The Montgomery Clan: Middle Eastern DNA

[Paulo Canedo]

Dear followers of the newsgroup I must say that the Y Haplogroup of the famous Montgomery Clan of Scotland is weird for European Nobility it is J2a1-L26. The subclades of the J Y Haplogroup are far more present in Middle Eastern Populations than in European Populations so how did this DNA end up in a Scottish Noble Clan? Explications and comments on the matter are welcome.

[Kelsey Jackson Williams]

On Saturday, 12 August 2017 20:55:24 UTC+1, Paulo Canedo wrote:
> Dear followers of the newsgroup I must say that the Y Haplogroup of the famous Montgomery Clan of Scotland is weird for European Nobility it is J2a1-L26. The subclades of the J Y Haplogroup are far more present in Middle Eastern Populations than in European Populations so how did this DNA end up in a Scottish Noble Clan? Explications and comments on the matter are welcome.

I can't speak to the genetic side of this, but there's nothing particularly unusual in what we know about the Montgomerys from the archival record. The first member of the family in Scotland, Robert de Montgomery, appears in the middle of the twelfth century (http://db.poms.ac.uk/record/person/10518/#). As the _Scots Peerage_ (iii. 421-422) relates, claims have been made for his relationship to an Anglo-Norman Montgomery family from south of the border, but - while that's very plausible - I don't think definitive evidence for his parentage has been discovered. From the surname, we could reasonably assume we're looking at a family with French (probably Norman) origins.

All the best,
Kelsey

[Kelsey Jackson Williams]

As a follow up to this, looking at publicly available Y-DNA results for a fairly widespread clutch of Montgomeries (https://www.familytreedna.com/public/Montgomery?iframe=ycolorized) there appear to be multiple, unrelated clusters of the surname, only one of which has the haplogroup Paulo has identified, so I'm not sure that speaking in blanket terms of a single "Montgomery" origin (in the Near East or anywhere else) is necessarily the way forward.

All the best,
Kelsey

[Paulo Canedo]

This haplogroup was found in Sven Jacob Montgomery who has a documentude descent from the Montgomerys of Lainshaw. This haplogroup is also found in many other Montgomerys and so the researchers concluded that this haplogroup is the true Montgomery DNA the one which belonged to the Montgomery Nobles. When I talk of the clan I'm talking specifically about the nobles and their descendants.

[Kelsey Jackson Williams]

On Sunday, 13 August 2017 10:16:41 UTC+1, Paulo Canedo wrote:
> This haplogroup was found in Sven Jacob Montgomery who has a documentude descent from the Montgomerys of Lainshaw. This haplogroup is also found in many other Montgomerys and so the researchers concluded that this haplogroup is the true Montgomery DNA the one which belonged to the Montgomery Nobles. When I talk of the clan I'm talking specifically about the nobles and their descendants.

Hmmm. Some leaps are being made here, though.

a) It would be nice to see evidence of this Sven Jacob Montgomery's descent from the Montgomerys of Lainshaw. I note that there appears to be a privately printed pamphlet containing the "verification" of his descent, but a quick Google of his name reveals nothing else. So step one would be to satisfactorily link the DNA donor with the historical family.

b) Step two would then be to test descendants of other gentry Montgomery families who, on paper, share a common agnatic ancestry with the Montgomerys of Lainshaw. Could SJM's DNA come from a non-paternity event at some point in his ancestry, whether recent or distant?

c) So *if* these two steps could be taken, then I think you'd be in a position to say that this would seem to be the specific Y-DNA associated with the aristocratic kinship group who used the surname Montgomery in late medieval and early modern Scotland.

As often with this sort of combination of genetic and archival genealogy, I find the ease which massive assumptions are made rather concerning. I certainly don't think that what I've seen so far in any way allows us to make a claim along the lines of "the Montgomerys are of agnatic Middle Eastern descent", which I assume is what is waiting in the wings here.

All the best,
Kelsey

[Paulo Canedo]

There is a Facebook posto about this you can find it googling his name they don't say everything but say that Sven is descendant of a Lainshaw Montgomery who migrated to Sweden and that they all agreed that his descent is valid. In a comment they also talk about a supossed Montgomery descent from the Romans that would help explain this haplogroup since it is present in Italy.

