OpenTube

Scientists Compared the DNA of Everyone With the Same Last Name What Yours Reveals Will Surprise You

Anglo Origins

60,338 views

What if your last name is written into your DNA? At the University of Leicester, geneticists Turi King and Mark Jobling compared the Y chromosomes of more than 1,600 men grouped by surname, the chromosome that passes from father to son the same way a family name does. This is the story of what surnames and DNA share, what the science can and cannot tell you about your own patrilineal line, and the 700-year question hidden inside a single word: yours. Watch before you decide what your name really means.
Sources (real, verified links):
Founders, Drift, and Infidelity — King & Jobling, 2009 (full text):
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/arti...
Founders, Drift, and Infidelity — journal page (Molecular Biology and Evolution):
https://academic.oup.com/mbe/article/...
Surnames and the Y Chromosome — Sykes & Irven, 2000 (full text):
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles...
Y Chromosome and Surname Study Challenges Infidelity 'Myth' — press release:
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...
Identification of the remains of King Richard III — Nature Communications, 2014:
https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomm...
Mark Jobling, University of Leicester (researcher page and publications):
https://le.ac.uk/people/mark-jobling

20 Comments

@angloorigins Creator 2 months ago Pinned

👉 Discover the full story of YOUR surname: https://anglorigins.com/

Your personalized 30-page Surname Heritage Report: the origin and meaning, its history, the DNA and haplogroup story behind it, how it reached America, and the famous bearers who shared it. Delivered straight to your inbox. ❤️

@becky8571 2 months ago

We should all use our mother’s surname…because you can always prove who your mother is.

@Emy53 2 months ago

Many people changed their surname for various reasons, but that "Y" marker still kept them connected.

@buzzzzzz69 2 months ago (edited)

I can trace my own ( maternally passed) surname back to a single person in Estonia in the mid to late 1600s.
The name itself is actually a shortened version of a "Christian" name....
which coincidentally happened to be KRISTOFFER.(meaning bringer of Christ)😅
However in Estonian it's KRISTOHVE.
So there's several ways to spell the same name in many languages.
I'm almost certain that out of the 120 of us in the world with this surname at least 70% of us are somehow blood relatives to some degree.

@ArnaudDufresne-v7m 2 months ago

That is a good point you made. Obviously everybody tends to exagerate by far the number of illegimate sons and daughters across centuries.

@wrrsean_alt 2 months ago

Surely men with the same surname might have some idea they are possibly related?

@GrößeBälle 2 months ago (edited)

My father was adopted by his mother's second husband so although we have a rare surname,I share dna with only a handful of people of that name. I do know however who my biological grandfather's family is and do share a relatively rare haplo group for Western Europe.

@NunyaOBrien-r5f 2 months ago

The hitch in this science is that many Celtic surnames are taken from the clan people were associated with, not the lineage those people were from. O'__ can mean the person's ancestors are of the house of the rest of the surname NOT related to the person who had that name!

@patriciajrs46 2 months ago (edited)

I am very proud of forensic genetics. One of my favorite shows is Forensic Files.
Listening from Manchester TN USA.

@greengorillah 2 months ago

I believe it was my 6th time great grandmother who fell pregnant by an unknown man. Her son got her family name but his Y-DNA was from that unknown father.

@davidwilliams1086 2 months ago

That is super amazing
.

@elainepannell2858 2 months ago

The infidelity’s we know about in our family tree are brothers and uncles being the biological father, therefore the Y chromosome will not be changed.

@samueldye2772 2 months ago (edited)

My NPE happened in 1721.... Thomas Dye was born to Sarah Dye of Farnham, Virginia, out of wedlock. Thomas kept the Dye Surname and through Big Y-700 DNA testing at Family Tree DNA, I found that a Steele male was the Father of Thomas Dye in 1721. I believe there is another NPE at some point in the 1600s with someone from Continental Europe... Neatherlands < Germany < Denmark....... Y-DNA Haplogroup I-FTA95282 ......

@heathersmith-v6g 2 months ago

Yet now science shows the male dna ends quickly, mothers is passed on infinitely

@GaryEchols-mk4wt 2 months ago

Where did the Echols sir name evolve from?

@cindiargumaniz2193 2 months ago (edited)

I would love to have this study done with my husband's family. I think Argumaniz is rare enough for at least 90% who share the same haplo group. And there are 2 branches that probably join into one when you go back far enough.
There is a town in Spain called Argomaniz and that is supposedly a Greek name. When migrating to Mexico somehow the O wasn't closed properly and became a U but both groups are definitely related. Today they live all over Europe, Mexico, US, and South America. And no telling where else.
Now my maiden name is different. It's Owens.

@tehatte 2 months ago

After 2 or more generations many people already don’t know their cousins. In Vietnam, some families they name all the males with the same last name and middle name in a unique combination so that descendants can tell that they’re related to each other.

@CynthiaBeverforden-c8l 2 months ago

Many people changed their names when they migrated to the US.

@cheriastrahan8453 2 months ago

I was part of a surname study group and when another surname male group matched . I found a paper link between the families. Our surname group matched a nextdoor pioneer family around 1800. The mother was a deaf mute who had multiple children and no spouse. Two male offspring matched our research group. Unfortunately there were several sons of the neighbor. We will never know if there was one son or more who fathered her children. Was it love or something else. We will never know.😢

@lindsayheyes925 2 months ago

Surnames may change for social reasons, such as sectarianism. The spelling of my surname is rare. It was very localised in 19th century Lancashire - but was a spelling not used by Catholics in the area, who were largely of Irish descent. The census shows them living on one side of a street; Those with my spelling - Protestants - lived on the other. Sectarian conflict was rife at the time. Some found themselves living or working among people of the other religion, and some of them concealed their religion by changing the spelling to the local norm - for advancement or for peace (one Irish immigrant on my wife's side claimed to be from Scotland for similar reasons).