How British are you? DNA study reveals UK’s ethnic diversity

23 Comments

1. September 19, 2016 at 1:33 pm

   Perhaps that would explain why my mostly British heritage shows up at exactly 0% on my ethnicity–they were of Viking heritage in the midlands, I suppose…
2. September 19, 2016 at 2:08 pm

   I would be interested in the size of the sample. Is it really representative of the British population? No surprises as to ethnic diversity though would have expected the old East Riding to be as Scandinavian as the East Midlands.
3. September 19, 2016 at 3:32 pm

   I was raised being told that we were Cherokee and the 5 civilized tribes from my mothers side. My DNA test indicated that I was British, UK and Western Europe but no Native American at all. What went wrong? My mother definitely has Native American features such as black hair and dark skin.
   • September 20, 2016 at 10:03 am

     @James: The DNA test can show if you inherited the markers for Native American. But you do not inherit every trait or marker from your Ancestors so even if you are a direct descendant it might not show up in your DNA test. The results do not provide a specific tribal affiliation, however. Please see the following articles that explains more about this: http://ancstry.me/23Yktn5 and http://ancstry.me/1Yrotvv.
4. September 19, 2016 at 3:37 pm

   All my DNA is Great Britain and Western Europe and nothing else. Yet my mother was born in Oklahoma and always told us we were Cherokees. I take pride in being British but I had always thought I was Native American. I grew up making my own archery gear and blowguns just as Cherokee and Creek Indians did.
5. September 19, 2016 at 3:48 pm

   That would explain why as a 3rd generation Brit in USA I’m more British than the avg Brit coming in at 96% British. My father’s Danish but I got Mom’s genes. My brother too. Our DNA mix is basically the same.
   Thanks for the explanation.
6. September 19, 2016 at 8:24 pm

   This is very helpful! I was flabbergasted when I got my DNA results, which showed a far higher amount of Irish and Scandinavian DNA (more than 30 percent) than British (only 10 percent). Most of my family came directly from England, almost all in the Puritan and Quaker immigration waves of the 17th and early 18th centuries. These explanations help me account for the Scandinavian tilt, although I still don’t understand how it could be so much higher than British. As for the Irish DNA: My most recent immigrant ancestors (1830s) came from Wales, so that DNA has been diluted the least by other infusions from all over England and from the Pennsylvania Dutch lines.

   What a fascinating hobby genealogy is!
7. September 19, 2016 at 11:17 pm

   Ms. Hyde… why do you think that the Ancestry ethnicity grouping for “British” is only representative of Anglo-Saxon bloodlines? I have long argued that it includes also some earlier Celtic tribes more associated with those in France and Belgium (the Belgae). For instance, Ancestry groups my heritage as being 45% British, 25% Western European, 14% Eastern European, 14% Trace Regions and 2% (West) Asian. But the thing is, I don’t have a one ancestor from the British Isles (most all my lines go back at least 3 generations in Europe – the exception being in Poland). I am, however by known ancestral regions, about 25% NW German (Saxon), 25% Wallon Belgian, 37% West-central European (from Lorraine, Baden, Franche-Comte, & Jura in Suisse) and 13% Eastern European (western Poland). I came to the conclusion that to get that rating from Ancestry of 45% British (and 4% Scandinavian & 1% Irish from the Trace Regions) that it had to come from my ancestors from northwestern Germany and my Belgian Walloons. Therefore to be called British by Ancestry should not be indicative solely of Anglo-Saxon ancestry but also of earlier Celtic roots more associated with those tribes which still had cognates in France and Belgium. Indeed their map of the Great Britain ethnicity would seem to indicate that.
8. September 20, 2016 at 1:12 pm

   I have kind of an opposite situation from what several described above. My “100%” Swedish-American mom ended up having quite a bit of British DNA show up in her test.
9. September 20, 2016 at 1:55 pm

   Don’t have to much faith in your DNA testing, mine came back 100% Europe. My mother was one fourth native American.
10. September 21, 2016 at 7:37 am

    dna results, the subject a close family member got the ancestry results which we did in hopes of connecting to other relatives but its quite perplexing as we have done 2 other dna tests which reflected Native American, also which confirms what we were told our entire life as well as the relatives we found on the Cherokee rolls? the ancestry dna came back 0% Native American, hmmmm?
11. September 21, 2016 at 10:33 am

    We were told gropwing that we had Native American ancestry, and I ave taken all 3 of the “Big 3” DNA tests.

    Not one of then showed Native American ancestry–but all of them showed a small percentage of “inidentifiable”–I suspect when a percentage gets small they don’t bother to go any further.

    I uploaded my Raw DNA to GEDmatch which has a MUCH more specific admixture report than Ancestry DNA—in fact Ancestry DNA has gotten VERY generalized over the years compared to what my ethnicity report from them showed when I first took their test many years ago—now my report is so vague nothing can really be learned from it.

    I uploaded my raw DNA to GEDmatch—and checked my admixture report and sure enough there WAS Native American DNA in the report…1.03%.

