Last summer I had the honor of speaking at Sunstone Symposium along with my research partner Marylee Mitchum. Our topic was on Sephardic Jews. I would like to share with you, dear friends, important information with exciting new research that is currently being done in genealogy and Sephardic Studies. In the upcoming weeks, I will reveal the information we shared at Sunstone. I will teach you the knowledge to search for and possible locate hidden Sephardic Jews in your heritage. Lets get started.
Maybe you are a proud descendant of Mormon pioneers, confident in your knowledge of your Western European heritage. Perhaps unknown to you, is that you may also have Hebrew ancestors hidden your linage.
Two years ago my husband and I decided to get DNA test to determine our ethnicity. We used a DNA company, called DNA Tribes, which analyzed ones DNA to determine ancestry for the last five hundred years. The DNA testing showed probability of ancestral origins only in stationary populations. When our DNA test results came back, we were confused, as Mayflower Pilgrim descendants, we expected to see traces of Native American and African mixed with a lot of Western European.
On my husband’s test he is predominantly India/Indian with African, Western European, Mediterranean and Middle Eastern.
I am predominantly Eastern European and North African with Middle Eastern, Mediterranean and Western European. On another page (not shown) revealed Mestizo ancestry; meaning European, African and Native American mix.
Later we had my parents DNA tested also by DNA Tribes, their results were close enough to validate my DNA test.
Our results were vastly different than what either of us had been led to believe. Both of us were descendants of Mormon pioneers on every familial line. His ancestors first joined the church in 1831 and the last ones arrived in Idaho in the 1880’s. Our combined line joined in 1831. My ancestors joined the church in the 1830’s and were in Utah in the early 1860’s. On paper my husband was British, Swiss and German. I was British, Danish and French. We thought ourselves to be the typical Western European Mormon pioneer stock. Here are the surnames of our ancestors who joined the LDS church. When they joined the LDS church and immigrated to Utah; where they were when they joined. If our convert ancestors were North Americans, what country their line came from. I believe that we must have thousands of cousins in the Mormon churches i.e. LDS, FLDS, Community of Christ etc…. Perhaps if you look closely you will see your ancestors as well.
Joanna’s lines
Allen 1840’s Hillsdale, Michigan England
Simmons 1850’s Carthage, Illinois France/England
Vail 1830’s Clark, Indiana England
Hood 1860’s Carthage, Illinois Netherlands
Clegg 1840’s Preston, England
Hall 1840’s Yorkshire, England
Hendry 1860’s Durham, England
Savage 1850’s Derby, England
Stewart 1860’s Durham, England
Lewis 1850’s Cardiff, Wales
Mc Coard 1860’s Edinburgh, Scotland
Murdoch 1850’s Aryshire, Scotland
Steele 1860’s Aryshire, Scotland
Pedersdatter 1860’s Fyn, Denmark
Marriager 1860’s Copenhagen, Denmark
Peterson 1860’s Copenhagen, Denmark
Jensen 1860’s Praesto, Denmark
Olsen 1860’s Aalborg, Denmark
Hansen 1850’s Fyn, Denmark
OUR SHARED LINES
Benson 1830’s Clark, Indiana England
Messenger 1830’s Clark, Indiana England
Mike’s LINES
Cummings 1840’s Cayuga, New York England
Bybee 1840’s Washington, Kentucky England
Lane/Layne 1840’s Washington, Kentucky England
Dann 1870’s Allegan, Michigan England
Harris 1870’s Allegan, Michigan England
Barney 1840’s Sangamon, Illinois England
Coltrin 1830’s Kirtland, Ohio Scotland
Young 1830’s Ontario, Canada unknown
Penrod 1830’s Union, Illinois unknown
Smith 1830’s Ontario Canada unknown
Tope 1830’s Union Illinois unknown
Heckman 1840’s Montgomery, Pennsylvania Germany
Winegar 1840’s Cayuga, New York Germany
Kunz 1860’s Bern, Switzerland
Karlen 1880’s Bern, Switzerland
Knutti 1860’s Bern, Switzerland
Fewkes 1860’s Stafford, England
Clark 1860’s Warwickshire, England
Robinson 1840’s Durham, England
Hopkins 1860’s Warwickshire, England
If you, dear reader, think that we might be your cousin please feel free to email me at: jabensonatmillennialstardotorg
PS A big thank you to Ringo who fixed my technical difficulties.
