Genetic DNA testing?

Question

my grandmother told me her parents were Irish & English, but I took a DNA test that says I'm Swiss, French, Italian, & Arabian. No where on the test does it say anything about Ireland or England. Is she lying or is the test wrong?

Answer 1

Most of the DNA tests are not that specific regarding ethnicity.  It might be what you are seeing is where people that matched your mitochondrial DNA lived at different time periods which can go back thousands of years.

Since you are female, the only test you could take is your direct female line.  It does not include your grandmother's father, her paternal grandparents or her maternal grandfather etc.

Y DNA is passed soley from father to son

Mitochondrial is passed from mother to sons and daughters only but only the daughters pass it on to their childre.

Most of your DNA is autosomal.  GenealogyDNA testing companies are working to use autosomal but it is very complicated.  Y & Mitochondrial are used because they go back in a direct line virutually unchanged.  

You get your Autosomal DNA 50-50 from both parents coming down from all your ancestors.  It is the only DNA that relates a female to her father or anyone to the spouses and their families of their direct Y & Mitochondrdial lines except their own parents if they have both test made.

Your ancestry pyramids as you go back. If you get back to your 6xgreat grandparents, barring any duplicates, you are directly descended from 510 individuals.  Of those 510, you get your mitochondrial DNA from only 8 and if you were a male, you would get your Y DNA from only 8, but you get your autosomal DNA from all 510.

Now, I said barring any duplicates.  As you go back you will probably find distant cousins marrying each other. So a great great grandfather in one family line might be your great great great great grandfather in another family line.  A lot of people find out for the first time they married a distant cousin when doing family history.

Also, remember, there are absolutely no such thing as pure nationalities or pure races or ethcnicities.

Answer 2

The most likely reason for the difference woudl be that she wasn;t raised by her biological parents. This happened quite a bit and the children were never told.

Answer 3

I'm not 100% positive about this, but the genetic testing you mentioned tests your blood line. So, for example, perhaps your grandmothers parents were Irish and English but your ancestors came from the places you mention.

They had a show on UK TV about these very (almost racist) proud Brits claiming they were TRUE Brits and they belonged to a long chain of British geneology....most of them turned out to have other blood in them (a little like you described) such as african etc.

So I don't think your grandmother was lying at all.

Answer 4

It could be very possible that you have a mixed ancestry. Look at the history of the United Kingdom with invasions by the Vikings, Romans, Normans for Normandy now France. And maybe one of your ancestors was involved in the Crusades, so that's where the Arabian genes come from. My friend Tom, who's father was from England told him that the anyone from England that called themselves British instead of English didn't know where their ancestors came from and he  called himself as an Englishman. BTW, PBS had a series on African Americans in which they also did DNA testing and found out that some of these African Americans had as much as 55% European blood, meaning some of their ancestors were white.

Have a nice day.