Hampshire Anglo-Norman Ancestry and DNA

[DocDAve]

Then there is the Y-DNA.

Did you know Y DNA can be carried through generations unaltered? My father shares the same Y-DNA and mutations as a guy in the early Norman era. And some mutations with people from earlier. He also shares the same mutations with a chap in the Americas, the only "close" DNA relative. He also shares the same with a guy in Denmark.

I put "close" regarding the American in quotes like that as over 300 years separate us as per FTDNA summary. Those 300 years however would be if we had the same surname & came from the same area. We don't. So, given our own family history which is well researched in England and England's own history of population movements [war, etc.] a more probable distance is something like 500+ years. The person seems to think closer, but, again given what we know of our own history (and the knowledge they have of their own British ancestry) and the entirety of Y-DNA results that'd be rather unlikely.

Useless in a way because until you can find the in between people god knows how close, how far we are related.

So you prove you're related to the Frenchmen. How far, how close. What if that Frenchman actually doesn't share the same ancestry - a non paternal event on his side - that you and he doesn't know of.

But given the surname it is likely anyways. Surnames don't just drop out of the sky.

Thanks for this.
I guess that if I compare my yDNA to a 2017 Monsieur Lancelevee and there is a close positive match then I'm happy. If I get a negative result I might still feel happy, or at least not dejected, that he may be a result of a non paternal event

[Break2015]

Thanks for this.
I guess that if I compare my yDNA to a 2017 Monsieur Lancelevee and there is a close positive match then I'm happy. If I get a negative result I might still feel happy, or at least not dejected, that he may be a result of a non paternal event

See that's the problem you can't actually tell who is the non paternal event without finding the ancestral skeleton. You may think he's the non-paternal, he may think you're the non-paternal.

Many people claim descendant testing - the testing of descendants - will clarify this for you. However, it won't. Let's say sixty people are trying to prove they are the descendants of John Smith some famous goldsmith. They've all got the same mutations & haplogroups so there's no denying that they're related to each other.

But between John Smith & these sixty people how many non-paternal events may have taken place? If let's say John Smith's great grandson's wife was having an affair with the local milkman. Each of her children aren't the children of John Smith's great-grandson but Mr. Milkman. So each of these sixty people are rather the descendants of Mr. Milkman not John Smith.

However, it gets more complex. Let's say John Smith had a brother. Hypocritically the same mutations & haplogroups as the mutations at least can change per few generations depending on their rate of mutation. My father's mother's mtDNA for example is possibly an American-only mutation on a French haplogroup.

But John Smith's brother's children are all of faithful marriages. No non paternal events. And there's another sixty people saying they are descended from this John Smith who are legitimately descended from John Smith.


How can you tell? You would literally have to locate John Smith, hope that the bones possess DNA, and then see. Otherwise, it is just a case of Mr. Milkman's children saying they're "John Smiths" and John Smith's kids saying they're "John Smiths".

The only way you'd ever prove one way or the other, without locating John Smith, is genetically testing every single male of John Smith's line. But again let's say that results in three haplogroups and numerous smaller subfractions within. Who exactly is John Smith's kids.


This is something DNA sites don't tell you. The non-paternal events, the this & that, which can result in all the descendants of Y actually being the descendants of N. Certainly deep Y and mtDNA is better than simple autosomal.

But, for example, on how deep some of this ancestry can go. My mother's haplogroup is Scandinavian. Her ancestry is British for 600 years. Her closest "matches" via mtDNA on FTDNA are Europeans & Scandinavians. Useful in a way, but useless if I wanted something more current than truly ancestral.

[DocDAve]

Well. I'm looking at this as simply as I can.
In medicine, if a person with a swollen painful lower leg is tested with a d-dimer test and it is negative, that unequivocally rules out a deep vein thrombosis ( DVT). If the test is positive, it means there is a DVT or there is a false positive and there could be a DVT. SO the test is called a negative predictor test for DVT.
In parallelel, it seems to me that a positive comparitive yDNA test, guided by rare surnames such as those in my paper trail, is evidence enough for paternal descent. If the test is negative, then it may exclude the possibility of descent or it may be due to bastardy at some point. So I am inclined to think that setting up testing with Monsieur Lancelevee ( if I can find a willing participant) in the hope of a positive outcome would be sensible ; considering the amount of time and energy I have spent on the document trail - 5 years at least of regular searching on aalt) this would be a gamble I'd be prepared to take. A negative result meaning I have been wrong all along or that there is bastardy is the chance I'd have to take.

