried to tender his oath at one place, but it was refused, so he traveled to the proper place, but government forces delay him. He got there and offered to give his oath, but it was refused because it was late. Then, because MacIain hadn't given the oath, the Campbells got an order from the king to exterminate them.

A very sad story.

The way that F Clade is parent to all the subsequent sub-clades was never undrstood the way you just finally explained it. For the last two years I was under the impression that each designated Clade preceeded the others by Aplhabetic position. A= Adam C,D , E and each of them preceeding the next.

R being near the bottom of the sequence was deemed younger by relative position...thus the I-1 is younger than I which follows quite naturally, then I1a out of I1. I now get that the Haplogroup follows that but not the sub-groups as compared to one another....Rather Cheeky & doubly confusing but I can now amend what I thought I understood. The last sentence above is not becoming to your stature when there was room to interpret the charts differently than you finally said. I have a Bound copy in Rust fabric of "Lion of the North" with embossed figure, I'll pay close attention to it's lessons.

Dale, I'm glad it was something so simple.

JPM: the mid section of the first 37 markers on Y is designated DYS464, As I have checked the Colla DNA project it seems that your values should fall
23 or 24 at DYS 390 which is not what I was expecting, and CDY marker in the Colla project as an average = 36-37. 35 is what I was predicting for an earlier Royal ancestor. In any event I don't think any of the values would be more than 2 steps in variation according to the Royal Stewart/Tzar Nicholas Y values. You can message me privately if you don't want to put up for everyone to see. Thanks DCR

This DNA discussion has been of acute interest, as I've been waffling about having mine tested. My mother's side all came from the same area of Germany & all moved to the same place in the US...so, no surprises there.
My father's side encompasses all the royalty, ancient lines, etc. There have been quite a few surprises; the biggest being that all his lines are cousins. (Relevant to this discussion, Colla is my grandfather 8X - all through Ranallt Olafsdottir).
Am I wrong in thinking that DNA testing wouldn't provide a great deal of additional insight in my situation, as I'm more interested in the "Y" than the "MT"?

Wow ....Justin...that's an amazing story and the way you explained it makes it easy to understand. You are right, that's a horrible sad story. I'm so glad the few that survived left the area. One thing never changes and that is Man's fight for land but what a dirty dirty deed and way to get it. Imagine inviting someone to your house for a party, feeding them and offering them drinks all the while they are waiting for you to sleep so they can kill you. That's as bad as shooting a fellow in the back only, maybe worse. Didn't a lot of the Clans' leave the area during those Jacobite risings and head over to America?

Linda, I don't want to sound like a DNA salesman but yes, I think you're wrong ;)

It sounds like you already know there are three different kinds of tests.

The tests for mtDNA were the first commercially available tests, so they've remained popular despite being hard to work with. I can't remember when they were first introduced, but I was one of the early adopters in 1998. This test is interesting, but it's really only useful if you're trying to solve a problem that can only be answered by testing the maternal line. For example, you have a line where you're not sure which of the two wives was the mother of a particular daughter, or you want to figure out if an ancestor was really American Indian.

The tests for yDNA have always been the most popular, but only men can test. Again, I don't remember when these tests were first available commercially, but I had mine in 2000. These tests are popular because so many people are just a little more interested in their male line (surname) descent.

For both mtDNA and yDNA you often have to go out and recruit a cousin, or even a distant cousin, who has the right kind of all male or all female descent from the line that interests you. It took me something like 12 years to track down a female line descendant of one of my 2nd great grandmothers, and when I did it was because we ran into each on Geni ;)

But my pitch to anyone thinking of testing is that the real bang-for-the-buck is in the autosomal ("Family Finder") test. Over and over I talk to people who aren't interested in that because they already know what they want to know. Then they have the test, and they start discovering mysterious connections that lead to a grand adventure.

I think the reason this happens is that most of us still don't really appreciate how sprawling and diverse our families really are. Even if we think we know that everyone's related, we really just see our own, mostly homogeneous families.

I've had a couple of fun things happen from autosomal testing. I don't want to share all the good stuff publicly, but a random, non-representative sample:

(1) I discovered a match on my dad's side with a woman in Sweden, even though I thought he had no Swedish ancestry. All of her known ancestors lived in Sweden, so WTH? It took months before I was smart enough to figure out that with so much of his ancestry in the "Middle Colonies" he must have an ancestor in New Sweden.

(2) I discovered a match on my dad's side with a man in Puerto Rico. Same deal. No Spanish ancestry on my dad's side, and this guy's ancestry is all Puerto Rico and Spain. I still don't have a theory to explain that one.

(3) On my mother's side I disproved an old family story by making the right guess about who the father really was, tracking down one of his descendants, and persuading him to get tested. That took me something like 4 years to pull off, all the while keeping it very hush-hush so I wouldn't tip my hand.

