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Archiver > DNA-R1B1C7 > 2008-02 > 1203435605


From: "Paul Conroy" <>
Subject: Re: [DNA-R1B1C7] Age of R1b1c7
Date: Tue, 19 Feb 2008 10:40:05 -0500
References: <e0d2d2870802170943n51812ebbn3dd499f647745d71@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <e0d2d2870802170943n51812ebbn3dd499f647745d71@mail.gmail.com>


David,

You bring up a very important point when you allude to a possible
non-paternal event in the founder population of the American Ewings.

I would point out however that there are 2 other scenarios, which may
account for the same results, the first being even more unwelcome, the
second being more likely, namely:

1. That some of the Irish slaves sent to the Caribbean, who made their way
to the Southern US, and some who were directly sent to the Southern US
states, may have been R1b1c7 and may have taken the name of their master -
Ewing.

2. That some "upwardly mobile" Native Irish immigrants who were R1b1c7 and
facing intense discrimination in the Southern US, decided to "pass" as
Scots-Irish in order to gain employment and betterment for themselves and
their families, by adopting a Scottish name and religion.

The reason why the last is more likely is that the bulk of emigrants to the
US, be they Scots-Irish, Anglo-Irish or Native Irish were Catholic, yet
today we find that about 60% of people of Irish descent in the US are
non-Catholic - while those who are of Irish Catholic descent have
traditionally had a higher birth rate. To me this can only be explained by a
switch in religion and sometimes a switch in ethnicity of Native Irish in
the US. I know some people will point out that the bulk of Scots-Irish and
Anglo-Irish immigrants were in the US about 2 generations before the bulk of
Native Irish emigrants made it over - but the latter were far greater in
number and far more fecund once they arrived. I personally know of a few
Laois families who abandoned Catholicism in the first generation of their
arrival in the US.

Regards,
Paul

On Feb 17, 2008 12:43 PM, David Ewing <> wrote:

> I have received a reply from Ken Nordtvedt off-list to my earlier posting
> about what methodology we should use to estimate the age of R1b1c7. He
> expressed his intention to join the list and post his reply directly, but
> if
> that doesn't appear today, I will post what he sent to me this afternoon
> or
> evening.
>
> Meanwhile, we should be cautious about "using the Ewings as a control
> group," because although we are "certain" that the name originated in
> Strathclyde in the southeastern Lowlands of Scotland, we can't be sure
> that
> the Y-DNA of the large group of closely related American Ewings originated
> there. Most American Ewings that have a paper trail of any depth document
> their earliest known ancestor in Donegal, and virtually all of these are
> R1b1c7. About a third of Ewings tested are diverse sorts of R1b1 and four
> are in Hg I. You can see this distribution graphically in the network
> diagram posted at
>
> http://www.clanewing.org/DNA_Project/DNA_ProjectResults/network/Y-DNA_Network_Overview.html
>
> A number of the non-R1b1c7 American Ewings, including some descended from
> relatively recent immigrants from Scotland, document their earliest known
> ancestor in Scotland. A couple of Scots that have joined the project are
> also R1b1 but not R1b1c7. I should emphasize that this correlation of
> R1b1c7
> with Ewings in Donegal and other R1b1 with Ewings in Scotland is not
> perfect--there are some exceptions to the rule, and quite a large number
> of
> individuals in both groups on whom we do not have deep enough conventional
> genealogy to decide where their immigrant ancestor originated.
>
> We have concluded that this is because only a small number of related
> Ewings
> immigrated to Donegal from Scotland, and that their descendants comprised
> most of the early Ewing immigrants to America, so we see the
> disproportionate representation of R1b1c7 among American Ewings as the
> result of a founder effect among the small group that immigrated from
> Scotland to Ireland. We should not neglect another possibility that will
> be
> exceedingly unwelcome to many Ewings. That is that we may have picked up
> our
> Y-DNA from an Irishman in Donegal, but didn't bother picking up his
> surname.
> It is a wise child that knows his own father, as the saying goes.
>
> David
>
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