This is a reprint of a Blog post from Dr. Maurice Gleeson for Ireland XO. As a genetic genealogist and ambassador for
the International Society of Genetic Genealogy, Maurice uses real-life
examples to outline to identify the unknown parent of someone in your family tree.
Using DNA Results - Irish Genealogical Research
Are
you stuck at your great-grandmother? Was your grandfather a foundling?
Did your mother grow up not knowing who her father was? These are cases
where DNA could help you break through that particular Brick Wall and
reveal a wealth of information about your family tree that you could
never have dreamed of.
Some of
the most important questions that we as human beings ask ourselves are:
who am I? and where did I come from? It is the reason why many of us
start researching our family tree and attempt to find the connection to
our ancestors and the places where they lived. These questions are even
more pressing for people who don’t even know who their immediate
ancestors are.
For many years now, DNA has
been helping Irish adoptees, and those with unknown fathers, to
identify their biological parents, thus connecting them with a hitherto
unknown family history, which in turn engenders a deeper sense of
belonging and identity. But the techniques used with adoptees can also
be applied to people who are searching for an unknown grandparent or
great grandparent.
This article describes the
steps involved in trying to identify the unknown parent of someone in
your family. It could be you, it could be your father, it could be your
grandmother. It could be anyone.
Let’s start off by using
you as an example. Let’s assume that you don’t know who your biological
father was. Here’s is what you do to find out.
Get your DNA on the commercial DNA databases
Firstly, do the DNA test
with Ancestry and once you have your results, you can download a copy of
your DNA datafile to your computer and then upload it to several other
databases for free, namely:
There is one other
major company you could consider testing with (23andMe) but only if you
don't solve the mystery with the close matches you get in the other
databases above.
Will you find close genetic matches? Yes!
If you are very lucky, your
DNA results will include a very close match (e.g. sibling, aunt,
nephew) and you will be reconnected with your paternal biological family
in a matter of days or weeks.
Most people don’t have such
very close matches, but they are occuring more frequently as more
people join the DNA databases. A 2021 survey found that very close
matches occur in about
15-20% of Irish & British test-takers.
It’s more likely that your closest match will be a second cousin, or if
you’re fortunate, a first cousin. Both of these scenarios are good news
and it could be relatively easy to solve your mystery.
What then follows is a
sequence of steps to figure out who is the common ancestor you share
with your close match (or rather, who is the common ancestral couple –
because most of the time you will share an ancestral husband and wife in
common).
Some people do this
work on their own (because they want to, and have a good grasp of the
technical aspects of the process). For those who need help, there are
professional genetic genealogists who can provide assistance (some
charge a fee), or there are volunteer genetic genealogists who can help
free of charge - if you are interested in this option, check out the
following groups on Facebook:
DNA Detectives,
Search Squad.
Five Steps to Solving you Mystery
Here are the technical
steps in the process. Often, these steps are done in parallel rather
than in sequence. And always we are looking out for a shortcut that
allows us to jump ahead. It’s like a game of Snakes and Ladders –
sometimes we get a match that allows us to skip a few steps ahead, and
other times we are sent right back to where we started!
1. Check for a Quick Win
Is there a very close match at
the top of your match list? Anything >700cM suggests a 1st cousin or
closer. And if they have a good family tree available, you may be able
to figure out who your parent is fairly quickly.
And if that is the case,
they will be able to see you too and the cat may be out of the bag very
quickly. But if you are not ready to tell your story, you may wish to
turn everything off i.e.
privatise your account so
that no one can see you as a match. Making yourself unseen and
incognito allows you to create some breathing space for yourself, and
give yourself some time to think about what you want to do next.
You may want to see if you
can find any of these new family members on Facebook just to see what
kind of people they are. You may even find some photos of your parent or
half-siblings. And then, when you are ready, you can attempt to make
contact.
2. Cluster your matches into distinct genetic groups
Matches who match each
other probably all share the same common ancestor. The goal here is to
try to get at least four groups of "matches who match each other".
Hopefully two of these four groups will be on your paternal side (one
connected to you via your father's father and the other via your
father's mother) and two will be on your maternal side (one via your
mother's father, the other via your mother's mother).
I usually start with the
first match below 200cM. On Ancestry, this involves selecting this first
match, clicking on Shared Matches, and putting a coloured dot beside
this first match and each match who matches you both. This creates the
first genetic group.
