Genetic Connections to Guadeloupe

Connecting to DNA Cousins from Guadeloupe [Google Maps] 

DNA testing is something I initiated about 10 years ago, and I was fortunate to have stumbled upon it when I did. With testing, I have been able to make great discoveries - some of them thanks to the DNA itself and others to the people I have met and interacted with along the way. If you have been following my blog (Thank you & ¡Gracias!), then you know a few years back (8 actually to be exact!) I begun to unravel a previously unknown discovery in my family about a connection to the islands of Martinique and Guadeloupe via my maternal grandfather's side of the family. At the time I knew very little about this branch but thanks to digging through documents and connecting with French Caribbean genealogists throughout these recent years, I was able to discover much more about this side of my family.

My research up until now has revealed two distinct sides in my 3rd great-grandmother's family, one side (her father's) comes from Guadeloupe while the other (her mother's) comes from Martinique. 

María Paulina Charles Lautin - 3rd Great-grandmother [Personal Photo]

Unfortunately, there is not much information past María Paulina's grandparents. It seems that on the Jean-Charles side, the family might have been mixed-creole seeing as how her parents were enslaved themselves, yet a Y-DNA test points to European origins for the "Charles" line. It is important to note that this side of the family received their freedom from slavery before 1848, unlike most of the enslaved peoples did in the French owned Caribbean islands at the time, this allowed María Paulina's paternal Guadeloupean grandparents a chance to marry before they passed away. Meanwhile, the "Lautin" side is probably all African in origin. Julienne was born a slave (noted as "negresse" on her birth certificate in 1844) and Eglantine herself was brought over from Africa. Unfortunately, we have no idea who the father of Julienne was. We only have a potential clue - in Puerto Rico the father's surname was written down as "Pedro" and searching the records in Martinique has allowed me to identify a family with the surname "Pitroo" who worked on the slave plantation as the Lautin clan; there might be a possible connection to that family and only time and DNA will tell.

Charles-Lautin Family Tree [Personal Photo]

One of my genetic goals was to potentially one day find a cousin who descends via their maternal line all the way down to Eglantine Lautin, this would allow for a MtDNA test to potentially identify a region in Africa she would have originally been from. I have been able to find a genetic cousin via AncestryDNA but they haven't logged into their account for over a year so I haven't heard back from them. The question now became were there segments in my DNA linking me back to potential cousins in Guadeloupe and Martinique? If not, would my grandfather's DNA contain segments? Luckily I have been able to test myself and my maternal grandfather on 23andMe and AncestryDNA along with our Y-DNA line on FtDNA. Thanks to the suggestion of David (a French Caribbean genealogist), I migrated my grandfather's DNA to MyHeritage - which seems to be more popular in France. 

After breaking up my DNA in DNA Painter into segmented colors of who gave me what, you can clearly see all the yellow segments below belonging to my grandfather. 

DNA Painter [Personal Photo]

This DNA in turn comes from his parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, etc. meaning that though those segments cover much of my maternal DNA, I would have inherited genetic material from one out of eight 2nd great-grandparents on that side of the family with ties to Martinique and Guadeloupe. And since it is far back, the odds of me receiving many segments is low as well, but having my grandfather tested means there are more odds of him having more segments as well. Recently in my DNA, I have been able to identify two matches on AncestryDNA and one match on MyHeritage with clear connections to the island of Guadeloupe. 

AncestryDNA

My first match shares DNA with my grandfather but not myself or my mother. Though they share 3 segments across 49cm it's possible that my grandfather was the last generation to inherit these segments. In their "shared matches" list they only share three matches, which is very uncommon for Puerto Rican matches to share such low and limited cousins, so I can probably rule out the fact that this cousin as remotely Puerto Rican. This cousin does however have on their shared matches a cousin who is Puerto Rican but connected to my grandfather via his Correa family which is tied to Martinique and Guadeloupe via María Paulina Charles. The first match I have no idea how they are connected and the third match is a cousin with is mixed Guadeloupean and I think African American. Since AncestryDNA does not share where they match on their DNA, I have no idea how to "chart" this for my grandfather on DNA Painter. The cousin I think is not on Gedmatch either, and I have reached out but no return message so far. 

Guadeloupean Cousin [Personal AncestryDNA]

This 2nd cousin shares DNA across 3 segments as well with my grandfather but this time at 38cm, my guess is that these 3 segments are probably the exact same ones as the first cousin from above. However with this cousin, my mother and myself are said to share DNA with as well. Unfortunately, I have no way of knowing where on my DNA these segments are located.

Cousin with Guadeloupean Ancestry [Personal AncestryDNA]

MyHeritage

This was my grandfather's first official Guadeloupean cousin to first appear for him which was very exciting, since it helped to solidify all the research I had done in the past 8 years. As you can see below I was able to find this cousin by filtering his DNA matches by geographic origins and selecting "France". The segment is listed as only one shared segment but also at 38.3cm like one of my grandfather's AncestryDNA matches. You can also see that based on our trees we both have "Guadeloupe" as an ancestral place for our families based on the trees we have built. I have gotten a chance to chat with this cousin and our families both have ancestry from Les Saintes, which are a set of smaller islands belonging to Guadeloupe! It is possible that there are more matches amongst my grandfather's DNA matches who have a connection somehow to Guadeloupe but so far this is the only one I have been able to find on MyHeritage. 

