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From:
Subject: RE: [DNA] DNA shows Celtic hero Somerled's Viking roots
Date: Mon, 09 May 2005 16:23:08 +0000


Mark:

Does this mean that Doug has a clear genealogical trail back to this couple circa 1100 AD? If you are using strictly Y-DNA data there are a lot of people (e.g., surname Perkins and some of my Shetlanders) who have close to the same signature. Somerled likely had brothers, cousins and even distant family members with the same Y signature. You appear to be putting a lot of reliance in these early genealogies which we are always told to view with a lot of healthy skepticism. I suppose that this situation is not unlike the assumptions being made about the descendants of Ghengis Khan - but realistically can you state as absolute fact that any person today is unequivocably a descendant of Somerled based on surname alone? Clan Donald has a wide variety of signatures as I understand it. It makes some sense to chose R1a as the "Somerled signature", but the Norse included R1b, I1a, Q and K haplogroups. I guess Mark I am asking what evidence you are using to make your assertion!
s. Granted that the R1a McDonalds are in all probabiity descendants of Norse Vikings, I am just wondering if you may be overextending things by chosing one signature without a straight line unbroken genealogical trail leading back to Somerled. Perhaps I am being overcautious.

David F.

David F.



-------------- Original message --------------

> Yes, in my earlier email response I failed to mention that she was also
> descended from Malcolm I, King of Scotland, as well as Thorstein the Red,son
> of Olaf the White of Dublin and Aud the Deep Minded who was one of the
> founders of Iceland when Thorstein died and Olaf returned to Norway as its
> king. She was also descended from Eystein of More, the father of Rollo who
> founded the Norman dynasty.
>
> Each of these lines require the assumption that the ancient lineages were
> accurately recorded which some historians dispute.
>
>
> Doug is a descendant of the Somerled Ragnhilda marriage in his pure paternal
> line.
> Mark MacDonald
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Doug McDonald [mailto:]
> Sent: Tuesday, April 26, 2005 2:44 PM
> To:
> Subject: Re: [DNA] DNA shows Celtic hero Somerled's Viking roots
>
> Raymond Whritenour wrote:
> > And see how carelessly this result is interpreted! Somerled may have
> > been 90% "Celtic," but because of his male-line signature, he's somehow
> > considered "Viking."
>
> Somerled himself has unknown ancestry.
>
> But his wife, and mother of his children with paper trails,
> Ragnhilda, was mostly Scandinavian, with some Irish, Scottish,
> Danish, Ukranian and Polish ancestry.
>
> Doug McDonald

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