One Lucky Bird

Well, they are not exactly new, however I have learned a lot of new information about my ancestry after getting my DNA test results from 23andMe.

My maternal haplogroup is W*. Passed on from my mother to me and my sister Cindy, and then to her two daughters Devon and Tara.

Wilma, the first member of the W haplogroup, was born between 49,000 and 26,800 years ago in what is now northwest India or northern Pakistan. Wilma’s descendants entered Europe through the Balkans, spreading in several directions. One lineage…settled in what is now France. Descendants of a woman … spread from Central through Northern Europe and then to the British Isles. Lineages with very little change from their Wilman ancestor settled in sparsely-populated Finland and Scandinavia. But everywhere in Europe there were also other W lineages that shared ancestors with cousins still living in India, Pakistan, and Iran. view source

My paternal haplogroup is R1a1a* from my Dad’s Y chromosome passed onto my brothers. David’s son, Jackson, has this haplogroup, and will pass it along with the surname, Cardinal, should he have a son. Dad’s brothers also have this haplogroup.

This haplogroup is believed to have arisen around 26,800 years ago, somewhere in Central Asia or South Asia. The R haplogroup is common throughout Europe and western Asia and the Indian sub-continent, and in those whose ancestry is from within these regions. It also occurs in North and Sub-Saharan Africa. It’s typical in populations of Eastern Europe and parts of Central Europe. R1a has a significant presence in Northern Europe, South and Central Asia, as well as Siberia. R1a can be found in low frequencies in the Middle East. The Modern “Out of Africa theory” ties in with R1a1 that it “could have found his way initially from India or Pakistan, through Kashmir, then via Central Asia and Russia, before finally coming to Europe”…”as part of an archaeologically dated Paleolithic movement from east to west 30,000 years ago.” view source

My father’s maternal haplogroup is T1a. Passed on from my paternal grandmother. Each of Dad’s sister’s (my Aunt Joan, Rene, Carolyn and Ann) carry this maternal haplogroup, as do their daughters (my cousins – too many to name).

If you’ve read the Seven Daughters of Eve, (thanks Mom!) your clan mother is Tara. The cluster is thought to have originated in Mesopotamia/the Fertile Crescent approximately 10,000-12,000 years ago, and then moved northwest into Europe and east as far as modern Pakistan and India. view source