If you would like to participate please contact us. Donations to the general fund to support those who cannot afford the cost of the test are welcome.
DNA STUDY
The Hawgood family DNA study aims to connect branches of Hawgoods who cannot be linked into the main tree from paper records alone. Every test result is invaluable to the study as those already in the main tree provide a benchmark for comparing to broken branches, and also confirms the connections made from paper records. We need as many Hawgoods as possible to take part. The more results we have, the better.
We have found genetic connections to a number of US based variants of the Hawgood name including Haywood, Hagewood, Hegwood, Haigood and Hagwood, as well as paper records that connect a UK family of Allgoods to the main family tree.
The information on this site relates primarily to determining relatively close links (ie within the last 500 years), but they also provide an insight into our past. All humans living today have their earliest ancestors around 100,000 years ago in eastern Africa, who then approximately 50,000 years ago migrated to Asia and beyond. Over time, a number of specific genetic groupings emerged defined as Haplotypes. Within each general Haplotype are subgroups and further subgroups which can narrow down specific relationships between surnames.
Hawgood DNA comes from Haplogroup I1-M170, which emerged in Europe about 28,000 years ago. Around 10,000 years later, the ice age had a major impact on our ancestors in Haplogroup I when most of northern and central Europe was uninhabitable. This forced them to retreat to refuge areas in Iberia and the Balkans where living conditions were better.
As the Ice Age receded, our ancestors of Haplogroup I1-M170 moved out into the surrounding areas. As Europe was being repopulated, some 8,000 years ago near Denmark, a sub group of I-M170 emerged, I1-M253, of which Hawgoods are a member of. These ancestors migrated west into the area of the Doggerland land bridge, a piece of land which linked England to Northern Europe, including Denmark and north Germany, and is now covered by the North Sea. It was therefore easy to move into England, where we can trace written records of Hawgoods from around 1500.
Today, the subgroup of I1-M253 is relatively common in Scandinavia at around 35-40% of the population, as shown in the map above, increasing to up to 50% in certain Finnish provinces.
When analysing the specific incidence of some our markers within the overall ‘I’ population, one of the interesting outcomes is that whilst still being in I1-M253, Hawgood DNA has several marker values that are relatively uncommon. It would seem that mutations occurred between 500 AD and 1500 AD. Hence finding similar persons that match these markers with different surnames would be quite significant.
If you are a Hawgood or derivative name, please consider taking parting in this study. Every test result is extremely useful. The pages on this site explain how DNA testing works.