Click any one of these to follow the AMH lineage's complete path through time

When these results came back in our project, some people in our family leapt on it as "proof" that many Sinclairs are descended of folks who fooled around or adopted the name of the laird in Scotland. What you're about to read is a vindication of sorts. It certainly indicates that patience is required in this work and that pronouncements of any sort had better be thoroughly researched.

The E1b1 haplogroup, formerly called E3b, is typically thought of as a Middle Eastern group. Most of this group stayed in Africa much longer than the R1 group and then, when they did come out, most weren't thought to have gotten much further than the Middle East. Here's what the Heyer Study said about them.

"Scientists believe that haplogroup E3b originated in the Near East, and spread across the Mediterranean
and North Africa during the Neolithic. It may also have spread up through the Balkans into northwestern Europe, becoming a minority admixture in Germany and Denmark, and eventually arriving in England with the Anglo-Saxons and the Danes." 82
 

Then the SNPs started coming in and things got very interesting. Our E1b1 group is among the only group of this haplotype who show a high frequency outside of Africa. The group represents about 19% of the population of the southern Balkans and declines as one looks west down to about 2.5% in Western Europe. 114

Much of the work on this haplogroup was done by Fulvio Cruciani with others and this study has become the definitive work on this E1b1. The study says that a single clade within M78 called E-V13 (our family member hits these 11 markers with near precision, see markers below) "highlights a range expansion in the Bronze Age of southeastern Europe..." proving that this group and our participant's ancestors were in the right place at the right time to acquire the surname. However, as is often the case, things get a little more complicated. And, as was often the case in a particular time period in southern Europe, it was the Romans who mucked everything up.

So many detours

Throughout the history of these people, their world was full of interruptions, uncontrollable events which altered and directed the course the E1b1 group took through time. Analysis by Cruciani strongly suggests that this group spread through Europe, from the Balkans in a "rapid demographic expansion." Cruciani's statement would seem to back up the one above from Heyer that these E1b1(s) may have tagged along with the Gothic peoples. Their trail and timing is very similar. 

Cruciani et al. says there were at least four major demographic events which have been envisioned for this geographic area:

• The "post-Last Glacial Maximum expansion (about 20 kya)"
• The "Younger Dryas-Holocene reexpansion (about 12 kya)"
• The "population growth associated with the introduction of agricultural practices (about 8 kya)"
• The "development of bronze technology (about 5kya)"

A Roman Connection?

Researchers have found a significant density of V13 in towns in Wales, England and Scotland. The old trading town of Abergele on the northern coast of Wales in particular showed 7 out of 18 local people tested with these markers (about 40%). 25 (search E1b1b1a2 v13) What does this point to? Likely Roman soldiers in Britain. As you may have read in "Our Path Through Time," the borders of the Roman Empire were not walled off. The tribes outside the borders traded with and eventually even became Roman citizens. Many gained lands in the Roman Empire by conscripting as soldiers. This may well have been the case for our E1b1 participants' ancestors. And this may have led their ancestors to England.

Summary of the Facts -  E1b1b1a2  (v-13) Lineage

(1) This lineage has two reasons to believe they were in Western Europe during the time people were acquiring the surname from the land - (a) they have the surname and (b) this haplotype was in fact there well ahead of the necessary time frame. (2) This lineage also could not have been in the right place to acquire the name from the land. They might well have been part of the Roman Army that was in Wales.

Further notes -  We currently have 4 members of this lineage.

AMH  |  Germany  |  DYS390=25  |  DYS390=23  |  S21-U106  |  Anglo-Saxon Visigoths  
E1b  |  I1  |  R1a  |  CCR5-Delta-32  |  Mutation Rates  |  Lineage Smugness

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