[Kelsey Jackson Williams]

On Sunday, 13 August 2017 11:47:10 UTC+1, Paulo Canedo wrote:
> There is a Facebook posto about this you can find it googling his name they don't say everything but say that Sven is descendant of a Lainshaw Montgomery who migrated to Sweden and that they all agreed that his descent is valid. In a comment they also talk about a supossed Montgomery descent from the Romans that would help explain this haplogroup since it is present in Italy.

Right, I now see what you mean (for others, Paulo is referring to the following: https://www.facebook.com/cultural.anthropology.of.haplogroup.j2/posts/989564611101694).

I'd like to point out some of the language used here:

"Although there are a couple of contradictions between the sources, the composite identification of each of Sven Jacob’s ancestors presented herein is accurate and complete within the limits of the sources . . . The identification of Sven Jacob’s ancestors presented herein establishes a coherent and logical sequence of descendants whose birth years and residence locations are reasonable in time and location. It is therefore the position of the MBWG that Sven Jacob's ancestry has been validated."

This does not fill me with confidence. We are told that there are contradictions between multiple (unnamed) sources which are nonetheless waved away. We are then reassured (?) that the residences and birth years of this man's ancestors are "reasonable". And this means that this man's ancestry is "validated"? Not even close.

I suspect, though, that the pedigree under discussion is probably one and the same with the Montgomery family in the Swedish nobility (Nr. 1960). You can see the relevant entry in Elgenstierna here: https://www.adelsvapen.com/genealogi/Montgomery_nr_1960

*If* that's the case - and, of course, the complete lack of any kind of documentation in the link Paulo provided makes it difficult to be certain - then we're right back where we started. The first known ancestor of the Swedish noble family is one Jakob Montgomery who died in a duel 1632x34 following a career as an officer in the Swedish service. I've also checked the SSNE (https://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/history/ssne/item.php?id=1632&id2=1632) in case anything concerning his ancestry has been revealed since Elgenstierna wrote, but that appears not to be the case.

So, just to reiterate: a Facebook poster has claimed that the man who bears the Y-DNA under discussion is descended from a family whose Scottish origins appear to be unknown. This is a very far cry from proof that this Y-DNA is associated with the main stem of the Montgomery family.

All the best,
Kelsey

[Paulo Canedo]

I found it I found the link to Sweden the Facebook post mentioned the link came through Neill Montgomery II of Lainshaw I searched and found out that Neill had a younger son named Robert who died in Sweden. What do you think?

[Bernard Morgan]

Roman auxiliaries from Syria are said to have been deployed on the Antonine Wall. However I thought the Montgomery were Normans who settled on the Welsh border and move to Scotland with the ancestor of the Stewarts?

Sent from my iPhone

> On Aug 12, 2017, at 1:04 PM, Paulo Canedo <paulorica...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Dear followers of the newsgroup I must say that the Y Haplogroup of the famous Montgomery Clan of Scotland is weird for European Nobility it is J2a1-L26. The subclades of the J Y Haplogroup are far more present in Middle Eastern Populations than in European Populations so how did this DNA end up in a Scottish Noble Clan? Explications and comments on the matter are welcome.
>

> -------------------------------
> To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to GEN-MEDIEV...@rootsweb.com with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message

[Paulo Canedo]

Wikipedia agrees with you it says the following Clan Montgomery originated in Wales, and emigrated to Scotland in the 12th century as vassals of the FitzAlans The family derives its surname from lands in Wales, likely from the Honour of Montgomery which was located near the Shropshire lands of the FitzAlans. There is no evidence of any familial connection between Clan Montgomery and the family of the Earls of Shrewsbury, who derived their own surname from lands in Calvados, Normandy.

A thing I may note is that the genealogy of the first Scottish Montgomerys is rather confusing with sources diverging on how many generations were there.

