Romany DNA - what would you expect to see?

[sallyyorks]

Hi Richarde
I was asking more for a primary source, but never mind

[richarde1979]

Hi Richarde
I was asking more for a primary source, but never mind

I understand. I of course use and reference primary sources to reach my conclusions. They are freely available to view in the book. I won't go into further detail here, simply as it is not relevent to Romany DNA, the subject of the thread, and as in the past, we would be guilty of diverting this thread from it's primary purpose.

[FenBosw]

Hello folks,
I’m new to this site and have just noticed this thread. It’s very interesting.
I would have thought autosomal dna results for someone with Romany ancestry would show Caucasus,Middle East and Eastern Europe along with the usual Scandinavian and Western Europe. All the places the Romany visited on there migration from Asia.
Just a thought.....

[Elliebean54]

I'm currently wrestling with our family's DNA results, and how it might relate to an ongoing mystery in our tree. In short, my mother's maternal GM is the mystery.
We're not 100% sure who she is or what happened to her. I have several versions mapped out on Ancestry but none fit all the known (supposed?) facts. We also have anomalous DNA results that could shed some light, and as one of the geneaolgy options involve her being a Bargee, the other to and fro movement between East Anglia and the East End of London in the late 19th century, I'm wondering whether she was Roma and if the DNA could support this.

On my mother's paternal side there is definately Traveller connections but it looks like Scots/Irish traveller, though a possible Bargee line has also been unearthed. This has been confirmed to some extent by a distant cousin I've connected with on that side who says her line also had at least married into a Traveller famiy. I have direct ancestors and other relatives recorded on various sources as Travellers, Boat People, Boatmen, Metal Traders, Hawkers, Rope Makers, Weavers and Horse Dealers. The surnames involved are Archer/Ansall, Williams, Abbott, Palmer, Powell and (by marriage) Boswell and Mattin. The famlies are connected with Suffolk/Norfolk, the West Midlands, Southwark and the East End of London.

My mother's maternal line also had a high level of black haired and dark skinned relatives, some with blue eyes some very dark. There was also a bit of a tradition of the women on that line practising backstreet arts like palmistry, dream interpretation etc in the East End.

On to the DNA.

We have DNA on My Heritage, Ancestry and Gedmatch (only just uploaded - not processed and available to match yet). I put it on Gedmatch because there were discrepencies as expected between us and with other relatives on the geneaology sites especially with the lower certainty DNA readings and I wanted a more detailed breakdown from mutiple sources.

The DNA that is shown in both me, my mother and other relatives on that side is a mix that is consistently around 15-20% Hispanic/West Meditarranean, 1% North African, 4-6% East Meditarranean/Caucasus and 1-2% South Asian. We have an extensive family tree and there is no known recent ancestor for this DNA and so far all DNA connections confirm the researched relationships. All we have to go on is some known degree of contact with the Travelling community and this mystery GGM.

When I've looked at the Archaic DNA (don't now if this is useful or not?) along with the mainly European HG/Neolithic mix there's a persistent 4-5% Basal and Iranian Mesolithic with traces of Archaic South Indian and North African.

My understanding is this DNA make up could suggest a Roma ancestor? I'm not so certain how the high levels of Hispanic fit, but there seems to be anecdotal evidence at least of hispanic DNA in UK Roma. Basically, am I potentially on the right track here?

[edesch]

Hi first time on this wonderful site, visitor from the Netherlands.
In my paternal line  I have an ancestor who could be of Romani ethnicity. The only thing I know is that he (Peter FRANCIS) is born around 1827 in the (nowadays) county Haromszek, Transilvania , Romania. So after doing a DNA test for my dad and his sister (my aunt) I was curious on the results in GedMatch. BTW we are Eurasians (60% Indonesia, 40 % Europe).
I also have a Romanian friend  whose 4 grandparents are born in Romania and according to her are Non-Roma and we uploaded her DNA kit also to Gedmatch for comparison.

I used the calculators that have Roma, Romani and/or Romanian-b_behar as ethnicity in Oracle4
and indeed those ethnicities are mentioned specifically for my dad/aunt and not for her. So I guess that a) the ethnicity will show up in gedmatch by using the right calculators and b) my ancestor is indeed descended from Romani.

What do you think?

