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And sometimes people get an unexpected ancestry that is real, they just didn't know about it, either because of insufficient research/records, or someone's father wasn't who they thought. On an episode this season of Finding Your Roots, author George R.R. Martin thought he was 1/4 Italian because of an Italian grandfather. It turned out that the man he knew as his grandfather was not his biological grandfather. His test showed 1/4 Ashkenazi instead of 1/4 Italian.
Yeah, but his ethnicity was only that conclusive because Ashkenazi are so endogamous that a significant result in Ashkenazi is very conclusive, whereas other ethnicities, not so much. It's the exception to the general rule.
I have traced many generations and roughly 3 centuries to same place in Southern Italy on one side of my ancestry, but instead of 50% Italian I get some 21% French. And that would not be on the other side of my ancestry either. They have a problem lately with anything Italian. They give some of it away to other countries and other people who are not Italian they make into Italian. I have had ancestry estimates since they started and this is the worst estimate they made outside the first few month they started making estimates, mostly because the Italian portion something is just plain wrong with their data.
Yeah, but his ethnicity was only that conclusive because Ashkenazi are so endogamous that a significant result in Ashkenazi is very conclusive, whereas other ethnicities, not so much. It's the exception to the general rule.
It happens with other ethnicities of course. My 1st cousin's daughter tested expecting 100% European results but got 25% East Asian, 75% European. She had her father (my 1st cousin) test and his result was 50% East Asian (and he turned out not to be my biological cousin).
I match a lot of people who consider themselves to be Native American of the Lumbee variety. Most of them have no Native American DNA but between 20-50% SubSaharan African, the rest European. Those results are pretty conclusive.
While it's true the algorithms are not as good at separating other European categories, I think it would be unusual for Ancestry to estimate 41% Italian when there is no Italian ancestry. As I pointed out above, the Bia surname is found in Italy (its frequency is higher in Italy than France), and the OP should check his DNA matches to see if he finds any Italians. Some Italians may have claimed to be from France in censuses which was less stigmatized. Usually the best way to confirm ethnicity X in the estimates is to find DNA relatives who are completely of ethnicity X. Choose a common surname like Russo and search your DNA matches to see how many pop up. I'm not Italian and I get only 15.
Yes, it can and does happen. I did not get a majority but I got 23% Italian from MyHeritage while I am zero % Italian and get zero Italian at the other testing sites. Some of your aunt's German and French might be showing up as Italian, or it could be that her French grandparents in turn had Italian ancestry.
We have considered Bia may be an Italian surname.Geni web identifies Aurthur Bia's (born 1886) parents as born in France in the 1860s. The border from Frankfurt to Strasbourg seems pretty fluid as opposed to the border from Frankfurt to Milan. We did identify a distant ancestor from Simmern (near Frankfurt).
We would not have been surprised to see more German, but the test came back 2% German and 41% Italian.
I said my grandfather "seemed" Syrian, but his sister had flaming red hair which seems unusual.
I guess we will get my mother's Ancestry DNA test back in a few weeks and see if she shows up as much Italian as her sister.
It happens with other ethnicities of course. My 1st cousin's daughter tested expecting 100% European results but got 25% East Asian, 75% European. She had her father (my 1st cousin) test and his result was 50% East Asian (and he turned out not to be my biological cousin).
On a continental level, yes. Ashkenazi is one of the few sub-continental groups which is so conclusive.
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While it's true the algorithms are not as good at separating other European categories, I think it would be unusual for Ancestry to estimate 41% Italian when there is no Italian ancestry. As I pointed out above, the Bia surname is found in Italy (its frequency is higher in Italy than France), and the OP should check his DNA matches to see if he finds any Italians. Some Italians may have claimed to be from France in censuses which was less stigmatized. Usually the best way to confirm ethnicity X in the estimates is to find DNA relatives who are completely of ethnicity X. Choose a common surname like Russo and search your DNA matches to see how many pop up. I'm not Italian and I get only 15.
That's not necessarily going to be conclusive either. My dad IS half Italian but if I search his matches for common Italian surnames not found in his tree, he gets equally low results (anywhere from 1 to 22). So you can have significant Italian ancestry but not necessarily have many matches with common Italian surnames.