[Kelsey Jackson Williams]

I think we're honing in on the origins of all this nonsense. Googling speculatively for a Robert Montgomery of the Lainshaw family who went to Sweden, I came across a website which appears to repeat more or less verbatim the claims made in the pamphlet we were discussing earlier (http://www.montyhistnotes.com/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I9718&tree=MontyHistNotes_II).

What is giving there is very telling. Jakob Montgomery (+ 1632x34), who I mentioned previously as ancestor of the noble Swedish Montgomerys, is there claimed to be a son of Robert Montgomery, a younger son of Sir Neil Montgomery, 3rd of Lainshaw. This Robert is supposed to have died in Sweden in 1574, but is assigned no wife. Now it is true that Neil, 3rd of Lainshaw, is said to have had two younger sons, but these are stated to have immigrated to Ireland rather than Sweden (Paterson, _History of the Counties of Ayr & Wigton, iii/2. 595) in the earliest printed history of the family. My suspicion is that this Robert was - for whatever reason - invented to fill the chronological gap between Jakob Montgomery and Neil, 3rd of Lainshaw.

So in other words I'm becoming increasingly convinced that this pedigree is an absolute tissue of fantasy. It seems to me that the genealogically responsible thing to do would be to study Jakob Montgomery in further detail, in the hope that that might elucidate his actual Scottish origins.

All the best,
Kelsey

[Paulo Canedo]

The source I found made Robert son not of Neil III but of his father Neil II and says that Neill II also had another son who went to Eire.

[Paulo Canedo]

Wrong the website makes Robert son of Neil II not III him being son of the third would be chronologically impossible.

[Paulo Canedo]

In http://www.montyhistnotes.com/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I5990&tree=MontyHistNotes_II it says that Origin and History of the Montgomerys by Bo-Gabriel de Montgomery makes Robert son of John Montgomery but that more evidence shows him to be son of Neill II.

[taf]

On Sunday, August 13, 2017 at 12:59:36 PM UTC-7, Paulo Canedo wrote:
> In http://www.montyhistnotes.com/genealogy/getperson.php?personID=I5990&tree=MontyHistNotes_II it says that Origin and History of the Montgomerys by Bo-Gabriel de Montgomery makes Robert son of John Montgomery but that more evidence shows him to be son of Neill II.

Bo-Gabriel Montgomery was extremely credulous as a genealogist, declaring himself a count (and adding the 'de' to his surname). For an account of the Swedish Montgomerys in the Dictionary of Swedish National Biography (in Swedish, but with charts), see:

https://sok.riksarkivet.se/sbl/Presentation.aspx?id=9470

It makes it clear that even the line to Jacob isn't exactly sterling in terms of documentation.

taf

[Kelsey Jackson Williams]

Thanks for this, Todd. It looks as if Elgenstierna was presenting the family's own understanding of its origins, but the _SBL_ provides a rather more nuanced account. To recap for those who don't fancy reading Swedish -

The first proven ancestor of this family is David Christoff Montgomery (1642-1708), an officer - ultimately lieutenant-colonel - in various Swedish cavalry regiments who married Emerentia Rosenstrale, the daughter of a well-established noble family and left a son Carl. It was only Carl's children who were introduced into the Swedish nobility in 1774 (which is in itself interesting, giving the claims made to this family's nobility).

According to the _SBL_, a MS genealogy from 1800 identifies David Christoff's father as a certain Jakob David who died in 1653. This figure has been linked with one David Montgomery in the Swedish service during this period and it has been further claimed - seemingly without any authority - that he was the son of the Jakob Montgomery I mentioned previously.

So we're left with David Christoff, perhaps the son of a Jakob David. To be fair to Elgenstierna and his sources, the Jakob and David mentioned above *are* the only two Montgomerys with those names in Swedish service during this period, so it's not unreasonable to suppose that one or both may be connected to David Christoff. It's much less clear to me, though, that they're father and son, partly because there are a couple of documents which seem to suggest that David himself may have been an immigrant from Scotland.

