Jewish Genetics: Abstracts and Summaries

Part 4: Non-Jewish Israelites

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Studies that test the potential Israelite ancestry of certain non-Jewish populations

Peidong Shen, Tal Lavi, Toomas Kivisild, Vivian Chou, Deniz Sengun, Dov Gefel, Isaac Shpirer, Eilon Woolf, Jossi Hillel, Marcus W. Feldman, and Peter J. Oefner. "Reconstruction of Patrilineages and Matrilineages of Samaritans and Other Israeli Populations from Y-Chromosome and Mitochondrial DNA Sequence Variation." Human Mutation 24 (2004): 248-260. Excerpts:

"Based on the close relationship of the Samaritan haplogroup J six-microsatellite haplotypes with the Cohen modal haplotype, we speculate that the Samaritan M304 Y-chromosome lineages present a subgroup of the original Jewish Cohanim priesthood that did not go into exile when the Assyrians conquered the northern kingdom of Israel in 721 BC, but married Assyrian and female exiles relocated from other conquered lands, which was a typical Assyrian policy to obliterate national identities. This is in line with biblical texts that emphasize a common heritage of Jews and Samaritans, but also record the negative attitude of Jews towards the Samaritans because of their association with people that were not Jewish. Such a scenario could explain why Samaritan Y-chromosome lineages cluster tightly with Jewish Y-lineages (Fig. 2A), while their mitochrondrial lineages are closest to Iraqi Jewish and Palestinian mtDNA sequences (Fig. 2B)."

Peter J. Oefner, Georg Hölzl, Peidong Shen, Isaac Shpirer, Dov Gefel, Tal Lavi, Eilon Woolf, Jonathan Cohen, Cengiz Cinnioglu, Peter A. Underhill, Noah A. Rosenberg, Jochen Hochrein, Julie M. Granka, Jossi Hillel, and Marcus W. Feldman. "Genetics and the history of the Samaritans: Y chromosomal microsatellites and genetic affinity between Samaritans and Cohanim." Human Biology 85:6 (December 2013): pages 825-858. They evaluated the Y-DNA and autosomal DNA of "12 Samaritans chosen to have as low a level of relationship as possible" and compared them with 461 non-Samaritans including representatives of 7 Jewish and 3 non-Jewish populations with ancestry from Israel and members of non-Jewish ethnic groups from Africa, Pakistan, Turkey, and Europe. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"[...] Estimation of genetic distances [...] revealed that the Samaritans were closely related to Cohanim. This result supports the position of the Samaritans that they are descendants from the tribes of Israel dating to before the Assyrian exile in 722-720 BCE. In concordance with previously published singlenucleotide polymorphism haplotypes, each Samaritan family, with the exception of the Samaritan Cohen lineage, was observed to carry a distinctive Y-chromosome short tandem repeat haplotype that was not more than one mutation removed from the six-marker Cohen modal haplotype."

It should also be noted that some Palestinian Arabs who live in the city of Nablus and nearby villages paternally descend from Samaritans who converted to Islam. Their family names include Buwarda, Kasem, Muslimani, Shakshir, Yaish, among others. I don't know whether their Y-DNA has been tested.

Susan M. Adams, Elena Bosch, Patricia L. Balaresque, Stéphane J. Ballereau, Andrew C. Lee, Eduardo Arroyo, Ana M. López-Parra, Mercedes Aler, Marina S. Gisbert Grifo, Maria Brion, Angel Carracedo, João Lavinha, Begoña Martínez-Jarreta, Lluis Quintana-Murci, Antònia Picornell, Misericordia Ramon, Karl Skorecki, Doron M. Behar, Francesc Calafell, and Mark A. Jobling. "The genetic legacy of religious diversity and intolerance: paternal lineages of Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula." American Journal of Human Genetics 83(6) (December 2008): pages 725-736. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"[...] The Iberian Peninsula provides a suitable region for examination of the demographic impact of such recent events, because its complex recent history has involved the long-term residence of two very different populations with distinct geographical origins and their own particular cultural and religious characteristics-North African Muslims and Sephardic Jews. To address this issue, we analyzed Y chromosome haplotypes, which provide the necessary phylogeographic resolution, in 1140 males from the Iberian Peninsula and Balearic Islands. Admixture analysis based on binary and Y-STR haplotypes indicates a high mean proportion of ancestry from North African (10.6%) and Sephardic Jewish (19.8%) sources. Despite alternative possible sources for lineages ascribed a Sephardic Jewish origin, these proportions attest to a high level of religious conversion (whether voluntary or enforced), driven by historical episodes of social and religious intolerance, that ultimately led to the integration of descendants. [...]"