Then return to the main
match list and repeat the process with the next match <200cM who
doesn't have a coloured dot beside them. This creates the second genetic
group. And then repeat the process for the third and fourth genetic
groups. You will find that your closest matches will probably have
several coloured dots beside them i.e. they belong to two or more
groups. You can try to repeat this process with the other websites
(MyHeritage, FTDNA, etc) but you may find that the genetic clusters are
much smaller.
In this working example, we
are looking for your biological father, so the matches on your mother’s
side of the family are not relevant to that search. Ancestry now have a
handy feature that automatically separates your matches into Parent 1
and Parent 2, but does not tell you which parent is which. However, you
might easily figure this out for yourself if you recognise any known
maternal cousins among the list of your matches – any matches you share
with that known cousin will be related to you via your mother’s side of
the family, and these can be put to one side and ignored. The remainder
will be on your biological father’s side.
If you don’t recognise any
maternal cousins on your list, you could ask a known maternal cousin to
test. Any matches you share with that cousin are maternal – the rest are
paternal, and those are the ones you want to focus on.
3. Identify the common ancestors for each cluster
You can organise and
analyse your clusters in any way you want. You can simply use a pen and
paper. I prefer to use a spreadsheet and you will find an example of
this Cluster Analysis Spreadsheet in a
previous IXO article here.
On Ancestry, starting with the cluster with your closest matches, compare the family trees of
everyone in the cluster and see if you can identify a common ancestral
couple (or at least a common surname or ancestral location). I usually
open each tree in a new tab (in pedigree view) so that I can rapidly go
from one to the next and do a quick scan of the most distant ancestral
surnames looking for surnames that repeat in several trees.
Sometimes a family tree is
not available because your match has not shared it publicly online, so
you will have to ask them nicely for it. And that means engaging them in
a conversation initially and developing rapport and a trusting
relationship with them over time. And this could take weeks or months
because some people do not check their messages. I will usually send a
brief but friendly initial message as a "way in" (see below) followed by
several "nudge messages" over the subsequent months (e.g. "Hi Joe, just
wondering if you have had a chance to read our previous message?").
Once you have identified
the likely common ancestral couple, try and figure out at what level you
are likely to sit within their tree. You can do this by assessing the
amount of DNA you share with each member of the cluster. The
Shared cM Tool can
help you figure out your relationship with each match. It also has a
handy Relationship Chart with the average amount and range of DNA shared
for a wide variety of relationships from half-sibling to 7th cousin.
Just enter the amount of DNA you share with a person and the
Shared cM Tool will
generate a list of possible relationships with probabilities for each
one. You can probably rule out some of the possibilities based on the
age of your match (if you can find it or figure it out) - for example,
if you are 40 and they are about 75, then they are likely to be your
parent's generation and thus would be a "once removed" cousin to you.
For difficult-to-place cases, I use the
WATO tool to generate the most likely scenario.
Be aware that the
Shared cM Tool does
not take into account double-connections e.g if you are related to a
match via TWO ancestral lines (e.g. you are related to them via both
your father AND your mother). These double (or more) connections are
quite common in small isolated rural communities ... and there are lots
of them in Cork, Kerry & Donegal. That's how I lost my hair.
I put everything into a
private, unsearchable family tree on Ancestry (you don't need a
subscription for this). In that way you can maintain your privacy and
you don't have to worry about other people being able to see what you
are doing. You can also be as experimental as you like without having to
worry about other people copying any mistakes into their family trees.
Copy across potential relatives and ancestors from the trees of your
matches and any other trees you find on Ancestry (or elsewhere). There
are lots of tutorials online about how to build these "mirror trees"
(google them).
4. Trace trees forward in time to identify candidates for your biological parent
Having identified the “most likely” common ancestral couple, trace all their descendants down
to the present day (using other people's family trees, available
records, and asking your matches). If your estimations are correct, one
of these descendants will be your biological father … but which one?
There are several tricks you can use to identify the most likely candidate for your biological parent:
- If you already know
the identity of your biological mother, then you know you are looking
for your biological father and therefore you only need to identify
family lines that have males of the right age to be your parent
- Look at locations. If you
know where your conception is likely to have occurred, then there may be
only one person from the list of descendants who was in “the right
place at the right time”
- Your ethnic makeup may
give clues to the likely person (e.g. his or her mother may have been
from a distinctive ethnic group, and this may be reflected in your
ethnic makeup results)
- There may also be clues
from your Y-DNA or mitochondrial DNA results, and from the amount of
X-DNA shared (which requires understanding the technicalities of DNA
transmission)
- Identify your
grandparents. If there are several candidates for (say) your
grandfather, research their wives' family trees and see if they connect
with a surname in one of the other clusters that you identified
initially.