Guadeloupean Cousin [Personal MyHeritage]

Luckily, on MyHeritage you can see where in your DNA you share the segments. For my grandfather and this match, the segment is located on chromosome 11. 

Shared Guadeloupean DNA [Personal MyHeritage]

My own personal chromosome 11 is inherited mainly in the same spot from my grandfather as the Guadeloupean match comes from but doesn't mean that I would necessarily share that same piece of DNA with that cousin, in order to better know I would probably have to transfer my own DNA into MyHeritage and see if I match this cousin as well.

My Chromosome 11 divided into Grandparent Inheritance [DNA Painter]

Interestingly enough, the region my grandfather shares with this cousin on Chromosome 11 is European on one side and African on the other and specifically the DNA on that side is registered as Nigerian. In a previous post, I took a look at inherited African DNA and I analyzed a bit the fact that Nigerian DNA was much higher on my grandfather's side of the family and potentially connected to María Paulina Lautin. If I had to put some money on it, I wouldn't be surprised if their shared DNA was on the Nigerian side via a slave(s) brought over to Guadeloupe. I'll have to read up on the African influx of slaves to Guadeloupe and see if any studies have been completed on which regions these slaves specifically hailed from.

My grandfather's Chromosome 11 [Personal 23andme]

Why no genetic connections with Martinique? 

I'm not sure why I originally expected genetic connections from Martinique over Guadeloupe. Maybe because I discovered the former side first versus the latter, I expected that my genetic connections would happen in the same order. But taking a closer look it kind of makes sense why I might not have Martinican connections right away, we know that Eglantine was from Africa and Julienne's father probably was as well. Out of Eglantine's five children (one of them being my own 4th great-grandmother), only three (two siblings) went on to have children and who knows if they were were full or half siblings (I'm guessing half over full). 

Next Steps

Nonetheless, this is exciting stuff! The next step would be to try and figure out how we're all related! It doesn't seem like we have any surnames overlapping with each other, but at the same time, knowing that my 5th great-grandparents from Guadeloupe were slaves means that they didn't carry surnames in the traditional sense we have come to know. My 5th great-grandmother only went by "Marie Lucie" and used no surname on documents while my 5th great-grandfather was known as "Jean-Charles Chaleau" and the children passed on both "Chaleau" and "Jean-Charles" as surnames depending on the time period. 

Recently, a document was discovered on Terre-de-Bas (merci beaucoup David!) which mentions Jean-Charles as an uncle in a death record in the year 1853, which would mean he would be related to one her parents. As you can see, there is still much to be discovered and I'm hoping that our DNA will reveal more about our connections. This is also why it is important to explore various companies of DNA and search within your matches! 

Nº 1 Françoise - Décès 1853 [ANOM]

I also can't wait to visit Guadeloupe one day!

Terre de Bas, Guadeloupe [Guadeloupe Le Guide]

My 200th Post- 8 Years of Blogging, 15 Years of Genealogy

July 4th, 2019 marks 8 exact years since I began blogging. It all started when I was 21 years old and home from college over the summer. I was inspired by Cece Moore who runs Your Genetic Genealogist and has become a common name in the genealogist household with all the work she has done with DNA, adoptees, and even working on "Finding Your Roots". In June of 2011, she herself had completed her first year of blogging and so I decided to trace my own family via a blog as well. Who would have thought that 8 years and 200 blog posts later, I'd still be on this journey!

Though I don't have many official followers for my blog (as I haven't dedicated myself full-time to running it/putting it out there), I really started doing this for two reasons:

1) Personal Motives - To keep track of my own progress, hurdles, difficulties, breakthroughs, and as of recently analyzing my DNA in conjunction with my paper trail/genealogical searches. In a sense it would serve as a digital journey for which I could refer to and keep track of my finds and brick walls.

2) Visibility - While initially researching my family, I hadn't found too many blogs that covered a wide range of Puerto Rican topics in regards to genetics and genealogy and I ultimately wanted to be a contributor in order to make Puerto Rican Genealogy more visible. There is a big misconception that genealogical records from Puerto Rico have been burned, lost, or destroyed by hurricanes and people give up without even realizing all of the amazing resources available for Puerto Rican research there are out there.

5 years ago, I posted my Post #100 and I actually really liked the style I wrote in so I think I'm going to mimic it for Post #200! Feel free to read post #100 to compare and contrast now that I have 100 more posts and 5 more years added!

What I've Learned

My first blogpost was titled "What Started it all - Part I", where I write about the typical Puerto Rican love story of a "Spanish man" and a "Taíno woman" who had fallen in love in Lares, Puerto Rico - my 2nd great-grandparents. By the time I had written that post I had about 7 years of genealogical research under my belt but I had only just begun to scratch the surface of research. There were many doubts about my tree and definitely many, many ancestors' names yet to be discovered. When I began at the age of 14 there were no known (to me) family trees out there, none created by my grandparents, uncles/aunts, parents, or cousins. All I knew at the time when I began my tree were 2 out of 2 parents, 4 out of 4 grandparents, 6 out of 8 grandparents, and 7 out of 16 great-grandparents - though it's a little, it's also a lot compared to what some people start out with.