Nicholas Wade, "DNA study shows 20 percent of Iberian population has Jewish ancestry." The New York Times (December 4, 2008). Excerpts:

"About 20 percent of the current population of the Iberian Peninsula has Sephardic Jewish ancestry, and 11 percent bear Moorish DNA signatures, a team of geneticists reports. The genetic signatures reflect the forced conversions to Christianity in the 14th and 15th centuries after Christian armies wrested Spain back from Muslim control. ... The genetic study, based on an analysis of Y chromosomes, was conducted by a team of biologists led by Mark Jobling of the University of Leicester in England and Francesc Calafell of the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona. The biologists developed a Y chromosome signature for Sephardic men by studying Sephardic Jewish communities in places where Jews migrated after being expelled from Spain in the years from 1492 to 1496. They also characterized the Y chromosomes of the Arab and Berber army that invaded Spain in 711 A.D. from data on people now living in Morocco and Western Sahara. ... The genetic study, reported online Thursday in the American Journal of Human Genetics, indicates there was a high level of conversion among Jews. ... The issue is one that has confronted Calafell, an author of the study. His own Y chromosome is probably of Sephardic ancestry - the test is not definitive for individuals - and his surname is from a town in Catalonia; Jews undergoing conversion often took surnames from place names."

Pedro Cáceres. "Uno de cada tres españoles tiene marcadores genéticos de Oriente Medio o el Magreb." El Mundo (December 10, 2008). Excerpt:

"El doctor Calafell matiza que [...] los marcadores genéticos usados para distinguir a la población con ancestros sefardíes pueden producir distorsiones. En realidad, la pista genética usada en este caso también es compartida por pueblos de Oriente Medio desde Turquía hasta Líbano, con lo que en realidad, ese 20% de españoles que el estudio señala como descendientes de sefardíes podrían haber heredado ese rasgo de movimiento más antiguos, como el de los fenicios o, incluso, primeros pobladores neolíticos hace miles de años." (Translation: "Dr. Calafell clarifies that [...] the genetic markers used to distinguish the population with Sephardic ancestry may produce distortions. In reality, the genetic marker used in this case is also a component of peoples of the Middle East from Turkey to Lebanon, with the reality being that the 20% of Spaniards who are identified as having Sephardic ancestry in the study could have inherited that same marker from older migrations like those of the Phoenicians, or even the first Neolithic settlers thousands of years ago.")

"Spanish Inquisition couldn't quash Moorish, Jewish genes." ScienceNews 175:1 (January 3, 2009). Excerpts:

"'The genetic makeup of Sephardic Jews is probably common to other Middle Eastern populations, such as the Phoenicians, that also settled the Iberian Peninsula,' Calafell says. 'In our study, that would have all fallen under the Jewish label. The 20% of Spaniards that are identified as having Sephardim ancestry in the study could have inherited that same marker from older movements like the Phoenicians, or even the first Neolithic settlers thousands of years ago.'"

Joana Francesca Ferragut, Sofia L. Marques, C. Ramon, Jose Aurelio Castro, António Amorim, L. Alvarez, and A. Picornell. "Founding Mothers of Chueta Population." Forensic Science International Genetics Supplement Series (September 23, 2015). The Chueta (Xueta) people live on the Mediterranean island of Majorca, Spain and descend from Sephardim who became Crypto-Jews when they were forced to adopt Catholicism but for some generations had preserved Jewish religious practices in secret and even after they ceased those practices they still were kept apart from their non-Chueta neighbors with very little intermarriage between Chuetas and non-Chuetas. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"[...] The aim of the present study was to study the mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) haplogroups in a sample of Chueta individuals and to compare with other Jewish populations and with their host population, in order to investigate the founding maternal lineages in this population. In the 109 individuals studied 50 different haplotypes were identified. The haplotype and nucleotide diversities of the complete CR were 0.952 and 0.010, respectively. Comparing with other Iberian Jewish population, the genetic diversity values were just slightly lower than in Bragança Crypto-Jews [7] and much higher than in the Portuguese Jewish community from Belmonte (Table 1), where a very strong founder maternal effect has been previously described [8]. High haplogroup (Hg) diversity was found in Chuetas (Fig. 1), with 35 different haplogroups. The Middle Eastern haplogroup R0a was the most prevalent (19.3%), followed by the widespread European haplogroup H (16.5%). In order to identify traits of Jewish ancestry, we took into account those Hgs with frequencies higher than 4% and significantly different frequencies to those found in the Majorcan host population [...] The haplogroups that stood out in the Chueta sample were: R0a, T1a, T2c1d, K1a1b1a, U1a1a and L3e2b, indicating a remarkable signature of Middle Eastern ancestry along with some degree of European and North African admixture. The haplogroup pattern in Chuetas pointed out that the most important Jewish putative founding lineage is R0a, found in other Jewish (especially North Africans) and Middle Eastern populations, like Druzes, Palestinian and Bedouins, but not in Portuguese Jewish populations. [...] These data confirm that the Chuetas, due to their singular history, have kept not only the cultural memory of their Jewish origin through centuries but also a substantial degree of ancestral genetic signature. Also some degree of the host admixture can be detected, as in other diaspora Jewish populations. [...]"

