Photos of My Relatives

[Dean]

deanmoulos.tripod.com/photoalbum/index.html

These are some of my maternal relatives. In the top photo is my uncle with his wife on his right and the family Russian maid on his left. The adults in the bottom left photo are my grandmother, and to her left an in-law and her husband, my grandfather's cousin. In the bottom right photo is my sister, my grandfather, my other uncle and my grandfather's cousin, the same guy as in the other photo.

Unless I'm mistaken or stupid, most of these people look like Meds, with some Alpine (grandpa's cousin). If this is the case, this should be detected by genetic tests, no? I'm sorry to repeat myself, but AncestryByDNA says that almost all Greeks show very low affinity with Native Americans. If this is the case, shouldn't I show that affinity, given that I tested twice and both times showed affinity with East Asians at the statistical noise level: 5% with ABD 2.5 and 2% with ABD 2.0 and no minor affinity with Native Americans? Any comments on the phenotypes of these people and how they relate to Greeks? I'm interested in what you think of the in-law woman to the left of my grandmother. She has a primitive appearance.

[Artemidoros]

They look like regular, mainstream Greeks to me. The guy with the sunglasses looks darker than the others but he might be more tanned. Difficult to say from a picture. The woman you mentioned seems to have pronounced zygomata and might be low skulled, or perhaps her hairline gives that impression. I can't really say anything else from that photo.

[Dean]

Artemidoros said:

They look like regular, mainstream Greeks to me.

That's what I figured. I'm tempted to say that it's irresponsible for AncestryByDNA to state that a Greek can assume that almost all Greeks will show minor Native American genetic affinity without disclosing how many Greeks were tested and what their origins in Greece are. There are millions of Greeks. How many have they tested? I don't show this affinity, yet I am probably typical of many Greeks. ABD has a sort of graph in the "Ethnicities" section of their website, showing admixture in certain populations, but this doesn't show Greeks. I know that on one hand I'm overreacting to my test result, that I'm just splitting hairs, that if you looked at a whole people you may find some erratic or accurate findings that don't apply to the majority. On the other hand, if we look like mainstream Greeks but don't test that way, something is really wrong.

[Graeme]

I think you should take the results of DNA and mtDNA testing with a few grains of salt. Until certain markers are conclusively found to be restricted to a particular race I would not take those results too seriously. I predict in the next ten years that the markers proving Negroid or Mongoloid genetic inheritance will be found to be present in every race, but at different percentages just like ABO blood groups are found in every race in varying proportions. Being group B in Ireland which is high O does not make someone less Irish, caucasian or Keltic.

[Artemidoros]

I think there is a lot of "fine tuning" to be done. Many people seem to expect NA admixture because of their family history and get EA instead. I seems to me that the NA and EA have not been very clearly defined yet.
In any case, not all Greeks have it. It is impossible. The origins of the Greeks are diverse. Practically every prehistoric migration to Europe passed through our doorstep. Combine that with the fact we have many relatively isolated populations, you can see some Greeks are bound to lack one or the other component.

[Dean]

Artemidoros said:

I think there is a lot of "fine tuning" to be done. Many people seem to expect NA admixture because of their family history and get EA instead. I seems to me that the NA and EA have not been very clearly defined yet.
In any case, not all Greeks have it. It is impossible. The origins of the Greeks are diverse. Practically every prehistoric migration to Europe passed through our doorstep. Combine that with the fact we have many relatively isolated populations, you can see some Greeks are bound to lack one or the other component.

ABD criticizes the use of single-lineage studies in that they do not examine the complete genome. These single-lineage studies (mtDNA, Y DNA), if accurate, are derived from geographically distant places and show diversity among ethnically homogenous people. You make a good point. How can a low level of a type of subracial admixture be detected and spread nearly evenly among this diversity? The only bona fide study of the Greek/Native American connection is ABD's Dr. Frudakis and his father, as shown at the ABD website. ABD has some explaining to do. Their assertions should raise some red flags and stimulate more research.

[Gus Morea]

The people on the bottom-right strike me as being from Asia Minor; they don't seem like mainstream Greeks to me for some reason.

I recently found an old, crusty photograph of my great grandmother, and she looked like that in-law women except much more pronounced in features. I'm told she was short in stature and fair in complexion. Supposedly she's from a Vlach side of the family.

Artemidoros said:

They look like regular, mainstream Greeks to me. The guy with the sunglasses looks darker than the others but he might be more tanned. Difficult to say from a picture. The woman you mentioned seems to have pronounced zygomata and might be low skulled, or perhaps her hairline gives that impression. I can't really say anything else from that photo.

[Dean]

kdh said:

The people on the bottom-right strike me as being from Asia Minor; they don't seem like mainstream Greeks to me for some reason.

Do they look like Kurds, Armenians, south/southeast Anatolia indigenous people, Assyrians or Iraqis? I don't think they look like central Asian Turkic people.