JA, very interesting. There are many things I don’t understand about these DNA tests. First, how do they have an appropriate sample to know what exactly a Polish tribe’s DNA looks like? Second, the Polish tribe didn’t sprout organically from there — they came from somewhere else at some point, so when exactly did they determine that you came from a Polish tribe? Is it 800 years ago, 1,000? 1500? And if you think about it, it would be nice to know where that tribe came from also.
Regarding my first question, what if the Polish tribe’s DNA sample is off — it’s possible that the sample could be all wrong. In which case your Polish tribe could in fact by a British tribe for all you know.
My impression is the science of DNA sampling is pretty crude and prone to huge errors.
Having said all that, it’s certainly interesting to see all of the different mixtures in your lines. I have a theory, completely unscientific just personal conjecture, that the 10 tribes completely mixed in with Europeans and that all of us have a bit of the 10 tribes in us. In addition, my personal feeling is that all of these efforts to make Jews of 2000 years ago look like Jews and Arabs today in the movies is a waste of time because we have no real idea what Jews of 2000 years ago looked like. More likely than not, they did not have the appearance of today’s Jews.
Geoff- My DNA test shows stationary populations for only the last 500 years.
Interesting thing about Podlasie Poland is that it is located on the far North eastern side of the country. Polasie’s population has a admixture of Turk, Polish, and Tartar DNA. Lodz Poland had the highest concentration of Jews in all of Europe (before WWII). Both Lodz and Podlasie are located in the Pale. The Pale was were most of Europe’s Jews were located.
My deep roots show Finno Ungarian, North Western European, Mestizo, Asia Minor, Mongolian, and North African. My DNA test, along with my parents and husband, is only one clue to my true heritage.
I believe that most of us are admixture of more than one tribe. Joseph Fielding Smith believed this also. We are starting to get ahead of ourselves.
Very interesting, JA. I would love to be able to test my DNA and find out what my DNA tribes are as well. Where can I get this done?
Brian, our DNA tests changed my life. I will never look at others who are not Western European the same way for they are all my dear cousins. Between my DNA, Mike’s DNA and Hong Mei (we are waiting to do hers when she is old enough to put up with the swabbing) we are the world. Also it led me to be diagnosied and treated for my autoimmune disease.
There are several companies out there the big ones are Family Tree DNA, Ancestry.com, and DNA Tribes. We went with DNA Tribes (http://www.dnatribes.com/) only because they were the cheapest, and easiest for me to understand at the time. Someday I want to go back and do Family Tree as they are collecting databases of families and will allow you to connect up with individuals with the same DNA family. Here is a price comparison chart by DNA Tribes:
http://www.isogg.org/eochart.htm
JA, I’ve also had my DNA tested by DNA Tribes. My story is much like yours. I thought I was predominantly, if not completely, Western European. All my genealogy lines were English, Welsh, Irish, Scottish, and a bit of French. One line, on my father’s side, came from England to the colonies in the 1600’s. I was positive my DNA testing would reflect that heritage.
Much to my surprise, my primary geographical affiliation was North African, with Arabian and Mediterranean in distant second and third places. I am still trying to figure out what all this means; and truthfully, have not spent as much time as I could or will have to in order to understand more. I’m looking forward to the rest of your series. You are motivating me to begin the journey.
Thank you KBAllen for stopping by and sharing your experience. I am positive that there are more of us out there.
While my Mom is Japanese (from Japan), my Dad has one Italian grandparent and three Swedish ones. And family history shows that the earliest recorded ancestor on the direct line of fathers (about 1650) is a man with a Jewish name, Englander, that is predominantly from Eastern Europe.
A recent news report of DNA surveys in Spain found that, despite the expulsion in 1492 of Sephardic Jews unwilling to convert to Christianity, some 25% of men in Spain have Y-chromosome genes associated with distinctly Jewish populations.
Another study found that modern Lebanese preserve Phoenician genes.
My guess is that a genetic analysis of modern Palestinians would find many who carry Jewish genes as descendants of the earlier inhabitants who converted to Christianity and then Islam.