My First Blog Post - July 4th, 2011 [Personal Photo]

I've been very fortunate that since I started my research and blog I have come pretty far with my pedigree, which I am both fortunate and blessed to have. Various of my lines reach the early 1700s with a few reaching the 1600-1500s and very few the late 1400s when they came over from Spain. A few lines stop at the 1800s due to the lack of records for slaves - these being my lines from Martinique and Guadeloupe. However, "Rome wasn't built in a day"! It's been 15 long years of painstaking research where I have put in literally thousands of hours to search for my ancestors. I have been blessed to be able to travel to Puerto Rico to continue my searches various times, as well as traveling to Mallorca to research my ancestors. I have also been able to visit towns in Spain where my ancestors lived/were from before heading to the New World. Recently, I have been able to continue to test various family members with DNA and across various companies to help triangulate and find new information about who we are on a genetic level.

I've linked above and below various posts to the different themes I've discussed over the years! 

Advances in Genetic Testing

There have been many advances in genetic testing since I first started researching my family, to believe when I first tested with 23andme back in 2010 the cost was somewhere near $600 for one single DNA test! Nowadays, genetic DNA testing has become much cheaper and fairly accessible to many, not only here in the US but in various other countries. Here are some of the more recent posts that highlight these advancements throughout the years. 

• Exploring my X-Chromosome
• Establishing an African-American Connection via Chromosome 7
• Deeper analysis of European Ancestry
• Deeper analysis of African Ancestry
• Using DNA Painter Tool to narrow down DNA inheritance

My Favorite Discoveries

Since 2014, there have definitely been some exciting finds! These discoveries are a combination of things: from DNA testing, finding new genealogical documents, to discussing/receiving help from other genealogists. There were a wide range of discoveries made, from very intimate ones to discovering my Dávila line's origin in Spain in the 1700s. Listed below are some of the recent discoveries I've been able to make! 

• How a RAOK (Random Act of Kindness) helped me learn more about my 5th great-grandfather, Jean-Charles Gustave
• Learning via 23andMe that my dad had a half-brother we had no idea about
• Tracing my Dávila line back to Spain via genealogical records
• Finding out I was related to another genealogist I had met in Spain with ties to Sóller, Mallorca

Words of Advice

I would tell myself keep doing what you're doing! I have come a long way since my initial searches and there is still a lot to find out! Researching my family has brought me much closer to Puerto Rico and my identity as a first generation mainland American born citizen. To those of you budding genealogists - it's never too late! Ask family members questions, document what they have to say, and search online to see what you can find. If you're interested in genetic genealogy - test those family members (with permission, of course!) who might be willing to help you learn more about your family's past.

Hopes, Dreams & Aspirations

Reading my post from 2014 it was interesting to see where I was amongst my hopes and dreams for genealogy. There are some I have been able to check off and some that are still on my genealogical "bucket list". For example, being able to travel to Puerto Rico and go around the island to discover the towns, barrios my ancestors lived in, and the churches my ancestors would have married in. I have been fortunate to travel to distinct parts of the island and as of recently meet cousins in Lares, Puerto Rico. I have also been able to travel to Mallorca which was amazing. I still haven't become a professional genealogist, though I'm sure there is still plenty of time and I also haven't been able to travel to Martinique and Guadeloupe yet. I haven't brushed up on my French though hopefully that is in the works and I am still interested in bringing genealogy to my everyday life and profession.

I still dream about connecting Eglantine Lautin to a certain country/tribe in Africa and it would be amazing to have DNA cousins that confirm my ancestors are connected to Martinique and Guadeloupe (I have one potential lead with a cousin but nothing solid yet!). I also want to continue collecting stories and record them to have a digital audio database of stories from my current living family members that I could look back on years from now and listen to. A genealogist's work is never done as you can see!

Here's to 2024 when I complete 20 years of genealogy! Let's see what's in store! 

A DNA Connection to Sóller, Mallorca

My journey to discover more about my Mallorcan roots has been a long one! It started with a simple story about an ancestor from Spain (Part I & II), learning about the surname Magraner, going to the archives in Puerto Rico to learn about a man named Damián Magraner and ultimately traveling to Mallorca to learn more about his life. All links above are to old blog posts throughout the years with different forms of research I have completed to learn more about this family branch.

My first time to Mallorca was back in 2015 where I visited Sóller for the first time. Two summers ago I traveled again to Mallorca to complete some more research into this branch. I spent a little over a week in Palma pouring over records from Damián's family in Sóller from the 1800s-1700s. The rest of my time in Mallorca was spent traveling around the island getting to know other towns such as: Fornalutx, Manacor, Pollença, Sineu, and of course Sóller.

Completing research through microfilms [Personal Photo]

Traveling around the island - Fornalutx, Mallorca [Personal Photo]

On Facebook I am a part of a group of people who have ancestry from Sóller and there are ton of people from different parts of the world - but mainly there are a bunch of people from different parts of France whose ancestors from Sóller immigrated over. In asking for advice about research and records, I began chatting with someone who like me had ancestry on the island and like me was a young researcher - his name is Jérôme. Since Jérôme had been living in Madrid at the time and I was completing research over the summer, we decided to meet up for some drinks and chat about Sóller. While in Madrid we chatted about our heritage; his a mix of European countries and mine a mélange of ethnicities found/brought to the New World. He had been interested in DNA testing to help with research and we chatted about that as well. That evening we parted ways but kept in contact about research, Sóller, and the prospects of traveling to Mallorca for more research. 

A few months later, Jérôme had told me that his brother had tested on 23andme and he was excited to receive his results, but little did I know that I would become excited about these results as well! 

