The Verdict Is In
The Verdict Is In
I’m A Viking?
Monday, July 17, 2017
I finally broke down and got myself an AncestryDNA kit. I went with AncestryDNA instead of 23andMe because I didn’t really care about my health propensities. I’ve been around long enough to know. And, if I’m going to lose it some day, I’d rather not know about it in advance. If I get all decked out in the middle of the night and run across a highway to go to a mall or start sending money to televangelists, somebody will figure out that I’ve lost it. But, it won’t be me – I’ll be busy looking for sales on thongs. And, who knows about the accuracy of such tests? 23andMe told my brother that he likely had little baby hair. Wrong. My mother thought she had given birth to a monkey. But, I think they got the lineage right: 98.4% European Ashkenazi Jewish with traces of Southern Europe, Middle East and North Africa.
My DNA was similar to my brother’s in that we are predominantly Eastern European Jewish (mine was 95%). No big surprise there. We have the word shtetl written all over our faces and probably a few other body parts. I did have a few surprises, however. Like I’m probably a Viking.
Huh?
I thought I came from a long line of babushkas (basically, grandmas in kerchiefs from Russia and Poland) – and, I do. But, according to my DNA results, before I was a babushka, I was something else. The next highest percentage of my DNA hailed from the Iberian Peninsula – basically, Spain and Portugal, followed by Western Asia (which includes parts of the Middle East) and Scandinavia. No North African for me and no Scandinavian for my brother. He has more of my mother in him and I have more of my father in me – but that was apparent before the DNA testing. Our appearances and personalities revealed that he was clearly a Schwartz and I was clearly a Littman. Still, it was fun to have confirmation.
Wow! This was getting interesting for me. I always thought I was strictly Tevye’s great-great-great -granddaughter and now I was so much more. So I did some more research.
I learned that the Vikings invaded large swaths of Europe in their day and they freely co-mingled (maybe “raped” would be more accurate) the locals.
My research revealed that the Swedish Vikings may have been the first Russians. They were called the Rus, and they entered the area now known as Russia early in the ninth century. At that time, the area was occupied by several groups of disorganized Slavic tribes. According to traditional stories, the East Slavic tribes thought that a foreign ruler would put an end to their tribal conflicts. In came the Vikings, also known as Varangians, along with a chieftain named Rurik and he became ruler of these tribes.
Rurik’s successor, Oleg, took Kiev, uniting the East Slavic lands into what is today known as Russia.
So, there you have it. Suddenly, I’m getting a craving for a bagel and Gravlax.
But, what about the Western Asia part? Well, Israel is included in that lineup, as are several Arab nations. Most Jews of Eastern Europe have traces of the Fertile Crescent in their genes. No big surprise there, especially with my father’s Halevi roots (that is, he is descended patrilineally from the tribe of Levi, along with the Spanish Jewish physician, poet and philosopher, Judah Halevi, who was born in Toledo, Spain in 1075, or so.).
We’re all such a hodgepodge. For example, a lot of my Christian friends with ties to Eastern Europe are discovering their Jewish roots for the first time. Hey, we got around. Some of us are Vikings, after all.
As it turns out, I have no ties to Ireland, regardless of what the psychics and astrologers have told me about my Irish roots and no matter how many people have told me that I look Irish – unless you count the ties to my husband who learned that he was nine percent Irish when he had his DNA tested.
And, I had a second cousin, Eddie, who was so convinced he was Irish, he had “Danny Boy” played at his funeral. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house.
It just goes to show you, It’s not all about DNA.
This is a follow-up to a blog I posted on February 9, 2016 about where we’re coming from, according to DNA analysis. Most people have some idea of their background prior to testing, unless they were adopted in infancy like my husband. But, going back thousands of years can still render fascinating information about our earliest beginnings. And, all it takes is a little spit.
© Copyright 2017, Mindy Littman Holland. All rights reserved.