What are these? Well, first there is a pass issued by the Marquis of Monrose (_Report on the Pepys Manuscripts_ [London, 1911], 254) dated probably May 1649 which gives Lt.-Col. Montgomery (i.e., David) permission to return to Sweden after he had evidently been serving with the Royalist forces in Britain during the Civil Wars. Second, a letter written by David to Duke Karl c.1650 (summary given in SSNE, no. 3132) states that he had served the Swedish crown for eighteen years and mentions the time, already highlighted in the previous document, during which he had temporarily returned to his "fatherland" to serve Charles I of Great Britain. While this could perhaps be interpreted in a looser sense, I'm inclined to think that this means David was probably a Scots native rather than a second-generation immigrant. I should also point out that he and Jakob entered Swedish service at the same time and appear to belong to the same generation.

So, in short: the first proven ancestor of this family is David Christoff Montgomery (1642-1708). He *may* be the son of an earlier David Montgomery (fl. 1630-c.1650 and allegedly + 1653) who was probably an immigrant from Scotland. No Lainshaws, no exotic ancestry, no Romans (at least not as yet).

All the best,
Kelsey

[Matthew Langley]

On Saturday, August 12, 2017 at 12:55:24 PM UTC-7, Paulo Canedo wrote:
> Dear followers of the newsgroup I must say that the Y Haplogroup of the famous Montgomery Clan of Scotland is weird for European Nobility it is J2a1-L26. The subclades of the J Y Haplogroup are far more present in Middle Eastern Populations than in European Populations so how did this DNA end up in a Scottish Noble Clan? Explications and comments on the matter are welcome.

Approaching this the other way, plenty of people are bringing up valid questions on whether those Montgomery's are in fact the right line, yfull places the age of L26

https://www.yfull.com/tree/J-L26/

At about 18,400 years ago. This old it almost doesn't matter where the group is, that's plenty of time for it to move into Europe well before surnames and clan names appeared.

In the latest Minoan and Mycenaean DNA show some J2a1

http://www.anthrogenica.com/showthread.php?11538-Genetic-origins-of-the-Minoans-and-Mycenaeans

Dating between 1200-2000 BCE

Plenty of time to make it into the waves that went into the British Isles, or a common ancestor to that group.

That's just off my initial search, I'm sure there's more data out there.

Just because something is rare or less common doesn't mean you wouldn't expect it to occur, quite the opposite exactly, it's highly unlikely it would never occur.

[Andrew Lancaster]

On Saturday, August 12, 2017 at 9:55:24 PM UTC+2, Paulo Canedo wrote:
> Dear followers of the newsgroup I must say that the Y Haplogroup of the famous Montgomery Clan of Scotland is weird for European Nobility it is J2a1-L26. The subclades of the J Y Haplogroup are far more present in Middle Eastern Populations than in European Populations so how did this DNA end up in a Scottish Noble Clan? Explications and comments on the matter are welcome.

J2a1 is very widespread and old in Europe? Not sure why this would raise any questions. Possible helps to mention that areas with high population density for a specific Y haplogroup tend to be places where it is NEW, not old, because they tend to disperse in waves. R1b is dominant in Europe but thought to have arrived and dispersed (at least most of it) in the Bronze age (possibly coninciding with Indoeuropean languages and all that). Before then, many of the more thinly spread haplogroups will have been much more common.

What I am not sure about is whether L26 might be a mutation that is recent and specific to a small part of the world, in which case there might be something worth discussing.

[Paulo Canedo]

The J2a1 haplogroup is not very widespread in European Populations it exists mostly in Jewish Populations however it exists in a considerable quantity in Italians where J2a1-L26 also exists see https://www.familytreedna.com/public/J2a4_Levant_Genetic_Match?iframe=yresults so I'm guessing the Montgomeries were somehow descendants of the Romans.

[Andrew Lancaster]

On Saturday, August 19, 2017 at 6:27:49 PM UTC+2, Paulo Canedo wrote:

> The J2a1 haplogroup is not very widespread in European Populations it exists mostly in Jewish Populations however it exists in a considerable quantity in Italians where J2a1-L26 also exists see https://www.familytreedna.com/public/J2a4_Levant_Genetic_Match?iframe=yresults so I'm guessing the Montgomeries were somehow descendants of the Romans.

