Hi there, how can I trace my ancient geneology?

Question

Hi there, I want to trace my ancient geneology, I was born Angela Webb in Saint John Canada in 1969. According to 23andme, my Haplogroup is Tb2 --which I guess is a very broad grouping. How can I begin this project?

Answer 1

Hi Angela, Welcome to WikiTree

Here is a link to get you started.

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Help:How_to_Use_WikiTree

Check your profile page, someone will be along to offer help and other links that will help.

You can always come back here (G2G) with questions.

Answer 2

Hi Angela!  Welcome to the one world WikiTree.  We can't help with your Ancient Ancestors without more information about your more recent Ancestors.  I suggest that you add your parents and grandparents to your profile so that we have a starting point to help your research.  Who are your earliest known ancestors too?

Answer 3

I assume from your name that you are female, which means your haplogroup is a matrilineal haplogroup, determined by 23andme by measuring some of your mitochondrial DNA.

To research what this means, you should research as far back as you can in your matriline, I.e. your mother’s mother’s mother’s … line. That is your only ancestral line that is relevant to your haplogroup.

You could also download your match list from 23andme and search for DNA matches that have your same haplogroup. If you are very lucky, you could maybe then find that you and such a match have a common matriline ancestor, but typically this search doesn’t lead to anything. You have to be lucky.

Here is a write up of my own experience researching my mitochondrial DNA. For this, I paid for a second test to determine my mitochondrial genome. 23andme only measures a small part of it.

https://www.wikitree.com/wiki/Space:Journey_with_mitochondrial_DNA

Answer 4

Greetings Angela.

I am guessing that by ancient DNA you mean REALLY ancient DNA.  You should absolutely follow the previous advice on how to trace your family tree and document it.  That however does not quite answer your question if you want to know about possible ancestors so far back in time that you can't trace them with the usual genealogy work.  There are free ancient ancestor search web pages I can recommend. However, first I think you need to revisit 23andme to see if the Tb2 haplogroup is correct, as I think it may actually be T2b.  T2b IS very basic, so you may want to upload your DNA to FTDNA to see if they assign you an expanded haplogroup name.

Answer 5

Mitochondrial DNA can be helpful, but it certainly can be extremely difficult to get back to 'ancient' times with it.  Had you tested with FamilyTreeDNA, you would be able to see the genetic distance you are from each of your mtDNA matches.  For those matches with a zero genetic distance from you, you have about a 50% chance of sharing a common maternal ancestor within the last five generations.  You might find this article to be of interest.

I tested my dad's mtDNA almost twenty years ago.  I still haven't been able to break down the brick wall of figuring out his 3rd great-grandmother's maiden name or parents.  But from the matches, it appears that the line was in Norway in the 1600s prior to South Carolina.