Your Mother's Mother

Deep Into DNA*

Your mother’s ancestry can be extremely challenging. Most of us live in a patrilineal society. The wife and the children take the surname of the husband. History shows us that recording the maiden name of the wife was often an afterthought. We have all tried traditional genealogy for our mother’s line. Some of us can go back a couple of generations and have hit brick walls. Some of us have researched a dozen generations. Mitochondrial DNA testing can aid a genealogist in discovering those lost surnames and validating your research.

Two months ago, I wrote about y-DNA and its use in tracing your paternal line. Mitochondrial DNA testing looks at your maternal line. There are many similarities and just as many differences between the two tests.

...continued at The In-Depth Genealogist with a free membership.

*The Deep Into DNA article series is published each month in The In-Depth Genealogist Newsletter and will demystify genetic genealogy and make sense out of DNA testing terminology. Each month we will talk about the types of tests available from major labs and show relevant examples on how to use DNA in your genealogy research.

#gDNA

Your Father's Father

Deep Into DNA*

 

Raise your hand if you’d like to know more about your surname and your father’s ancestry. I’m raising mine!

Most of us live in a patrilineal society. The wife and the children take the surname of the husband. We can’t help but to associate with our father’s family, his clan. The males in the family will inherit the Y chromosome virtually unchanged, though genetically, we can only attribute a small fraction of our overall DNA to that patrilineal line. Psychologically though, 50% of our ethnic identity comes from dad.

We have all tried traditional genealogy for our father’s line. Some of us go back a couple of generations and some of us have researched a dozen generations. A few of us are adopted and know nothing about our paternity. Y-DNA testing has benefits that aid a genealogist in all these situations...

...continued at The In-Depth Genealogist with a free membership.

*The Deep Into DNA article series is published each month in The In-Depth Genealogist Newsletter and will demystify genetic genealogy and make sense out of DNA testing terminology. Each month we will talk about the types of tests available from major labs and show relevant examples on how to use DNA in your genealogy research.

#gDNA