Genealogy Reviews Online

Ancestry.com DNA Tests - Update

Earlier this year I let my Ancestry.com subscription expire and rarely went back to the site since I wouldn't have access to any records.  I completely forgot about DNA Ancestry and when I visited I noticed some changes. 

The most obvious change was the number of matches I now have.  As of today, I have a total of 153 paternal DNA matches (based on the 46 marker Y-DNA test I took).  The interesting part is I now have a new guy at the top of the list who is (according to DNA Ancestry) related to me within 12 generations (approx 300 years).  The cool part is I can actually trace my paternal line almost 300 years, but this new guy's name is hispanic and not Italian so I don't know if it will be helpful.

The one group I joined (Y-DNA Haplogroup E1b1b - The Early Farmers) has grown much larger.  I think the last time I looked it had under 100 members, but now is up to 254 and they appear to be a rather lively bunch.  As normal, I never really participate, but I do find all of the comments interesting - I was struck by how knowledgable people are now about genitic genealogy compared to 3-4 years ago.

One thing that didn't change is the price.  When I ordered the test not too long after Ancestry.com started, I think the Y-DNA 46 marker test cost me $149...the Y-DNA 46 marker test still costs $149.  I think they lowered the 33 marker test, however, from $119 to $99.

I haven't heard a whole lot of complaining about Ancestry.com's DNA offering so maybe people are getting what they expect.

Check out this post to see a round-up of my DNA testing articles...most are dated now however.

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My Greatest Genealogical Mysteries - Revealed (not solved) by Family Tree DNA

It's been almost two years since I last wrote about Family Tree DNA and thought I'd check in and explore how I'm doing so far (You can see my first post about FTDNA here...just don't laugh because it was also my very first blog post).  It looks like FTDNA is now up to over 204000 records as of July 17, 2008.  My haplogroup was updated and is now E1b1b1b2 because the Y-chromosome tree changed.  FTDNA has also added some cool maps allowing you to pinpoint where potential DNA cousins come from...Here are my 25 marker Y-DNA and high resolution mtDNA maps.  I still have no matches I would call a verifiable genealogical possibility.

While my Y-DNA test has enlightened me somewhat on the origin of my paternal family, it has also puzzled me.  According to my haplogroup, my paternal family is of North African origin (Berber specifically).  This makes complete sense because of the Muslim expansion across the Mediterranean into Spain and Southern Italy.  Most of the matches I've received come from people with Spanish or Arabic sounding names completely in line with my haplogroup and my understanding of the history of the Mediterranean world.  The puzzling part is represented by the red markers as shown in the 25 marker Y-DNA map in the link above.

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New (to me) Italian Genealogy Resource

I've had a genealogical break-through of sorts recently.  This wasn't one of those eureka moments where I found a name leading to a hundred others going back in time, but it may eventually allow me to push my paternal linage back further than I thought possible.  This discovery has also given me great historical background I never had before on my paternal grandfather's place of birth - San Giovanni in Fiore in the Cosenza Province of the Calabrian Region.

While using my grandfather's place of birth as a search term, I found a 1995 article titled A Social-Demographic, Isonymic and Genetic Investigation on an Isolated Calabrian Village, in the International Journal of Anthropology.  This was both good and bad.  The good news is the "Isolated Calabrian Village" in the title was San Giovanni in Fiore, but in order to access the information I had to buy it.  Because I hoped it would provide me good info on my grandfather's hometown, and because I'm a sucker for spending money for genealogy reasons, I paid my $32 to download a 9 page article even though I had no clue what the title meant.  Sometimes being a sucker pays off and this time it did.  Copyright provisions won't allow me to reprint the entire article here, but what I found excited me.   

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