The links shows it is extremely geographically widespread? (Possibly you are thinking widespread means very common over a widespread area, but it does not. And to repeat, concerning very common haplotypes, these normally did not start spreading from the point where they are very common.)

Calling nearly everything except for R1b "probably Roman" or "probably Middle Eastern" etc is something Family Tree DNA and the other testing companies are famous for though. Such stories have been great for business, but they are 99% nonsense.

What I am saying is by the way starting to be confirmed as ancient DNA starts to become a reality. J2 has been found in Minoans and Myceneans. E-V13, another haplogroup you will be told was spread by Romans, has been found in Neolithic Spain.

[Katherine Kennedy]

You have to look further into the subclades. J2 is of course older than J2a1. J2a1 seems to be more common around the Mediterranean, so we could expect an Italian or Greek origin for them.

Another interesting and unexpected Middle Eastern connection is from the Clan Graham Y DNA group. They are largely J1 and their subclade is apparently very closely related to the cohen modal haplotype. I've read a suggestion of an auxiliary Syrian archer being their ancestor. The family is too old to consider a Crusader connection.

[taf]

On Wednesday, August 23, 2017 at 12:39:49 AM UTC-7, Katherine Kennedy wrote:

> Another interesting and unexpected Middle Eastern connection is from the
> Clan Graham Y DNA group. They are largely J1 and their subclade is apparently
> very closely related to the cohen modal haplotype. I've read a suggestion of
> an auxiliary Syrian archer being their ancestor. The family is too old to
> consider a Crusader connection.

The misnamed Cohen modal haplotype has been found across a wide swath of middle eastern and even among some African populations, and when you say 'closely related' you are expanding the potential pool even further, just identifying someone with middle eastern ancestry anytime within 5000 years. Yes, it could have been a Syrian archer, but it could have been slave from the viking raids in Al-Andalus, or a captive among the Celts, a Romanized Jewish or Carthaginian legionnaire, a trader, anything. In historical times we see individuals making some very unusual peregrinations, not linked to specific population movements, and there is no reason similar one-off instances can be excluded from a period before we have such detailed records. To think one can point to a moment of time and say 'that is when it came to Britain' is a classic example of genealogists abhorring a vacuum.

taf

[Michael OHearn]

>>You have to look further into the subclades. J2 is of course older than J2a1. J2a1 seems to be more common around the Mediterranean, so we could expect an Italian or Greek origin for them.

My O'Brien ancestry connects with Montgomery by way of marriage with a MacCarthy. This traces back to Arnulf "Cimbricius" Montgomery, supposedly of Calvados in Normandy. Assuming the Y-DNA is of Greek origin, my guess is that it was transferred to La Tene Celts in Gaul before the arrival of the Romans in Gaul.

Sent from my iPhone

[Katherine Kennedy]

Allow me to share some further information on the Graham DNA findings, so you can better put any deductions into context. A short synopsis concerning the age of their subclade, J-L1253, can be found below.
https://www.familytreedna.com/public/J1c3d-with-SNP-L1253/default.aspx?section=results

Eupedia states, "All three branches of J1-L858 (S640, YSC76 and FGC11) are found in Europe, principally in Spain, Italy, central and eastern Europe. Their relatively recent time of divergence with their Middle Eastern cousins (Late Bronze Age to Iron Age) suggests that they would have arrived with the Phoenicians (Sicily, Sardinia, Spain), and later in greater numbers with the Jewish diaspora. Spain and Portugal have the highest percentage of FGC12 in Europe, but this amounts to about 12% of J1 lineages, i.e. less than 0.5% of the population, suggesting that the Arabs had a much smaller genetic impact on the Iberian population than the Jews and the Phoenicians." As can be seen from the first link, the Grahams' J-L1253 stems from YSC76.
http://www.eupedia.com/europe/Haplogroup_J1_Y-DNA.shtml

Genealogists most certainly abhor a vacuum, and I'm sure Ancestry.com and a host of others are glad they do. It does indeed lead to some colourful theories, however.