    Ancestry reports have just gotten far too generic lately. I recommend uploading your Raw DNA to GEDmatch to get more detailed reports–and a lot of other features you won’t find on the “Big 3” sites.

    GEDmatch is a free site designed by people who know far more about DNA than I do-and they did it because they were not happy with any of the tools and other things on the “Big 3” sites.

    A DNA report is only as good as the levels they are testing…do some googling and see comparisons out there about how “good” the various test sites have been judged by folks who have studied DNA testing in detail.

    You will be surprised.
12. September 21, 2016 at 1:29 pm

    My DNA results has me at 52% British (Anglo-Saxon), does that include Scottish or say Welsh?
13. September 22, 2016 at 9:41 pm

    So “British” means Anglo-Saxon, and “Celtic” means Irish? That must be a surprise to the Welsh, Cornish and Scots, Celtic peoples who lived in Britain 1,000 years before the Anglo-Saxons showed up.
14. September 23, 2016 at 5:24 pm

    Is it possible to see the full results of this research, i.e. a map or table showing the different regions of the UK and the proportions of each ethnicity.
15. September 27, 2016 at 11:57 am

    Just got my Ancestry DNA results are I’m not very happy. Guess I should have read more concerning what I was getting (must have missed the key word “ancient”. My mother’s family history goes back 500 years and virtually every ancestor came from Canada first and prior to that – France. Imagine how shocked I was to see 1 % Europe West. Oh well…
16. October 1, 2016 at 7:30 pm

    Your results are garbage! I’ve never been to UK yet I’m supposed to be 62%. No you neanderthal so I am Native American
17. October 2, 2016 at 7:14 pm

    My husband’s results came back 68% British. He was surprised it was that high with so much of his family tree on his father’s side coming from Quebec City prior to arriving in the US.
18. October 17, 2016 at 3:04 pm

    roger vanderveen, you are so right. my heritage includes large proportions of scottish and cornish – who knows how that would display. celts too, but not irish.
19. October 18, 2016 at 6:20 pm

    How can a site that claims to be experts on DNA & ancestry claim that “Anglo Saxon” is British and Celtic is “Irish”? The Anglo Saxons were Germanic invaders of Celtic Britain, the native British Celts include Scots, Welsh and Cornish not just the Irish. Why should anybody want to pay for a test that gave the false result that their Welsh ancestry is Irish or their Saxon ancestry is British?
20. November 7, 2016 at 6:52 pm

    I know a lot of my mom’s ancestors came from Yorkshire. I gotten about 15% Great Britain with the range up to 37%. I gotten a lot of Irish (25%); but I think some of that came more from my dad’s side. I also gotten a some Scandinavian at 6% and Finnish/Russian at 3%. Everything else came from other ancestors. Interesting to learn more about them. All from my Native American to my European ancestors and everyone else in between even if just trace regions.

    I think people are confused. I think Great Britain DNA is more of the Britons which is one tribe of Celts and Anglo-Saxons would be more Germanic. There were also some Vikings which would be Scandinavian. This is why I think people get Europe West or Scandinavia and why Great Britain and Irish DNA are so similar and hard to separate. People traveled, migrated, etc…so it shouldn’t be a surprise if you studied history.
21. November 20, 2016 at 5:21 pm

    Hi, I also did my dna test from ancestry I am 75% British and live in the u.s.
22. November 26, 2016 at 7:51 am

    Ancestry DNA testing doesn’t show everything as it is rather generalized. In order to get a full breakdown, or to see where your various ethnicity are in your chromosomes you can download your raw data then upload it to GEDMatch.

    For example. I’ve done my tree, research, and we had family records, dawes rolls records,photos, etc which shows that we are descended from Germany, England (related to Queen Elizabeth, Prince Charles, etc), Irish, Native American (Seminole, Muscogee Creek, and Cherokee), and black…..However when I took the Ancestry DNA it doesn’t show the Native American or the black. It shows up 3% West Asian(Caucus) and 6% Iberian Peninsula – Which I still hadn’t found in our research and we have no idea where that came in…..My Ancestry DNA shows: 49% Great Britian, 20% Europe West, 13% Ireland, 6% Iberian Peninsula, 4% Scandinavia, 3% Italy/Greece, <1% Europe East, <1% Finland/Northwest Russia, and 3% West Asia…..

    Anyways, when I uploaded my raw dna file into GED Match it broke it down further and my Native American showed up as well as the black and middle eastern – Melano Polynesian, Melanesian, Arctic American Indian (Inuit? Aleut?), American Indian, Indian (India), Indo-Iranian, and sub-Saharan African.
    Even though these are small amounts showing up in each chromosome they are still there. Some of them are higher than 1% which I don't understand why Ancestry doesn't show them.

    It would be nice to see Ancestry pinpoint more or include everything instead of being so generalized.

    So, those of you whom are wondering why it isn't showing stuff up – thank genetics for that. We get bits and pieces in our chromosomes and one sibling may show higher native than another. Just go to GEDMatch, you'll get a fuller overview.