Surprisingly, Jérôme's brother matched some of my profiles on 23andme! He matched my father, two of my paternal uncles, and my paternal great-uncle - all of them connected to my paternal grandmother who was a descendant from the Avilés Magraner line. I was shocked to see this connection! Jérôme's family is a mix of Italian, French, and Spanish ancestors but specifically his grandmother was from Sóller, Mallorca! So here was DNA proof that along my paternal grandmother's line there was a definite connection to Sóller, Mallorca confirmed through a match to Jérôme's family.

Comparing his brother to my dad, my paternal uncles, and my great-uncle you can see that all of that DNA shared overlaps on Chromosome 2!

DNA Match on 23andme [Personal Photo]

Jérôme and I chatted about our connection and our surnames, since we share such a small amount of DNA we imagine our connection is far back, probably somewhere in early 1700s. Sóller is a fairly small town (pop. 13,791 in 2016) and a lot of surnames repeat themselves in our family trees so we're fairly sure if we sit down and start tracing our lines to find this ancestor we would find them buried in our older branches.

Since the match is far back, my brothers and I did not inherit this piece of DNA but it seems to have made it all the way down to my dad's generation. I am wondering if I test other cousins who are related to the Avilés Magraner line, will they also have this piece of DNA? 

Interestingly, on AncestryDNA I did match Jérôme's family again and this time it was my paternal great-aunt, sister of my grandmother. If I had to take a wild guess, this set of 8.2 shared centimorgans would be found on Chromosome 2 as they were on 23andme. 

AncestryDNA Match [Personal Photo]

So here we see that the DNA was picked up by two separate companies - both 23andme and AncestryDNA. Again, though it is a small fragment of DNA the fact that four members of my family connect with two separate members of Jérôme's family I think it is much more than just a coincidence or statistical noise.

We were pretty surprised to see that we shared ancestry and the fact that we had decided to meet up in Madrid while our time overlapped and then months later found out that we were related was pretty funny! It's definitely a small world and technology has made it much smaller for genealogists. 

Moving forward my goal is to test other cousins on my paternal side, especially those along the Avilés Magraner line to see who else matches with Jérôme and potentially new matches in Sóller will appear as well. Hoping that one day I am able to establish a connection again with the Magraner line that returned to Mallorca. 

A Puerto Rican Look at : A Generational Exploration of African Ancestry

Recently, I bought a few AncestryDNA test during their Black Friday/Cyber Monday sale. With those tests I was able to add 3 new members of my family to the site: my father, my mother, and my maternal grandmother. I still have one more test left and I'm hoping to test my maternal grandfather, but I'd have to travel to Puerto Rico to personally test him myself. After a few weeks of waiting for their results to process, I finally received them. Wanting to extract the most information as possible from their results, I decided to do some research ahead of time to have a better idea and understanding of what I was looking at.

Thanks to FonteFelipe's blog on Tracing African Roots I was able to specifically read about "Puerto Rican Results". Amongst his other posts, there are many that are directly tied to Caribbean and Diaspora African DNA results. There is definitely a lot of information there and much to explore about population genetics and the various tribes and countries involved in the Transatlantic slave trade. Since one of my New Year goals this year to learn more about my African roots, FonteFelipe's blog amongst some of the books I have in mind to purchase will definitely help me reach that goal.

My Results

Here is a quick look at my own personal AncestryDNA results taken about 1-2 years ago:

AncestryDNA [Personal Photo]

As you can see, my regions in Africa range from: Mali, African Southeastern Bantu, Africa North, Cameroon/Congo, and Senegal. I was rather surprised when I saw that I had 12% Mali as it is a fairly high number and a big chunk of my African DNA.

Based off what I know about my family, I know that there is mixed ancestry amongst many of my lines in Puerto Rico across various towns, but I have yet been able to pinpoint any slave ancestors inside of the island itself throughout my years of research, and I have traced many lines to the early 1800s late-1700s which will be important later on when discussing African DNA inheritance. The 'People of Color' mixes in my research so far range from "trigueño", "mulato", "pardo", and the occasional "negro" for my ancestors from Salinas. My research shows that those ancestors from Salinas, the Gustave and Lautin lines, came to Puerto Rico respectively from Guadeloupe and Martinique. These lines do carry African genes as both of these 4th great grandparents were slaves themselves on those islands. I'm hoping that by getting my grandfather tested and having both my mother's and grandmother's DNA I'll be able to have a better grasp into the possible regions of Africa (most likely in the western region) that my Guadeloupean and Martinican ancestors' African DNA point back to. 

One important thing to point out is that I am not going to talk much about the "Africa North" segments of my ancestry. The main reason being because most of these genetic leftovers in my and my family's DNA probably point more towards a Southern Spanish influence. There is the possibility of a genetic geneflow from northern African countries down into the Western area of Africa but for now, knowing what we know about Moorish Spain and my ancestors' presence in Andalucía and the Canary Islands we'll stick to the former theory. 

