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Archiver > GENEALOGY-DNA > 2007-05 > 1179930763


From: "Joe Knapp" <>
Subject: [DNA] Every mutation a gift
Date: Wed, 23 May 2007 10:32:43 -0400


Being new to this yDNA testing game, I am still trying to make sense
of all the science (alternatively heady, wonky and fuzzy) around it,
but I think in the area of recent genealogy my initial yDNA test
(courtesy Family Tree DNA) has made some real headway. I hope to not
overreach the data--see what you think.

On paper using traditonal genealogical means I am descended paternally
from a settler who came to America from England in the 1630 fleet of
Winthrop and Saltonstall, named Nicholas Knapp, b. about 1600, d. 1670
in Connecticut. That genealogy, as far as it goes, has stood up to
scrutiny over the years, but of course there are many things to break
the yDNA continuity like adoptions or various other "non-paternal
events." Enter the DNA test.

My FTDNA test came back as probable haplotype R1b1c, with 67 markers
tested. See:

http://www.ysearch.org/search_view.asp?uid=5XCAV&viewuid=5XCAV&p=1

Well and good, given that Nicholas was from Bures. St Mary, Suffolk,
England. So at least that's consistent, if proof of little. As for
anything more definitive in vetting this line, comparisons with others
of my surname who may have been tested, and claim descent from
Nicholas, are in order. Turns out very few Knapps have been tested so
far, but as luck would have it, there's one perfect candidate, who not
only claims descent from Nicholas, but from a different one of his
sons. This person tested 25 yDNA markers with FTDNA:

http://www.ysearch.org/search_view.asp?uid=5XCAV&viewuid=3JN6S&p=1

5XCAV (myself) and 3JN6S above differ on only 1 of the 25 comparable
markers (DYS385a 10 vs. 11). Just a single stepwise difference. By my
calculation, one mutation along one or the other of the two lines to
Nicholas (approx. 11 generations) is actually the most likely
occurrence (of 0, 1, 2 ... mutations, assuming mu=0.002). So this
result would tend to confirm the respective descents of myself and
3JN6S from Nicholas (being backed up by paper records). Moreover,
since the two lines tested converge only at Nicholas' sons, paternity
is confirmed down the line. Pretty good result, if my reasoning is
correct. Of course, to bolster the conclusion it would be good for
3JN6S to upgrade to more markers, and for other potential relations to
get tested.

For its part, the mutation is a gift, because by doing other
comparative tests the exact point at which the mutation happened can
theoretically be found as more relations get tested. There may even be
more than one mutation discovered ultimately. Each mutation it seems
to me can potentially define a distinct subclade, so to speak, of the
recent (records-backed) paternal line--and pretty straightforwardly.

Joe

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