[geoc...@gmail.com]

On Saturday, August 12, 2017 at 3:55:24 PM UTC-4, Paulo Ricardo Canedo wrote:
> Dear followers of the newsgroup I must say that the Y Haplogroup of the famous Montgomery Clan of Scotland is weird for European Nobility it is J2a1-L26. The subclades of the J Y Haplogroup are far more present in Middle Eastern Populations than in European Populations so how did this DNA end up in a Scottish Noble Clan? Explications and comments on the matter are welcome.

This is the oldest sample I have found so far that is related to the Montgomery Clan which I believe is J2a-M410-PF4610-L26-Z6064-Z6055-Z6057-Y7013-Y7010-Y13128. https://www.yfull.com/tree/J-L26/

LATE NEOLITHIC EUROPE
J2a-M410-PF4610-L26-Z6064-Z6055-Z6057-Y7013-Y7010-Y13128-Z36827
5. I5078 Y-DNA: J2a-SK1363(xZ36827,Y14435), originally reported as J2a1, mtDNA: H10, Sopot MN, Croatia, 5000-4800 BCE/4692-4546 BCE. Source: Mathieson et al. 2018. Raw data check: https://anthrogenica.com/showthread....l=1#post359864

Sample Population Date Skin Hair Eyes
I5078 Sopot HR LN 4692–4546 BC Light Brown/ D-brown Brown

[Andrew Lancaster]

On Wednesday, August 23, 2017 at 9:39:49 AM UTC+2, Katherine Kennedy wrote:
> On Saturday, August 19, 2017 at 2:11:29 PM UTC-4, Andrew Lancaster wrote:
> > On Saturday, August 19, 2017 at 6:27:49 PM UTC+2, Paulo Canedo wrote:
> >
> > > The J2a1 haplogroup is not very widespread in European Populations it exists mostly in Jewish Populations however it exists in a considerable quantity in Italians where J2a1-L26 also exists see https://www.familytreedna.com/public/J2a4_Levant_Genetic_Match?iframe=yresults so I'm guessing the Montgomeries were somehow descendants of the Romans.
> >
> > The links shows it is extremely geographically widespread? (Possibly you are thinking widespread means very common over a widespread area, but it does not. And to repeat, concerning very common haplotypes, these normally did not start spreading from the point where they are very common.)
> >
> > Calling nearly everything except for R1b "probably Roman" or "probably Middle Eastern" etc is something Family Tree DNA and the other testing companies are famous for though. Such stories have been great for business, but they are 99% nonsense.
> >
> > What I am saying is by the way starting to be confirmed as ancient DNA starts to become a reality. J2 has been found in Minoans and Myceneans. E-V13, another haplogroup you will be told was spread by Romans, has been found in Neolithic Spain.
>
> You have to look further into the subclades. J2 is of course older than J2a1. J2a1 seems to be more common around the Mediterranean, so we could expect an Italian or Greek origin for them.

If by "J2" you mean a modern person who's test result says "J2" then of course technically speaking this is not correct, even though it is unfortunately a common way of writing.

All modern Y DNA haplogroups are equally "old" in the sense of being an equal number of generations (maybe give or take a couple) from the common ancestor.

[Andrew Lancaster]

That is true for better or worse. From your closing paragraph I am sure you realize that you should be careful of Eupedia theories. In the early days of genetic genealogy they just told everyone who was E or J that they were probably Jewish. Later all the people who were E and European were told they descended from Roman soldiers from the Balkans.

There has been lots of progress. E has been found found in Copper Age Spain for example. But it is disappointing to me to see that the "Roman soldier" type stories are still always going to get more coverage than more boring stories. I suspect basic technologies like farming probably spread a lot of Y DNA types.

[Todd Pronovost]

Decendants of Ragnar Lodbrok through Ivar the Boneless.

[taf]

On Monday, November 30, 2020 at 8:26:48 PM UTC-8, Todd Pronovost wrote:

> Decendants of Ragnar Lodbrok through Ivar the Boneless.

Except for the fact that neither of them really existed (what parts of them that are not complete invention are chimera of multiple historical individuals), would be just as good a theory as any other named person at the time they supposedly lived.

taf