Some Prior Research

In FonteFelipe's blog post about Puerto Rico, he goes into depth using various Puerto Rican AncestryDNA results and textual sources on the Transatlantic slave trade to begin breaking down and analyzing their various results. Using his blog as a jumping point, I was able to look at my family's results through a different lens and begin to better understand slave trading patterns of the Caribbean and Puerto Rico. Here are some main points I learned from his post and I hope I am not oversimplifying and/or overstating some of the points (if so, let me know!): 

• It seems that on average, Senegal, N. Africa, and Mali were high and/or main ancestral contributions to the DNA gene pool for African DNA in Puerto Ricans. 
• Senegal and Mali specifically create an "Upper Guinea" Founder effect in Puerto Rico, where the genes were entered into the families' genetic pool early on and kept passing down through the various generations. 
• South-central Hunter-Gatherers can be from an ancient geneflow from the Pygmy/San people into the Bantu areas. 
• These higher Senegal and SE Bantu results can be from the 1500-1600s, again causing a Founder Effect. 
• "Mali" in the AncestryDNA categories is a hard category to fit into a box. From the colonial period, "Mali" DNA can be from Guinea Conakry and Sierra Leone. Some of the slaves from the region were known as "Bambara" and others as "Zape" (these mainly the Temne from Sierra Leone) and there was definitely a presence of these peoples throughout the slave trade in Puerto Rico. 
• There are three main regions that FonteFelipe works with when looking at the African DNA break down in AncestryDNA, these are: 
• A) Upper Guinea: Senegal, Mali 
• B) Lower Guinea: Ghana/Ivory Coast, Benin/Togo, Nigeria
• C) Central Africa: Cameroon/Congo, SE Bantu, Pygmy/San (South-Central Hunter-Gatherers) 

To have an idea of the regions and the various countries involved* in the Transatlantic slave trade, see below.
*When I say "involved", please take into consideration this does not mean that these countries willingly and purposefully took part. Remember that there are many elements at play such as: colonial powers, brute force, unequal trading, false beliefs, etc.

Having this knowledge in hand I went forward to look into my own family's African results. 

West African Countries/Regions [Wikipedia]

Generational Puerto Rican African DNA Results

In this snapshot of my family's African DNA there are four members shown: Myself, my father, my mother, and my maternal grandmother. I was born in the US and the rest of these members in Puerto Rico, however we are all "Puerto Rican" through Ancestry. I have talked extensively about my family in this blog but TL;DR - my family's results are quiet mixed: European (mainly an influence from Spain and potential countries such as France); Native (Taíno from Borinquen with a potential smidge of Carib/other), Jewish/North African (most likely a remainder of the Sephardic Jews of Spain and the Arab influence in southern Spain), and an west African mix most likely all introduced via slavery. Dividing these last results into the 3 categories mentioned above of "Upper Guinea", "Lower Guinea", and "Central Africa" this is how our results fair: 

African AncestryDNA [Personal Photo]

As you can see our African DNA is sprinkled into each of the three regions but mainly distributes itself into Upper Guinea first and then Lower Guinea, which goes along with what is mentioned in the blog. Interestingly enough I do not inherit any "Lower Guinea" DNA but my dad has only 2% Ghana/Ivory Coast while my mother and maternal grandmother have DNA from each of those regions.

Something important to mention is the odd disproportion of Mali DNA in my genes vs that of my parents. I inherited 12% while my parents only show 2% and 1% and my maternal grandmother herself at 2%. This makes me question my 12%, could there have been an error in that calculation? When you click on "Mali" for my ancestry my range is given as 4%-18%, could there have been an oversight there? I wonder how much of that "12% Mali" might be genetically attributed to other countries nearby. Nonetheless, the presence of the Senegal and Mali like mentioned in the blog might be a result of the Founder Effect of slaves brought onto the island early on. As I've mentioned in this blog and on this post, most of my family has been on the island since the early 1700s and some branches reach the 1600s, so whichever ancestors carry African DNA have yet to be identified as "esclavo" (slave) or even "negro libre" (free black - a term used for descendants of free black persons) in documents. More digging into the church records over time will hopefully begin to divide my ancestors further into more accurate categories. 

Mali Results [Personal Photo]

Looking at the other results, you can see where certain parts of my African DNA are inherited from. For example: it seems that my mother passed on segments of her Cameroon/Congo and SE Bantu genes to me. Something important to also consider is that lower numbers such as 1%, 2%, or 3% may be found in the "trace regions" of the DNA, which means that this might not mean direct ancestry from that country if not a mix already present in Africa before arriving to the New World.

Looking at the results, this makes it interesting to look at my parents' ancestry and their potential slave narratives in their family trees. For example, my father only has about 11% of African DNA on Ancestry (a bit higher than in 23andme). 7% of his 11% is found in the Upper Guinea region and 2% in Ghana/Ivory Coast. (The 1% of Pygmy/San again might be an ancient geneflow influence). Most of my father's families can be found in the mountains of Puerto Rican in areas such as Lares, Adjuntas, Utuado, and Yauco while his paternal branch mainly hovers around Toa Alta and Corozal. This Upper Guinea DNA was probably introduce early on and integrated fairly quickly into the branches of my paternal tree. Both sides of my paternal branches from my grandmother and grandfather carry African DNA so probably various groups from Senegal, Mali, and Ghana/Ivory Coast were introduced to various branches which ultimately gave my dad his 7%. It's also important to note that my father carries an African maternal haplogroup as well, which so far I have traced on paper to the early 1700s in Yauco, Puerto Rico to a woman named "Ana del Espíritu Santo".