[Break2015]

Well. I'm looking at this as simply as I can.
In medicine, if a person with a swollen painful lower leg is tested with a d-dimer test and it is negative, that unequivocally rules out a deep vein thrombosis ( DVT). If the test is positive, it means there is a DVT or there is a false positive and there could be a DVT. SO the test is called a negative predictor test for DVT.
In parallelel, it seems to me that a positive comparitive yDNA test, guided by rare surnames such as those in my paper trail, is evidence enough for paternal descent. If the test is negative, then it may exclude the possibility of descent or it may be due to bastardy at some point. So I am inclined to think that setting up testing with Monsieur Lancelevee ( if I can find a willing participant) in the hope of a positive outcome would be sensible ; considering the amount of time and energy I have spent on the document trail - 5 years at least of regular searching on aalt) this would be a gamble I'd be prepared to take. A negative result meaning I have been wrong all along or that there is bastardy is the chance I'd have to take.

You just said there's what dozens of people with the same or similar surnames in the area? I have a rather rare surname. You will rarely find mine outside of Scotland and northern England & even then that isn't common. Even the most "common" variation, and there's just three variations in total, is still rather unusual.

But Lanceley - all over England. Lansley - all over England.

Lancelevee is a rather French surname. It is all over France and predominant in areas where Huguenots once were. There's been Huguenots all over England including Hampshire. This is why one must research. I won't tell you how many Americans I've encountered claiming British ancestry with Baltic originated surnames. Guess they don't know there was once, for example, enough Poles to be transported in the Virginia Company during the 1600s to the Americas.

But the fact that it is, in your own words, common among French Canadians would lean more to a Huguenot origin or an early French origin [a French trader] than a Norman origin to begin with. Not because of the time gap but because of the simple fact most French Canadians trace their ancestry to western central & southern France not exactly Norman country. That is, of course, not taking into consideration misspellings, etc.

However, it is interesting you mention a famous Anglo-Norman family but don't name that family itself. So I am curious about how large of a gap there is between their surname and the surname you are searching after.



As for the negative result, reread what I said. Unless you find the ancestral skeleton you can't tell who is wrong and who is right.

[DocDAve]

You're correct, I should say perhaps distinctive not rare. Distinctive in a helpful way when it comes to researching the surname. The Anglonorman family I refer to IS Lancelevee, records exist easily found for them in Hampshire from the 12th C, and as knights of Edward I and Henry III ( John, Roger).The family features in the Norman Pipe rolls, landowners in Falaise and I have a document of them in Southampton at around the same time 1160. Their moated manor house still exists today near Sherfield-on-Lodden near Basingstoke ( Lance Levy Farm) and they precede Huguenots. The last La(u)ncelevee I can find is 1480 and the next "variant" I can find is Launcelett in 1522 - a GGF many times of mine in the family tree. The descent is such a nice thing to have, I thought yDNA would nail it so to speak.

Re negative result - well I would only be interested in a positive and then start gardening for 5 years instead!

[patsnudden]

My experience of paying for Y-111 for my brother, and for Y-67 for a maternal cousin (FTDNA) is that the numerous matches all with different and unknown surnames, makes the father to son idea non-sensical to me, and of no use at all. Nothing relates to the paper trail, which for my mother's father's family is documented back to the Middle Ages in the Isle of Wight, and mainland Hampshire.

We all know that the info on marriage certificates can be untrue, also on censuses, and gravestones .... but the DNA investment has just made me conclude that there must be far more false paternities than one could have guessed.

Am very disappointed with the dna tests I have bought from FTDNA and 23andMe for genealogical results, but pleased to have found some useful medical genetic info about myself, and my daughter.