Below are the results for the used calculators in Gedmatch<

MDLP K-23b      
                                                Eurasian  Romanian
Austronesian                                   27,80   
South_East_Asian                           24,01     1,20
Caucasian                                      12,21   32,21
European_Early_Farmers                   10,00   41,35
European_Hunters_Gatherers             9,03   13,17
South_Indian                                     6,75   
South_Central_Asian                             2,66   3,61
Near_East                                             2,05   3,12
North_African                                     1,70   
Australoid                                             1,42   

Eurasian
50% Dai + 50% ROMA_SLOVENIAN    @7,5
50% Dai + 25% French + 25% ROMA_BH    @2,7
50% Dai + 25% Murut + 25% ROMA_BH    @2,7

Romanian
50% Central_Greek_ + 50% Latvian_    @2,9
50% Belarusian-East_ +25% Crimean_Tatar_Coast_ +25% North_German_    @2,5
25% Ukranian-Center_ +50% Crimean_Tatar_Coast_ +25% Swede_    @2,2

==============================================================

HarrappaWorld
                                            Eurasian     Romanian
SE-Asian                                          46,57   
NE-Euro                                          13,06          47,57
Mediterranean                                  10,92          21,32
Caucasian                                       9,88          18,04
S-Indian                                           5,66   
SW-Asian                                           3,94            2,91
Baloch                                           2,39            7,50
Siberian                                           1,83   
NE-Asian                                           3,07   
Papuan                                           1,93   
Beringian                                           0,62


Eurasian
50% Iban_Xing + 50% Romanian-a_behar    @6,7
50% Iban_Xing + 25% Morocco-Jew + 25% ROMANIAN-B_BEHAR    @6,0
50% Iban_Xing + 25% French + 25% ROMANIAN-B_BEHAR    @6,0


Romanian
50% romanian-a_behar +50% ukranian_yunusbayev     @2,0
50% serbian_harappa +25% slovenian_xing +25% ukranian_yunusbayev    @1,2
25% hungarian_behar + 25% serbian_harappa + 25% serbian_harappa + 25% ukranian_yunusbayev    @0,7

==============================================================


PuntDNAL K13 Global
                                                        Eurasian     Romanian
SE-Asia                                                    31,68     1,01
SW-Europe                                            16,33   28,82
NE-Asia                                                    17,46   
NE-Europe                                                    12,77   47,03
South_Asia                                              8,37   
West_Asia                                                      5,70   13,87
SW_Asia                                                      4,35     6,19
Oceania                                                      1,96   
Siberia                                                               1,47


Eurasian
50% Luzon + 50% ROMANI    @8,7
50% Luzon + 25% Spaniard + 25% ROMANI    @5,0
25% Luzon+ 25%  Dusun + 25% Spaniard + 25% ROMANI    @4,1


Romanian
50% Macedonian + 50% Russian    @1,8
50% Estonian +25% French_ +25% Turkish    @1,5
25% Estonian+25% Greek_Central+25% Russian + 25% Serbian    @1,4

 

[Redman45]

Just wondering if any people who have Romany ancestry and have tested with ancestrydna have noticed there results change?

[kr236rk]

The Powells are a very interesting family, of clear importance to the British Romani community of the past. I have dedicated an eleven page chapter to the Powell family, and their allied family the Finches, in the first part of my upcoming five volume work on the Early British Gypsy Families. I aim to begin publishing summer next year. Together the work comprises over 1,100 pages and attempts to trace all Gypsy families mentioned in Tudor and Stuart records up to the early part of the 20th century. It's companion piece is a hundred page work I have written on the Tudor Gypsies which I aim to publish early in 2018. The Powells are mentioned there also. There are many sources for Powells in the Tudor and Stuart era which unambiguously state them to be 'Egyptians' or 'Gypsies'. They are one of the better documented families in that period. They continue to appear in the Georgian era, and also in the Victorian era and early 20th century, though had decreased significantly in numbers by then.

But I think we are in danger of derailing this thread now from its original subject Romany DNA, so I will leave it at that. Perhaps those who are genuinely interested will search out my work when it's available.

I have not come across any 'Powell' Romany before. I think it is more of an Irish or Scots surname?.

There's many Powells in the Forest of Dean records.

Hi richarde1979,

Am researching Powells, can you forward the title of your book which mentions the Powell & Finch surnames please?

Thank you.

[richarde1979]

Hi Kr236rk

The link to the book is here

https://www.richedmunds.co.uk/early-gypsy-families-1

It s due to be published 4th November.

Thanks for your interest

Richard

[kr236rk]

And thank you Richard!

Grew up in Norwood, many place names Romani, such as Finch Avenue SE27, have been interested in the Romani People ever since. Only recently discovered the Powell surname in relation to the Romani heritage of this part of South London.

Richard