In 2012 exciting news spread across the globe about the
discovery of King Richard’s burial, which had been a mystery for hundreds of
years. But the solving of this mystery led to another one. When DNA tests were
performed on Richard III’s body along with living relatives from both Richard’s
maternal and paternal sides. DNA from the maternal relatives (the XX
chromosome) matched, but DNA from the paternal side (the Y chromosome) did not.
This means that a male descendant or ancestor of Richard III was illegitimate.
During Richard’s time the important part of a family’s lineage was the paternal
side, so this evidence raises many questions about Richard and his family.
Richard was a relative of Henry VII, both Richard and Henry were descendants of
Edward III. One of Henry’s ancestors, John of Gaunt was surrounded by rumors of
illegitimacy and with further studies could be a candidate for the ancestor who
does not fit into the paternal lineage of the family. Scientists can now even
distinguish that Richard may have had blue eyes and blonde hair, this could
help with the mystery as well.
This makes us think about our own ancestry and if the DNA we
have also belongs to those who we think are our ancestors. Today science can
help with this, there are many programs offered to do DNA testing for genealogy
and family history purposes. National Geographic and Ancestry.com offer a
program for people to have their DNA sent to a lab and traced back thousands of
years and revealing where their ancestors first came from. This raises
interest, questions, and curiosity for the field of genealogy and those who
study family history. Science has become a great resource for genealogy because
genealogical studies used to rely heavily on documents, accounts, stories, and
objects that no longer existed or never did exist.
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