On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 1:01:31 AM UTC-7, Andrew Lancaster wrote: > On Wednesday, August 30, 2017 at 1:18:06 AM UTC+2, Stewart Baldwin wrote: > > > Your comment (elsewhere in this thread) indicating that 23 markers might > > not be enough to get good information made me wonder if my own results > > are atypical.  Among my Y-DNA matches at Family Tree DNA (none > > apparently any closer than 6th cousins), my 67 marker test shows 25 > > matches with "genetic distance" between 3 and 5 (none closer than that), > > 19 of whose surnames are either Baldwin or one of the variants of > > Maybury (Mayberry, Mabry, etc.), with many more of the latter.  My group > > of Baldwins appears to have arisen from a "non-paternal event" (NPE) > > with a Maybury biological father around 300 years ago, or perhaps > > earlier.  (I have circumstantial evidence for a specific "suspect.")  > > A 67 marker cluster containing about 3 major old surname groups sounds fairly typical in English surnames. (Logically for example, highland families tend to show much more surname mixing.) In my experience though, the testing companies give guidance about expected time back to the common ancestor which UNDER estimates (possibly thinking it helps keep enthusiasm up?). This leads people to assume NPEs. But possibly the two surnames go back to the middle ages and a time when surnames were less fixed. In many examples there is enough paper trail to be confident that recent dates are not possible. *Paper trails* with conflicting Y results, and with *no* Autosomal proof are worth... nothing.