(4) Also on my mother's side, just a few weeks ago I was able to help a woman find the family of her grandfather, who had been adopted in the 1940s. He was such a close match to me that I only had to read his place of birth to know which of my great uncles was a bit wild in his youth.

I could go on with other stories, but I think this is enough for the basic idea -- autosomal tests are the exciting ones ;)

I'm thinking that there needs to be a separate discussion on interpreting DNA results. All of this is fascinating and is tangentially related to Richard III BUT if someone is not that interested in Richard, they won't be following this discussion. I had even thought of un-following, except I keep seeing posts from my good friend and cousin Justin and I want to see what he's writing.

John Pat, we are 14th cousins, twice removed. Our common ancestors are the Carters of Virginia, moving backward toward the Todds, the Drakes and the Grenvilles.

My kit is still being tested at 23andme (my Christmas present to me!). I am so anxious to get the results. I've already warned Justin and a couple other knowledgeable people here on Geni that I was going to be a real nuisance when I finally get the results, learning how to interpret them.

Hi Dale,
My first four markers: DYS393 = 13, DYS390 = 24, DYS 19 = 14, and DYS 391 = 11.
Middle marker: DYS 464 =15-15-17-17.
Last four markers: DYS590 = 8, DYS537 = 10, DYS641 = 10, and DYS472 = 8.
Please confirm that I have the correct DYS markers.

Hi Maria, Thanks for introducing me to the Carters of Virginia, the Todds, the Drakes and the Grenvilles. These are branches of the family that I didn't know about. WOW.

Thanks, Justin!

Relative to DNA, is there a project &/or discussion on mistresses & illegitimate offspring? A Geni search only brought up one on Henry VIII.
Prior to, say 1500, there are a lot of them & it's hard to keep of track of who belongs where.

I don't know of a general project. Let's create one!

Here's a shell:
http://www.geni.com/projects/Royal-Mistresses-Illegitimate-Children...

This could be a very fun joint project.

Linda,

I've put on quite a lot of mistresses and rather more illegitimate children (without identified mothers). A problem on Geni is that partners and wives are not always identified on the tree. Unless one is a manager, one cannot see the relationship field on a profile.

Until the 18th century you get a lot of acknowledged illegitimate children. Then, mostly, it goes from about the accession of Queen Victoria.

I don't think I would like a project called "bastards" (or however you dress it up). What I would like is a possibilty of adding in adopted children. From classical times until very recently there is very little chance of identifying their biological parents. Cutting their existence off Geni seems unduly cruel.

Mark

I certainly agree with the sensible opinion of Woodman Mark Lowes Dickinson, OBE

I have recently discovered That Richard the III is my grandfather and I would love to be a part of this community and would also love to be a part of the community that has recently discovered the remains of the beloved Richard III my (grandfather) if this is at all possible. This is so fascinating beyond any words can express. Also, I did a DNA test through ancestries ; I would love to compare my grandfather's DNA to my DNA. How would I become a part of this? Thanks again for this community and I hope to learn more in the future about my recently discovered family. Blessings, Rev Deacon Laura Kelson

Laura Kelson is Richard III of England's third cousin 20 times removed!

http://www.geni.com/path/Richard-III-of-England+is+related+to+Laura...

Richard's Grandmothers dads sister, then from there down to Laura.

That's not a Grandfather Laura unless Ulf missed a different connection. It also has to be direct MTDNA or YDNA and Ebson was the only person they found. For example my relation is 1st Cousin 17x removed. http://www.geni.com/path/Wanda+is+related+to+Richard-III-of-England...
A first cousin sounds closer than a 3rd Cousin but what matters is all the surnames in between. In between myself and Richard I have Pierce, McDaniel, Bryan, Morgan, Herbert and Neville. The only direct line from Richard iii would be a pure Neville line. With so many Nevilles still out there today, has anyone tried that? Isn't Richard iii a Neville?

Richard III's mother and wife were Nevilles, but he belonged to the Yorkist branch of the "Plantagenet" family. None of them really used the name Plantagenet, despite what Geni says ;)

Wanda is right that the only way to compare DNA to Richard III right now is in the straight male line or the straight female line. When they were looking at Richard's mtDNA they had to look for descendants of his mother in the female line. They only found a handful, but it's still possible they'll find someone else.

When they were looking at Richard's yDNA they had to look for male line descendants of his father's family. They found some, but the ones they found didn't match.

There will be a lot of people who match Richard III on either the female line and the male line, but those groups are thousands of years old. A match doesn't indicate a close relationship.

For example, Richard III belongs to yDNA group G2a3. At least we think he does, from the limited information that has been released. I belong to that same group, but from the details we have it's very likely that Richard III belongs to a different subgroup than I do. He and I have a common male-line ancestor maybe 6 000 years ago ;)