Looking towards my mother's side I can make some guesses as to what my maternal grandfather might have contributed. It seems she definitely received some Ghana/Ivory Coast from him and some SE Bantu. No doubt there are probably influences from Senegal and Mali in her DNA from him as well. I'm itching to get him tested because he is my highest African DNA family member. My mother on AncestryDNA has about 35% African DNA and based off his 23andme results I wouldn't be surprised if his AncestryDNA results bring him into the 40% range!

Conclusions/Take Aways

With this type of research, it's very difficult to really come to conclusions! Ultimately, it's important to see how my African DNA is distributed amongst my parents and what that means for me as their child. Having read FonteFelipe's blog (which I definitely need to go back and read much more of!) there are interesting patterns that are important to take into consideration when thinking of my African DNA and the history behind it. There's a segment in his blog where FonteFelipe talks about Puerto Ricans whose results fall under "African>25%" and "African<35%" and how the "African<35%" seem to have a closer chronological input of African DNA in their genetic pool. This seems to hold true with my own family as my mother who is 36% and her father surely over 35% as well have a genetic African influence from Martinique and Guadeloupe that was introduced into the family in 1895 with the birth of my 2nd great grandfather, Julio Correa Gustavo (50% Puerto Rican, 25% Martinican, 25% Guadeloupean). Meanwhile, my father falls into the "African<25%" groups and his African input seems to be chronologically much older.

There is still much to learn about, research about, and inquire about in my family tree. I hope that as time continues, the African DNA on both 23andme and AncestryDNA become much clearer as it is an important piece for those of us who do not know where our African ancestors come from. Luckily, I think a better picture has begun to be painted in regards to my family's African ancestry with the help of genetic testing and with the help of texts such as books and blogs and primary sources such as the Civil Registry and Puerto Rican church records, thus allowing me to be able to put together a more cohesive picture and story of our past. Excited for what the future holds when it comes to African DNA! 

A Puerto Rican Look at: Genetic Communities

Now that I'm on summer vacation I hope I can get some more posts out -- especially since I'll be traveling and doing some research as well! I want to dedicate this post to the Genetic Communities aspect of AncestryDNA that was recently released.

This new feature of AncestryDNA is currently listed as "beta" meaning there are some kinks that will probably still be worked out. Though for me it does give me a generally accurate genetic community, I've noticed that it's not available to all - for example: a co-workers Panamanian husband does not currently have a genetic community listed for him.

Currently, I am listed as a part of 1 genetic community - let's take a look at what that means!

AncestryDNA Genetic Communities [Personal Photo]

What are Genetic Communities?

AncestryDNA describes Genetic Communities as the following: 

Genetic Communities [AncestryDNA]

When you click on your genetic community it takes you to your Genetic Ancestry page and now on the left corner towards the bottom you can see your genetic community. I was expecting my community to be something along the lines of Caribbean/Hispanic/Latino/etc. but it actually gets most in-depth than that. 

"Puerto Ricans in Northwest Puerto Rico"

It was able to group with "Puerto Ricans in Northwest Puerto Rico". 

"Puerto Ricans in Northwest Puerto Rico" Community [Personal Photo]

Genetic Community Grouping [Personal Photo]

I'm kind of torn with this grouping for various reasons. Something that's really cool about this grouping is that it gives you an overall history of the genetic community, and if you were raised outside that community it's a cool way of getting an overview of where your ancestors are from. For me, having done genealogy now for 13 years I can safely say that most of my family is spread ALL over the island and not just the west. Both of my parent's sides come from various towns across the islands, for example: my Rivera side has lived in in Toa Alta (more towards the East) for over 300 years and my maternal Correa side has traveled from San Juan to Coamo and finally to Salinas over the same time period. However, other sides do come from Lares, Adjuntas, Utuado (central), and some from San Sebastián, Mayagüez, Quebradillas (more western towns). However, shouldn't I belong to both West and East Genetic Communities?

You are able to see all the other genetic communities they currently have listed in AncestryDNA. If you head into the South & Central American cluster you can find a Caribbean cluster that list three regions: 1) "African Caribbean", 2) "Spaniards, Cubans, Dominicans & Venezuelans", and 3) "Puerto Ricans". 

All Genetic Communities [Personal Photo]

Caribbean Regions [Personal Photo]

As you can see under "Puerto Ricans" there are 3 Genetic Communities, though when I click on it I'm led straight to my community rather than the various others. I'm not sure if there are other actual regions to Puerto Rico, especially since it's such a small island. I can't see my DNA cousins' Genetic communities so I can't investigate from there as well.

Final Thoughts

Nonetheless, it's super interesting to see how AncestryDNA is developing this new area of DNA/Genetic genealogy. I'm guessing that this feature will continue to grow from the better and will ultimately be able to point more granular regions (maybe harder for places like Puerto Rico vs. countries like Spain, though). I wonder if my parents or other family members would have different regions show up. For example, I have Martinican and Guadeloupean ancestry… will that pop up for other cousins? 

Excited to see where this will take us genealogists in the future! 

A Puerto Rican Look at: DNA Circles

DNA Circles [Ancestry]

Fairly recently (in the genealogical world), Ancestry.com has been working on a DNA matching portion of their website called "DNA Circles". I've been waiting to write a post about DNA Circles until I got my first match, and very recently this occurred (this post has been sitting in "drafts" for a while now haha). Here is the definition of how DNA circles works below straight from Ancestry:

DNA Circles Description [Ancestry]

Initially I wasn't in any DNA Circle and that is mainly due to the fact that my tree had been set to private and couldn't be connected to anyone. I am very, very hesitant about setting my full tree to public because of people creating false connections and just taking entire branches off your tree and transplanting it onto theirs, so I decided to create a simpler public tree for DNA circles.