We have considered Bia may be an Italian surname.Geni web identifies Aurthur Bia's (born 1886) parents as born in France in the 1860s. The border from Frankfurt to Strasbourg seems pretty fluid as opposed to the border from Frankfurt to Milan. We did identify a distant ancestor from Simmern (near Frankfurt).
We would not have been surprised to see more German, but the test came back 2% German and 41% Italian.
I said my grandfather "seemed" Syrian, but his sister had flaming red hair which seems unusual.
I guess we will get my mother's Ancestry DNA test back in a few weeks and see if she shows up as much Italian as her sister.
Geni is not necessarily a reliable source. It's just a family tree that anyone can put any information on, whether they're using reliable sources for that info or not. Like I say, you need to reliably research her tree before you can say anything with much certainty. Even if Arthur's parents were born in France, it does not exclude the possibility that their ancestry was from Italy.
Later records seem to consistently say he was born in France, but before birth certificates were being issued (which didn't happen until the 20th century in PA) it's not unusual for people with foreign parents who immigrated just before their birth to mistakenly believe they were foreign born too and came here as a small child - after all, they were too young to remember. So you wind up with a record or two from their youth correctly saying they were US born (because their parents would know better) but then later records as an adult say foreign born.
That's not necessarily going to be conclusive either. My dad IS half Italian but if I search his matches for common Italian surnames not found in his tree, he gets equally low results (anywhere from 1 to 22). So you can have significant Italian ancestry but not necessarily have many matches with common Italian surnames.
The surname test works really well for some ethnicities but I have not tested it for Italian. I'd be curious to know what other people with Italian ancestry get when they search on the name Russo in AncestryDNA (the most common Italian surname). It's an under-tested population like East Asians-- my cousin's daughter who is 25% East Asian (now determined to be Japanese) can only find one person in her Ancestry results with that ethnicity. She has plenty of Polish matches (one grandmother was Polish). And a 3rd cousin whose mother has all Slovak ancestry has lots of Slovak matches.
We used to joke in an adoptee forum when an adoptee took a DNA test and found out they were Italian. "Good news! You're Italian! Bad news: you have only 3 DNA matches." But I think things have improved a little since then. Still, even having a very low number of DNA matches can be a sign of Italian ancestry.
The surname test works really well for some ethnicities but I have not tested it for Italian. I'd be curious to know what other people with Italian ancestry get when they search on the name Russo in AncestryDNA (the most common Italian surname). It's an under-tested population like East Asians-- my cousin's daughter who is 25% East Asian (now determined to be Japanese) can only find one person in her Ancestry results with that ethnicity. She has plenty of Polish matches (one grandmother was Polish). And a 3rd cousin whose mother has all Slovak ancestry has lots of Slovak matches.
We used to joke in an adoptee forum when an adoptee took a DNA test and found out they were Italian. "Good news! You're Italian! Bad news: you have only 3 DNA matches." But I think things have improved a little since then. Still, even having a very low number of DNA matches can be a sign of Italian ancestry.
I always wondered about this as well. One of my wife's 1st cousins once removed is 1/2 Italian, and you have to go down at least 30 or so entries to find her first Italian cousin, and there are very few compared to the Greek matches, and generally share less DNA. My theories is no particular order.
1. Italians are underrepresented in DNA testing.
2. Italians are diverse genetically, and not particularly endogamic, and being mostly recent immigrants you really would need to find an actual descendant of a great-great grandparent who has taken the test to be a match. Having an ancestor from the same region/village as a fellow testee is unlikely to mean you share DNA.
3. Italy has always had a pretty large population (30M+ in 1900) so again, the odds of having a cousin or other close relative be among those that immigrated (or those who have tested) is smaller than with other ethnic groups.
Well, that's not really taking it literally then, lol. The very definition of "literally" means if it says "Italian" it means "Italian", not many areas around the Mediterranean.
But Italy WHEN? It did not become a unified country until 1861. Before that you had many city-states made up of people from around the Mediterranean, including the Greeks. Way before that you had the Romans. Were they Italian? So if your ancestry says Italian, it can be any of the peoples who came to and lived in that region we now call Italy. So yes, Italian ancestry can literally include people who originated from around the Mediterranean. On today's map they are literally Italian.
We can agree to disagree.
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