On Tue, 18 Mar 2008, Charani wrote: > OK, so two people may "know" they are related because of the DNA but > can they *prove* it with a paper trail? If the paper trail stops 5 or > 6 generations back, then they are going to have a tough time proving > to the vast majority of people in their respectives families that they > are related. People will believe what they can see (a paper trail) > but not believe what they can neither see nor understand (DNA). Well that's the thing. You can't ever "prove" that the paper trail ends. It is always possible to find new evidence - it just depends on one's perseverance (and maybe one's resources). Perhaps one can exhaust the logical places for documentation (e.g. public records), but who knows what other sources may surface such as memoirs, diaries, etc. (one of my ancestors shows up in 19th century Belorussian police records). At the very least, a DNA match has the potential to show direction of research. For example, I know my ancestors come from a certain town; my closest DNA match comes from a different town quite a distance away. The logical course would be to research this "new" town to see whose family came from which town in search of the common ancestor. > Like you, I hoover up (love that phrase :)) ) all mentions of the > family I'm doing a one name study of. All mentions get added to the > database with notes as appropriate until such time as I can link them > to the correct part of the family. My work is also essentially a one-name study, so I have many isolated individuals who I can't connect to anyone else. I just wondered about the views of the "pros" on this group with regard to Y-DNA results. Bob Kosovsky New York City

kos@panix.com wrote: > On Tue, 18 Mar 2008, Charani wrote: > >> OK, so two people may "know" they are related because of the DNA but >> can they *prove* it with a paper trail? If the paper trail stops 5 or >> 6 generations back, then they are going to have a tough time proving >> to the vast majority of people in their respectives families that they >> are related. People will believe what they can see (a paper trail) >> but not believe what they can neither see nor understand (DNA). > > Well that's the thing. You can't ever "prove" that the paper trail > ends. It is always possible to find new evidence - it just depends on > one's perseverance (and maybe one's resources). Perhaps one can exhaust > the logical places for documentation (e.g. public records), but who > knows what other sources may surface such as memoirs, diaries, etc. (one > of my ancestors shows up in 19th century Belorussian police records). > > At the very least, a DNA match has the potential to show direction of > research. For example, I know my ancestors come from a certain town; my > closest DNA match comes from a different town quite a distance away. > The logical course would be to research this "new" town to see whose > family came from which town in search of the common ancestor. > >> Like you, I hoover up (love that phrase :)) ) all mentions of the >> family I'm doing a one name study of. All mentions get added to the >> database with notes as appropriate until such time as I can link them >> to the correct part of the family. > > My work is also essentially a one-name study, so I have many isolated > individuals who I can't connect to anyone else. I just wondered about > the views of the "pros" on this group with regard to Y-DNA results. not a pro but for a one-name studt just record it as it is without interpretation Hugh W -- For genealogy and help with family and local history in Bristol and district http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Brycgstow/ http://snaps4.blogspot.com/ photographs and walks GENEALOGE http://hughw36.blogspot.com/ MAIN BLOG