DNA Circles is supposed to find connections to other members who have tested and create a place where you can connect with these matches, see how you match them, and hopefully extend your family trees. AncestryDNA has been hard to manage as a Puerto Rican for various reasons, the main one being that it constantly creates false connections to people and I do not necessarily understand why. Under my "hints" tab, I rarely match anyone correctly. For example, one hint says I have a cousin matching my 3rd great grandmother Antonia González Padilla but it's connected to their ancestor who's last names were "Nieves González". I'm guessing the system is confused by the use of two last names and doesn't know how to properly connect cousins.

So my one circle is to "Estebania Rivera Rodríguez" but as you can see the connection is labeled as weak and there were 831 - now 952 - connections listed.

DNA Circles - Estebania Rivera Rodríguez [Personal Photo]

Entering my DNA circle, more information is given about what this Beta program does:

DNA Circles - Estebania Rivera Rodríguez [Personal Photo]

Within the circle, you can see a relationship lists of those who are believed to be attached to Estebania Rivera Rodríguez. The "strongest" match listed has a public tree but when you check out how we are connect, it doesn't really add up.

DNA Circle Match [Personal Photo]

Notice how my tree goes up from my 2nd great grandmother Ramona Rivera Rivera to my 3rd great grandmother Estebania Rivera Rodríguez and on the other tree it ends with an unknown González. It is very likely that I share with this cousin DNA but I'm not quite sure that it's through Estebania especially when you compare it down the line and the other descendants.

Ironically I DO match with others through paper trail and have figured out where they match me through my family tree but no DNA circles have populated for them. Some of their trees have been set to private while it also might not have enough "connections" for the DNA circle to be created.

Nonetheless, I am excited for the day that I can get a DNA circle and have it match correctly to my DNA cousin and use it for further my genealogical research. Until then, I patiently wait and continue to try and match and confirm through paper trail. :) 

A Puerto Rican look at: FtDNA's myOrigins

FtDNA myOrigins [FtDNA Email]

Recently I received an email about the release of FtDNA's myOrigins; this would replace the old version of the calculations given for ancestry breakdowns. I was pretty excited about this upgrade because it would add another view of my ancestral breakdown by another company. Currently I have 23andme's Ancestry Compositon as well as Ancestry's AncestryDNA. I have also used DNATribes for myself and a couple of other family members. So let's take a look through a Puerto Rican lens of the myOrigins release!

23andme Ancestry Composition

For comparison's sake let's look at my 23andme Ancestry Composition. Here on the left is what my percentages look like in Standard View. I go back and forth between the Standard View and Speculative View, but for this comparison sake let's stick to the main one. You can see that in solid, raw numbers I am approximately: 54% European, 15% Sub-Saharan African, 12% East Asian/Native American, 1% Middle Eastern/North African, and 18% Unassigned. I don't like the large amount of unassigned here in Standard View but we can't live in a perfect genetic genealogical world (Not yet at least!).  

FtDNA myOrigins 

Now take a look at my recently released myOrigin percentages! There are definitely a few similarities and some differences. Here on myOrigins you can see that I am slightly more European at 58%, which is only a ~4% difference from my Ancestry Composition. My African is listed as 21%, a good ~6% higher than 23andme. The Native percentage called here "New World" is a solid 10%. Here on myOrigins there is a Jewish Diaspora breakdown where I score 7% and then a Middle Eastern group where I score 3%. On AncestryDNA I do score 5% on their category of "European Jewish" but 0% on their "Middle East". 

The categories can then be expanded to show a more in-depth look at the main category. For example, my European breaks down into: North Mediterranean Basin, European Coastal Islands, and European Costal Plains. My African breaks down into: Niger-Congo Genesis, and East-African Pastoralists. While my Middle Eastern breaks down into: North African Coastlands (Which if you look at it that way I score a 4% on AncestryDNA). Here are the pictures of the breakdowns for my main categories. Note: New World is Bering Expansion which covers North, Central, and South American while the Jewish Diaspora hovers/radiants over and near Poland. 

European Ethnic Makeup [FtDNA myOrigins]

African Ethnic Makeup [FtDNA myOrigins]

New World Ethnic Makeup [FtDNA myOrigins]

Jewish Diaspora Ethnic Makeup [FtDNA myOrigins]

Middle Eastern Ethnic Makeup [FtDNA myOrigins]

It was definitely interesting looking at these numbers especially at the African and European scores. My African on myOrigins is at 21% while on AncestryDNA it's at 23%, the highest 23andme places me is at 15.7%. Also AncestryDNA predicts that 12% of my DNA is from the Mali region and here on myOrigins 17% of it is labeled as "Niger-Congo Genesis". I was also surprised that I scored 24% on the European Coastal Islands portion and I wonder if that has anything to do with the potential connection through Gustave Jean-Charles and also potentially through my great grandfather's Irish/English paternal haplogroup. 

All in all, I didn't think the ethnic breakdown was too far of from what I have seen with other companies. Whether or not it's true to my family is a completely different story! Since my family is pretty mixed for the last past 200+ years I don't really know where certain parts of Native, European or African come from -- rather it's coming probably from all my lines. I can only guess that my 4th great grandmother was 100% African because she was born on a sugar plantation in Martinique. I'm really interested to see if myOrigins develops a bit further and adds more specific breakdowns for African like AncestryDNA has done. 

