Were your ethnicity estimates a surprise?

[Gadget]

I was tested by Ancestry DNA a christmas gift from my son .

Have you logged in to your DNA page on Ancestry or did your son set it up?

[Bambi1st]

I logged in and it said 50% Irish and 50% English but it was all the other stuff I didnt understand ,I will have to get my brother to look at it when he is next over .

[Gadget]

Have a read of this:

https://www.lostcousins.com/newsletters2/wedding18.htm#Masterclass

If you have any particular questions, just ask. We'll try to help 


Gadget

[Bambi1st]

Thank you very much

[smudwhisk]

I know the ethnicity results need to be taken with a pinch of salt, but was somewhat amused after uploading my AncestryDNA raw data to MyHeritage to be told I have no English DNA at all.

Ancestry ethnicity - 97% England, Wales, and North Western Europe, 3% Scotland and Ireland

which is pretty much what I would expect based on paper trail

MyHeritage ethnicity - 50.5% North and Western Europe, 33.2% Scotland, Ireland & Wales, 12.2% Scandinavian, 4.1% Finnish, 0% English

Now I know it depends on their sampling and yes I can see that as I do have quite a lot of East Anglian ancestors they may appear under North and Western Europe, and the probable Welsh ancestors (Welsh surnames, no idea where they came from), but to say 0% English does beg the question.

That said, I have matched a second cousin of my father's who I've had contact with before and the amount is about right compared to a 2nd cousin of my mother's on Ancestry, although twice as much as another of Dad's second cousins on that line on Ancestry).  MH are saying 1st cousin or 2 cousin twice removed, but he is actually 2nd cousin once removed.  And someone I match on Gedmatch also appears so its definitely my DNA.  However, they are showing matches with people in Germany, which may mean I might have a chance at working out where my 3xGreat Grandfather came from.

[melba_schmelba]

I know the ethnicity results need to be taken with a pinch of salt, but was somewhat amused after uploading my AncestryDNA raw data to MyHeritage to be told I have no English DNA at all.

Ancestry ethnicity - 97% England, Wales, and North Western Europe, 3% Scotland and Ireland

which is pretty much what I would expect based on paper trail

MyHeritage ethnicity - 50.5% North and Western Europe, 33.2% Scotland, Ireland & Wales, 12.2% Scandinavian, 4.1% Finnish, 0% English

Now I know it depends on their sampling and yes I can see that as I do have quite a lot of East Anglian ancestors they may appear under North and Western Europe, and the probable Welsh ancestors (Welsh surnames, no idea where they came from), but to say 0% English does beg the question.

That said, I have matched a second cousin of my father's who I've had contact with before and the amount is about right compared to a 2nd cousin of my mother's on Ancestry, although twice as much as another of Dad's second cousins on that line on Ancestry).  MH are saying 1st cousin or 2 cousin twice removed, but he is actually 2nd cousin once removed.  And someone I match on Gedmatch also appears so its definitely my DNA.  However, they are showing matches with people in Germany, which may mean I might have a chance at working out where my 3xGreat Grandfather came from.

This ties in with my experience smudwhisk, some very different ethnicity breakdowns on MyHeritage with much more 'Celtic' Scotland/Ireland DNA than what was mostly English on Ancestry. Also some extra regions I am not 100% sure if they are accurate or just 'noise'. My ancestry % breakdowns for my parents both match my recorded ancestry so I think we can say at the moment Ancestry are more accurate for the ethnicity breakdowns. I presume they are doing a similar analysis on England/Scotland/Wales as they have recently done with Ireland, so hopefully we might get a more accurate and detailed breakdown there in the not too distant future.

[smudwhisk]

Thanks melba, glad its not just me with some weird MH ethnicity results.  If it wasn't for the fact that I match a few known cousins at different levels, I'd wonder if it was my sample.  The weirdest is the Scandinavian/Finnish, apart from a possible multi-x great grandfather who could be Norwegian or Danish, nothing shows.  There is known French Huguenot/Walloon and the aforementioned German 3x Great Grandfather but nothing else.  I have no known Irish, one confirmed 4x GGF from Scotland but possibly another but don't know where from (its I think a Scottish surname) and while there are some Welsh names on both sides of the family, don't know where they were from (they all appeared in London pre 1800s) but I suppose English counties bordering Wales could get reflected in the MH sample and appear as Welsh.  Who knows.

[Romilly]

Hi smudwhisk,

I seem to have more English DNA on the 'My Heritage' Site than I do on Ancestry! (But perhaps their calculations are different? Or they've just split it up more?)

This is my Ancestry Ethnicity Estimate:

England, Wales & North Western Europe
Wales & the West Midlands: 52%
Southern England
Ireland and Scotland: 37%
European Jewish 7%
Germanic Europe 2%
Sweden 2%

On My Heritage:

North and West Europe : 93.5%
Irish, Scottish, and Welsh : 48.7%
English:40.2%
Finnish : 4.6%
South Europe: 3.5%
Iberian : 3.5%
Ashkenazi Jewish : 3.0%

I have no idea where the Askenazi Jewish DNA come from... But it must be on my BrickWall Paternal side, as my first cousins on that side also have it.

Romilly.

[stevemiller]

Ethnicity "estimates" are tosh.

My original Ancestry test had 12% Scandinavian, amended to 3% Norway (when they increased the number of their reference groups).

The same data at MyHeritage - 53.3% Scandinavian 

Ethnicity "estimates" at MyH are double tosh !!!!