5. Approach potential candidates for information (and DNA)
Armed with your theory,
supported by the evidence, you decide to approach your potential close
biological family (maybe a potential half-sibling). This is when the
emotional rollercoaster really takes off. You can imagine how delicate
this last step can be. You may benefit greatly from using an
intermediary, particularly someone with professional training in
reconnecting adoptees with their birth families. You usually only get
one shot at this.
If you have a social
worker, you may wish them to make contact on your behalf ... or use
some other form of intermediary. It is often very helpful to have
someone act as a buffer between you and your biological family. Or you
may wish to contact them yourself (e.g. via the Ancestry messaging
system, or via Facebook messenger, or simply sending them a letter).
There is no right way to do this and you have a choice of various
options, each with their pros and cons. Trust your gut feel when you get
to this stage.
Initially you do not ask
them to do a DNA test. You introduce yourself, tell them your story, and
ask them if it rings a bell - is there a story within the family of a
child being given up for adoption? You could consider mentioning the
surname of your known biological mother and ask if anyone was
romantically involved with someone by that name? And you could also
discuss the DNA evidence that led you to their door. If you are lucky,
one of the family might suggest: "would it help if I did a DNA test?"
... in which case you could say: yes, that would be great if you could.
And their results may be the final piece of the jigsaw puzzle that you
need to identify your biological father.
Applying the Process to Generations further back
So, the above is an example
of how to solve an unknown parentage case as if you were the subject
concerned. But what do you do if the person involved was your deceased
parent or grandparent? Well, it’s exactly the same approach but with a
specific adaptation.
You can still use your own
DNA, but you will need to identify and isolate those DNA matches that
relate to the person of interest. So for example, if your mother did not
know who her father’s parents were (i.e. your great grandparents), you
would need to 1) identify which of your matches are on your mother’s
side, and then 2) which of those matches are only on your mother’s
father’s side.
To
do this, first you could
test someone on your father’s side of the family (test your father if
he is still alive, or his sister, or a paternal 1st
cousin, etc). Any matches that you share with that paternal relative
will be on the paternal side of your family and all of these matches can
be put to one side and ignored. What you are left with are those
matches that are likely to be only on your mother’s side of the family.
Alternatively you could test a maternal 1st cousin, and this too would
help identify which of your matches are on your maternal side.
Secondly, you could test a relative on your mother’s mother’s side of the family (e.g. your maternal 2nd
cousin) as that would help you identify which of your matches are
related on your mother’s mother’s side (which you could then ignore),
thus isolating the matches that are related to you via your mother’s
father.
You then apply the 5 steps
above to this subset of your matches and with a bit of luck you will be
able to figure out who your mother’s father was.
You should always ask
yourself the question: is there anyone else within the family that I
could test whose DNA would add more information to what I already have?
Or whose results could help me narrow things down further? As a general
rule of thumb, test the older generation if they are available (and
willing) – they will have twice as much relevant DNA as the next
generation down.
About 3-4 million people
join the DNA databases every year so as time goes by, the chances of
solving your unknown parentage mystery get better and better. The first
step is for you to do the test … and then convince a few targeted
relatives to do the same.
Read More
Clan Dalton thanks Dr. Maurice Gleeson for his insightful article and IrelandXO for bringing this helpful information forward.
SURNAMES
The
earliest known Irish surname is O’Clery (O Cleirigh); it’s the earliest
known because it was written that the lord of Aidhne, Tigherneach Ua Cleirigh, died in County Galway back in the year 916 A.D.
In fact, that Irish name may actually be the earliest surname recorded in all of Europe.
Until
about the 10th century, Irish surnames were not passed down from
generation to generation. Instead, surnames were patronymic, or based on
someone’s father’s name. A person was identified by his given name plus
“mac,” meaning “son of,” followed by his father’s name.
For instance, Brian mac Colum was Brian, son of Colum. Brian’s son might be Finnian mac Brian (Finnian, son of Brian).
The female form of “mac” is “nic,” shortened from the Irish iníon mhic.
Alternatively,
the prefix “o” was sometimes used in place of “mac” and meant “grandson
of” or “descended from.” If Colum was well known, his grandson might
have gone by the name Finnian O Colum.