Happy DNA Day!!

April 25, 2014 [DNAart]

I know I am a day behind with this post but I still wanted to publish it! DNA has truly changed the way I view myself, my culture, my history, and my view on the world. I wanted to share a bit why taking a DNA test was important to me.

Before taking my 23andme test, which back then was a hefty price ($500), I didn't really know what to think of myself. I knew that my history was full of multicultural ancestors, yet how much of me was actually native Taíno, African, or European? I had always been proud to be Puerto Rican and my tree was definitely helping me to realize more and more how deep my roots are on the island, yet I still had no idea what continents my lines ran back to.

Parranda en Puerto Rico [ElBoricua]

Taking the 23andme test and later the AncestryDNA test really helped to show how mixed our culture, my culture, really was. I learned about my Y-DNA, mtDNA, and my ancestral composition. I learned that my Y-DNA traces back to the area between Spain and France where the Pyrenees lie; this wasn't too surprising since many Spaniards came to Puerto Rico. I learned that my mtDNA traced back to the natives of the Americas and probably specifically to the native Taíno and/or Arawaks who lived in Borikén before the arrival of Cristóbal Colón. I also learned that while I am little over half European, I do carry about 15% and 12% African and Native American genes respectively. Other haplogroups in my family tie into various groups such as: West Africa, Middle Eastern/Jewish, Irish, English/French, and there is more to learn about.

Ancestry Composition - Luis Rivera [23andme]

I learned that even though my family has been on the island of Puerto Rico for at least 200+ years I have ancestors who immigrated to Puerto Rico from Martinique and Guadeloupe, bringing their own culture and identity with them to their new land. In that 15% Sub-Saharan African, I carry their names, their stories, their memories.

Many of us come from very complex and interesting backgrounds, we have to learn more from both a genetic and historic standpoint to understand who we are here today. I am a combination of curious explorers, friendly natives, and determined slaves. I have learned to view the world differently, that skin color doesn't make or break your identity and that there is more than meets the eye. My DNA results have made me proud of all aspects of my ancestry, to realizing that I am my own melting pot. 

So Happy DNA day: take your own DNA test, test someone in your family, or learn more about your results! I don't think you'll regret it!

Spanish, Taíno, Africans [TainoNationNews]

A Puerto Rican look at: AncestryDNA 2.0 (African Portion)

This week something awesome happened- Ancestry.com updated their DNA part of the website and added more ethnicity groups! More importantly, they now break down Africa into various sections which is amazing since this is the first time (to my knowledge) that a company has broken down the Autosomal DNA by African countries.

Part of the website introducing the new AncestryDNA

My original breakdown from AncestryDNA is provided below:

Original AncestryDNA Breakdown

Below is the new breakdown from the updated AncestryDNA:

New AncestryDNA Genetic Breakdown

Like I mentioned what's awesome is that there is a new African ethnicity breakdown which is the first time I've had some genetic hints (from my own DNA) as to where my African ancestors are from. As you can see from the picture above, my African percentage is estimated to be 23% which at 23andme is currently estimated at 16.1% (Standard) and 17.7% (Estimated).  The first country is mentioned as Mali at 12% then the rest (11%) is part of "trace regions". As you can see the Trace Regions include: African Southeastern Bantu, Africa North, Cameroon/Congo, and Senegal. The Africa North part is most likely from southern Spanish ancestors who mixed with the Muslim inhabitants who arrived from northern Africa and lived in Al-Andalus. 

Top African Country- Mali

What was so interesting is that I score 0% in the categories of: Ivory Coast/Ghana, Africa South-Central Hunter-Gatherers, Benin/Togo, and Nigeria. I was surprised since many slaves were brought over from these West African countries. My 1% in Senegal and Cameroon/Congo make sense since they are along the coast. Africa South Eastern Bantu interestingly matches with the Zimbabwean and Angolan 23andme cousin matches I have.

I was very surprised to receive Mali at 12%. With research I've realized that current day Mali was part of the Ghana Empire as well as the Songhai Empire, which were big players during the trans-Saharan trade. It is very possible that my ancestor(s) lived inland and were brought out to the coast and put on ships or already lived in the coast through migration within the Mali empire when borders weren't officially set. 

Mali Empire

Present Day Mali borders

According to AncestryDNA a typical native Malian is in the range of 39% due the various multiple ethnicities that exist in the country. And interestingly I am at 12% which isn't too too far off. 

Me vs. Typical Native Estimates

Having "Mali" listed in my countries is eye opening. Even though I wasn't raised "Afro-centric" I knew that I have slave roots throughout various lines in my family. With the recent discovery of my 5th great grandmother, Eglantine Lautin, being a native African brought to Martinique as a slave I wonder if current day Mali would be her homeland? Or where does this high percentage of Malian ancestry come from, various ancestors? Did they speak Bambara and a part of the Mandé people? Did they mix with the Tualeg/Berber people or were tensions already high between the two groups?

Ethnic Groups of Mali Explained

There is still MUCH to learn. Both about these results, myself and the possibility of other countries/ethnicities not yet listed. I am patiently waiting for the updated 23andme version of their Ancestry Composition to see if there are any trends/patterns. For now I will continue my research on Mali, its people and history!