My supervisor at work is named Bensussen, meaning one of his ancestors was from Susa, the ancient capital of Persia, sometime after the Babylonian Exile. They were kicked out of Spain in 1492, and moved to Turkey, eventually finding their way to the US. Their name and family traditions have preserved that remarkable journey for their modern descendants.
Thanks Raymond for stopping by. There were many Converso Sephardic Jews who stayed in Spain after 1492. They are divided into two groups true Converso (really converted to Christianity) and Crypto-Jews (who only pretended). In both cases they usually married other Cryptos or Conversos. These descendants were called New Christians. THe Old Christians often discriminated against the New Christians up until the 1800’s or so. THis is why 500-plus years later the Jewish DNA is so high.
Also it is interesting to note, many believe as much as 40% of Puerto Rico is Sephardic Jewish descent from Converso/Crypto Jews who fled the Inquisition.
I agree the Palestinians are very close cousins to the Jews. Were they the Samaritans? Seems like I heard that from somewhere. It is sad, the animosity they have to one another.
Very interesting about your supervisor. Is he still a practicing Jew? His story I believe is similar to my DNA. I have one line that has been documented coming from ancient Babylonian. Bensussen could be what is now our Benson. Ben is hebrew for son and there are a lot of Jewish Ben names. The Sephardic Jews and Muslims had last names way before the rest of Europe. Our (yep, married my cousin) earliest known Benson was John b. 1582 in England. His son, also John, migrated to America shortly after the Mayflower and settled in Plymouth, Mass.
hello my name is linda I had recentley did an dna ancestrial test showing alot of polish an czech and of course spain and germany and others I believe i will find some jews in my family Im going to do a jewish dna test cant wait to see results also my aunt did a dna test it showed sephardic jew
Hi Linda,
Thanks for stopping by. It is nice to meet a fellow traveler on the journey to discovering our true ethnic identity (s)! Don’t worry if you do not show Jewish (neat about your aunt). You do not inherit all of your ancestors. The Jews, especially the Sephardi, do not always show up.The same is true for Native American. Hang on thru my series.I will give other clues on how to find your ancestral Sephardi. Parts 2 and 3 are now available. Just click on JA Benson and it will show you my list.
Also where in Poland? My Germany is Hamburg (big Ashkenazi and Sephardic communities there). My parents both showed from North and South Spain and Portugal. I showed neither.
Thanks for an interesting series.
Would you kindly post links to all the articles in each article? I’ve had a hard time locating all the articles in the series.
Thanks
Thank you Tracy for stopping by to comment. Here are the links:
Our pioneer names and DNA. THe rest of the posts explain how this happened
part 1- http://www.millennialstar.org/rising-out-of-obscurity-sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection/
What happened in Spain
part 2- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-ii-sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection-a-history-of-the-sephardim-in-spain/
Some went to Turkey
part 3- http://www.millennialstar.org/ew/
Some went to Western Europe
part 4- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-iv-lds-and-the-sephardic-connection-western-europe/
Sephardic Influences
part 5- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-v-lds-and-the-sephardic-connection-seeding-the-protestant-reformation/
England and Spain were at war. The Western Europe Converso and Crypto Jews fled even farther west in fear of Spain
part 6- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-vi-lds-and-the-sephardic-connection-braving-the-new-world-the-lost-colony-of-roanoke/
part 7- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-vii-sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection-the-first-thanksgiving-or-sukkoth-in-america/
Some Sephardic Jews were part of the tri-isolate communities in America
part 8- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-viii-sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection-what-the-heck-is-a-melungeon/
Sephardic descendants preferred to be out on the wilderness
part 9- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-ix-sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection-the-great-melungeon-migration/
Sephardim altered or adapted their surnames, but often kept a few Sephardic given names
part 10- http://www.millennialstar.org/part-x-sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection-sephardic-names-and-what-to-look-for/
Sephardic Jews had unique illnesses:
http://www.millennialstar.org/family-history-can-save-your-life/
Evidence of Orson Hyde’s Jewish ancestry using the Hirschman model
http://www.millennialstar.org/sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection-utah-history-encyclopedia-is-wrong-joseph-smith-was-right-orson-hyde-is-of-jewish-ancestry/
We are all gathered
http://www.millennialstar.org/sephardic-jews-and-the-lds-connection-the-gathering/