DNA and Europe

As the holiday season is in full swing I tend to dive into my genealogy more frequently. I think this simply because of more time off from work and embracing family memories and traditions. This year I am going a slightly different route. Geography is actually far from a strong point of knowledge for me which makes genealogy much more difficult.

So it is time to go beyond the people and to the land in which they came from. During Thanksgiving of 2019 I completed an Ancestry.com DNA kit for the first time. Naturally there were certain things in the results that surprised me but the biggest shock was not inheriting any Italian DNA from my maternal grandfather. To clarify, we do in fact match as grandparent/grandchild, I just received his French heritage more than the Italian. It can be a bit startling at first to have that moment of: I’ve always identified one way, and that’s biologically not true.

My Personal DNA Results

I’m excited to share my DNA results with you, and would love to hear about your background. Based on Ancestry.com my family roots come from the areas now known as: Iceland, Ireland, United Kingdom, Norway, France, Luxembourg, Germany, Liechtenstein, Czechia, Poland, Belgium, Switzerland, Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, Moldova, Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia. So all this to say, I am completely European.

To clarify a little further, prior to this DNA test, I only identified as being Italian, French, and Polish. Since these were the family traits I was aware of from my maternal grandparents. I was unaware of my paternal history. I am looking forward to learning more about these countries and the voyages my predecessors traveled from their homes to what is now my home in the United States.

Questions: Have you taken a DNA test and from what company? What is something you were surprised to learn? Have you or do you hope to travel to one of your ancestor’s home towns?