There were no fixed surnames, so a surname changed every generation or two. That can make tracing your family tree a bit more complicated!
But
even without hereditary surnames, those names still hold clues. For
example, that person named O’Clery or O Cleirigh (or Ua Cleirigh) was
the grandson or descendant of someone named Cleirigh. (“Ua” was an
earlier form of “O.”)
O’Clery – Defendant from the Ireland Court of Chancery Records, 1641.
It
was around the 1100s, as the population was increasing, that people in
the upper social classes started taking hereditary surnames (those that
remain fixed over the generations); others didn’t need surnames, or even
get around to them, until the 1500s.
Another
strong influence on Irish names came with the Norman invasion of 1169,
when a lot of Anglo-French names came marching into Ireland (this, too,
is when the Latin-derived prefix “Fitz,” meaning “son of,” first came
into Irish names). It’s from this influence that some of the names we
now consider Irish — Costello, Power, Burke, and others — first entered
the scene.
And
in the 1500s, the influence of the English was beginning to make itself
felt in Ireland. Ireland was experiencing religious persecution and
invasions, and many changes came to the island — including the changing
of Irish names, steadily but surely over the ensuing years, into ones
that sounded more English.
An
example of this was the common Irish surname Mac Gabhann, which meant
“son of a smith.” Some Mac Gabhanns, living in County Cavan, had their
name translated to Smith and it remained that way. Others outside that
area resisted, but the spelling became anglicized and they became
Mac/McGowans. This was very common.
Also, in many cases the prefixes Mac and O were done away with.
Many
surnames originated as occupational or descriptive names. That earliest
known name, O Cleirigh (O’Clery), was someone descended from a clerk;
Mac an Bhaird (Ward) was son of a bard; and Mac Labhrain (MacCloran) was
son of a spokesman.
Descriptive
names were names that described the first person to take them. The
first person with the name Dubh (Duff) (“black” or “dark”) was probably
dark featured. Other descriptive surnames include Bane (“white”), Crone
(“brown”), and Lawder (“strong”).
Irish
toponymic surnames, deriving from a place where the original name
bearer once lived, are rare. They include Ardagh, Athy, Bray, Kelly,
Sutton, and a few others.
The most common Irish surnames in Ireland haven’t changed much for a century. Here are 10 of them:
1. Murphy — The Anglicized version of the Irish surname Ó Murchadha and Mac Murchadha, meaning “sea warrior.”
2. Kelly — The origin of this Irish name is uncertain. An Anglicized version of the Irish name Ó Ceallaigh, it can describe a warrior or mean “white-headed,” “frequenting churches,” or “descendant of Ceallach.”
3. O’Sullivan — (Ó Súileabháin or Ó Súilleabháin in
Irish). In 1890, 90 percent of the O’Sullivans were estimated to be in
Munster. Many people agree that the basic surname means “eye,” but they
do not agree whether the rest of the name means “one-eyed,” “hawk-eyed,”
“black-eyed,” or something else.
4. Walsh —
This name came to Ireland via British soldiers during the Norman
invasion of Ireland and means “from Wales.” It’s derived from Breathnach
or Brannagh.
5. Smith — This surname does not necessarily suggest English ancestry, as some think; often the surname was derived from Gabhann (which means “smith”).
6. O’Brien — This name came down from Brian Boru (941-1014) who was king of Munster; his descendants took the name Ó Briain.
7. Byrne (also Byrnes; O’Byrne) — from the Irish name Ó Broin (“raven”; also, descendant of Bran); this dates to the ancient Celtic chieftain Bran mac Máelmórda, a King of Leinster in the 11th century.
8. Ryan — This name has various possible origins: from the Gaelic Ó Riagháin (grandson or descendant of Rían) or Ó Maoilriain (grandson/descendant of Maoilriaghain) or Ó Ruaidhín (grandson/descendant of the little red one). Or it may be a simplification of the name Mulryan. It means “little king.”
9. O’Connor — From Ó Conchobhair (grandson or descendant of Conchobhar; “lover of hounds”).
10. O’Neill — Anglicized from the Gaelic Ua Néill (grandson or descendant of Niall).
The name is connected with meanings including “vehement” and
“champion.” The main O’Niall family is descended from the historic
“Niall of the Nine Hostages.”
Original article at Ancestry https://blogs.ancestry.com/cm/history-of-irish-surnames-is-yours-here/?o_xid=127429&o_lid=127429&o_sch=Email+Campaigns