What will Breton ancestry show up as in a DNA test?

[CuriousAboutStuff]

If someone of fully Breton descent were to take a DNA test, would they fall under the French or British category?

Curious as I'm aware of the linguistic and cultural relationship Brittany has to the British Isles, but I was wondering if there was a genetic relationship too, one maybe distinct from the rest of France?

[Titane]

If someone of fully Breton descent were to take a DNA test, would they fall under the French or British category?

Curious as I'm aware of the linguistic and cultural relationship Brittany has to the British Isles, but I was wondering if there was a genetic relationship too, one maybe distinct from the rest of France?

Look at the French thread! Most people from the North of France, and that would include Brittany, show up half and half. I am French Canadian - 99% French on paper but from 15 to 55% British and Irish genetically depending on the testing company. But looking at the fine print, you see that AncestryDNA lumped Britain, Belgium and the whole North-West of France under "British". Bottom line - too mixed - can't tell.

[Tolan]

Yes, there is clearly a correlation between the Breton language, spoken only in the west of Brittany) and genetic.
And the difference is seen even in Brittany, between the Breton zone (West of the peninsula) and the non-breton zone (East of the peninsula)

The Western Bretons are quite close to the British Isles, whereas the Eastern Bretons are quite close to the Northern-French.

[rms2]

My seventh great grandfather Paul Micou was born in Nantes. He is buried in Essex County, Virginia, not far from where I currently live.

Paul Micou tombstone.jpg Paul Micou_ Huguenot memorial at the foot of his grave.jpg

[moesan]

Yes, there is clearly a correlation between the Breton language, spoken only in the west of Brittany) and genetic.
And the difference is seen even in Brittany, between the Breton zone (West of the peninsula) and the non-breton zone (East of the peninsula)

The Western Bretons are quite close to the British Isles, whereas the Eastern Bretons are quite close to the Northern-French.

I think "true" Bretons are/were in a between position between Irish and Welsh pops (not exactly the same ones) and the N-W pop of France; a difference existed between Western and Eastern Bretons as you say, but not as marked :Eastern Bretons are surely not so close to Northern France (of old times) - A study has been made -
You can try - the interesting part is the distances with other French close regions and others countries of Europe: a beginning of answer... let's notice that at fine sacle concerning Y haplo's the Vikings influenced region of Cotentin shows also some differences with the more continental parts of Normandy even if not too striking (surely same case with Bessin and Pays de Caux) -

http://www.nature.com/ejhg/journal/v...g2014175a.html

[moesan]

I add tha breton languages has been spoken until the end of the XIX°Cy in NW Loire-Atlantique, and until end of XIII°/beginning of XIX° Cy in some parts of Morbihan, todate labelled "gallo" (Brittany roman dialect speaking) - until XIV°/XV° Cy the linguistic frontier was very far more towards East in Brittany, but marking rather a bilingual zone -

[avalon]

I think "true" Bretons are/were in a between position between Irish and Welsh pops (not exactly the same ones) and the N-W pop of France; a difference existed between Western and Eastern Bretons as you say, but not as marked :Eastern Bretons are surely not so close to Northern France (of old times) - A study has been made -
You can try - the interesting part is the distances with other French close regions and others countries of Europe: a beginning of answer... let's notice that at fine sacle concerning Y haplo's the Vikings influenced region of Cotentin shows also some differences with the more continental parts of Normandy even if not too striking (surely same case with Bessin and Pays de Caux) -

http://www.nature.com/ejhg/journal/v...g2014175a.html

Yes, you can see from the PCA in figure 2 that Bretons separate from the rest of the Western France sample along PC1. Although there is some overlap between Pays de la Loire and Brittany.

What would be really interesting to see would be the Breton samples from this study plotted against samples from the Irish DNA Atlas and the POBI samples.

Personally I think that the closest modern Isles based population to modern Bretons could well be POBI's North Pembrokeshire cluster, not least because it had the highest FRA14 component on the POBI analysis. (FRA14 component identified in a sample from Rennes Hospital).

[moesan]

I add Pays-de-Loire is a artificial région, in the drawers since PETAIN, and which has amputed the ancient region (closer to the historical province of Brittany) of the Loire-Atlantique departement, added to other departememnts pkkced here and there from ancient Maine, Anjou and Western Poitou (Vendée) to become the too famous "Pays-de-Loire" with a stupid name as a gift and pharaonic costs to forge a false historical identity with the "public money" (Loire river goes from the Ardèche departement in North-Languedoc to the Atlantic Ocean! - but we have Hauts de France now for Nord-Picardie so...)
2 departements were only partially breton speaking in far past: Ille-et-Vilaine and Loire-Atlantic, breton was spoken all over Finistère, Côtes-du-Nord and Morbihan - it was sweaped out from I-et-V since the XIII° Cy (proxi only) but survived in Loire-Atlantique until the second part of the XX° Cy, in a reduced district it's true -
in East-Brittany the breton was the elites languages and the country people spoke either breton or roman or both for some time before roman gained completely -
genetically speaking, Loire-Atlantic is in a between situation and I think the "breton blood" would be stronger and North the Loire, and in some way, West the departement -

[moesan]

at the beginning of the XX° CY, large parts of Morbihan and Côtes-du-Nord too was completely gained to french -

[ffoucart]

(Loire river goes from the Ardèche departement in North-Languedoc to the Atlantic Ocean! - but we have Hauts de France now for Nord-Picardie so...)
2 departements were only partially breton speaking in far past: Ille-et-Vilaine and Loire-Atlantic, breton was spoken all over Finistère, Côtes-du-Nord and Morbihan - it was sweaped out from I-et-V since the XIII° Cy (proxi only) but survived in Loire-Atlantique until the second part of the XX° Cy, in a reduced district it's true -

Hauts de France (Top of France) is clearly an awful and stupid name.

Anyway, to my knowledge, Loire Atlantique has always been mostly French speaking. I am not saying that Nantes is not part of Bretagne, but Breton was not usually spoken there.

To give some insight comments: it is clear from records that French was commonly used in the Finistere since the XVIIth century (for administrative purposes, but not only), if not on a day to day basis. The use of "LE" in the names instead of "AR" or "AN" is common since 1650.