When I sent in a saliva swab to have my DNA tested, I expected more than just a certificate identifying my maternal ancestry as belonging to haplogroup HV. I hoped to learn I'm linked to someone who'd get me tickets to Paul Simon concerts or a discount at Zabar's.
Turns out there are no perks, no haplogroup HV parties, picnics where we drink beer and sing under a large sign, reading, "Haplogroup HV," not even a newsletter. How silly I was to anticipate I'd become connected with others in my haplogroup, that we'd plan a gathering or, if that wasn't possible, convene in a chat room and compare notes on whether we all burn easily, have mitral valve prolapse, love dark chocolate and hate marzipan.
Unhappy that the test was such a non-event, I e-mailed the DNA people to complain. It may be that we're the complaining haplogroup. Do I have any famous relatives?" I asked, hoping this would lead to invitations to the inauguration or season tickets to Yankee games. "As far as digging up famous relatives," was the response, "I do not see any current publications to famous samples for haplogroup HV or those that match the CRS in the first region".
If there was anything surprising, it was being told, "We know that your deep ancestral roots trace back to Europe, which rules out Native American, Semitic, Asian, or more recent African ancestry on this direct maternal line."
When my son finds out, he'll squawk about all those years in Hebrew school.
2 comments:
Hey Sybil,
I just took an mtDNA through National Geographic Genographic and came up as part of Haplgroup HV* as well. It seems like we're a small group indeed since most Europeans are descendants of the HV line (either Haplogroup H or Haplogroup V). In other words, our mtDNA is older than most Europeans and probably came up from the Middle East into the area of Turkey, Southern Russia, Georgia before moving north and west in Europe and then having another mutation for either Haplogroup H or Haplogroup V. Since it is such an old Haplogroup, people who carry it are found all throughout Europe (and some in America and India).
I wish I knew more than that, but alas I do not.
I only have one HVR1 mutation: 311C
I am planning on checking my HVR2 in hopes I may have a better, more fine-tuned results.
P.S. I LOVE dark chocolate and hate marzipan. You may have something there....lol
Miguel Labrego
mlabrego@english.upenn.edu
my mother did the saliva test via Nat. Geographic and found she was haplogroup HV and I love dark chocolate and HATE marzipan
http://shelob.bioanth.cam.ac.uk/mtDNA/HV
As for whether your pattern is likely to be Jewish, I don't think there's any
way to tell. When you study Y chromosome patterns of Jewish males who now
live in different parts of Europe and other parts of the world, many of them
seem similar to each other and to patterns found in the Middle East today.
However, when you study mtDNA patterns of Jewish women, there doesn't seem to
be a common denominator. It appears that Jewish men who left the Middle East
married local women wherever they settled. This causes a "founder effect" --
most of the Jewish community will be descendants of a small group of women.
That means that a large percentage of Jewish women might have a certain
pattern, but there will be lots of non-Jewish women who have that pattern,
too.
FTDNA works with Dr. Hammer at the University of Arizona, who has done many
studies on Jewish migrations and DNA. FTDNA's database will have lots of
records from those studies, but not as many records from the general
population of Spain or Poland or wherever. So you might match 5 Jewish women
and only 1 non-Jewish woman, but that doesn't mean that your ancestry was
more likely to be Jewish. There's just no way to tell from this kind of data.
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