Analysis of Y-DNA, mtDNA, and autosomal DNA matchups through direct-to-consumer DNA tests has conclusively demonstrated that both some Latin American Hispanics (especially, but not exclusively, Mexicans) and some Ashkenazic Jews descend from Sephardic Jews from Spain and Portugal and that's why they match each other. I summarize several of the many known examples of these matchups in my articles "Sephardic Jews in Galitzian Poland and Environs", "Sephardic Jews in Lithuania and Latvia", "Sephardic Jews in Central and Northern Poland", "Sephardic Jews in Belarus", and Sephardic Jews in Central, Eastern, and Southern Ukraine.

Juan-Camilo Chacón-Duque, Kaustubh Adhikari, Macarena Fuentes-Guajardo, Javier Mendoza-Revilla, Victor Acuña-Alonzo, Rodrigo Barquera, Mirsha Quinto-Sánchez, Jorge Gómez-Valdés, Paola Everardo Martínez, Hugo Villamil-Ramírez, Tábita Hünemeier, Virginia Ramallo, Caio C. Silva de Cerqueira, Malena Hurtado, Valeria Villegas, Vanessa Granja, Mercedes Villena, René Vásquez, Elena Llop, José R. Sandoval, Alberto A. Salazar-Granara, Maria-Laura Parolin, Karla Sandoval, Rosenda I. Peñaloza-Espinosa, Hector Rangel-Villalobos, Cheryl A. Winkler, William Klitz, Claudio Bravi, Julio Molina, Daniel Corach, Ramiro Barrantes, Verónica Gomes, Carlos Resende, Leonor Gusmão, Antonio Amorim, Yali Xue, Jean-Michel Dugoujon, Pedro Moral, Rolando González-José, Lavinia Schuler-Faccini, Francisco M. Salzano, Maria-Cátira Bortolini, Samuel Canizales-Quinteros, Giovanni Poletti, Carla Gallo, Gabriel Bedoya, Francisco Rothhammer, David Balding, Garrett Hellenthal, and Andrés Ruiz-Linares. "Latin Americans show wide-spread Converso ancestry and imprint of local Native ancestry on physical appearance." Nature Communications 9 (December 19, 2018): article number 5388. This is an autosomal DNA study of thousands of people from Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, and Peru. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"We also detect South/East Mediterranean ancestry across Latin America, probably stemming mostly from the clandestine colonial migration of Christian converts of non-European origin (Conversos)."

Excerpts from the body text:

"SOURCEFIND finds that Sephardic/East/South Mediterranean ancestry is detectable in each country's samples: Brazil (1%), Chile (4%), Colombia (3%), Mexico (3%) and Peru (2%). Altogether, ~23% of the CANDELA individuals show >5% of such ancestry (an average of 12.2%) (Fig. 1d) and in these individuals SOURCEFIND infers this ancestry to be mostly Sephardic (7.3%), with smaller non-Sephardic East Mediterranean (3.9%) and non-Sephardic South Mediterranean (1%) contributions. Individuals with Sephardic/East/South Mediterranean ancestry were detected across Latin America (Fig. 2c). [...] Although Christian converts were legally forbidden from migrating to the colonies, historical records (often from the Inquisition) document that some individuals made the journey. Since this migration was mostly a clandestine process, its magnitude has been difficult to assess. Genetic studies have occasionally provided evidence that certain Latin American populations could have some Converso ancestry and this is at times supported by some historical evidence. Our findings indicate that the signature of a colonial migration to Latin America of people with relatively high South/East Mediterranean ancestry is much more prevalent than suggested by these special cases, or by historical records."

Christopher Velez, Pier Francesco Palamara, J. Guevara-Aguirre, Li Hao, Tanya Karafet, M. Guevara-Aguirre, Alexander Pearlman, Carole Oddoux, Michael Hammer, Edward Burns, Itsik Pe'er, Gil Atzmon, and Harry Ostrer. "The impact of Converso Jews on the genomes of modern Latin Americans." Human Genetics 131:2 (February 2012): pages 251-263. First published electronically on July 26, 2011. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"[...] Here, we analyzed DNA collected from two well-established communities in Colorado (33 unrelated individuals) and Ecuador (20 unrelated individuals) with a measurable prevalence of the BRCA1 c.185delAG and the GHR c.E180 mutations, respectively, using Affymetrix Genome-wide Human SNP 6.0 arrays to identify their ancestry. These mutations are thought to have been brought to these communities by Sephardic Jewish progenitors. Principal component analysis and clustering methods were employed to determine the genome-wide patterns of continental ancestry within both populations using single nucleotide polymorphisms, complemented by determination of Y-chromosomal and mitochondrial DNA haplotypes. When examining the presumed European component of these two communities, we demonstrate enrichment for Sephardic Jewish ancestry not only for these mutations, but also for other segments as well. Although comparison of both groups to a reference Hispanic/Latino population of Mexicans demonstrated proximity and similarity to other modern day communities derived from a European and Native American two-way admixture, identity-by-descent and Y-chromosome mapping demonstrated signatures of Sephardim in both communities. [...]"

I. Makriyianni, N. Hamel, S. Ward, William D. Foulkes, and S. Graw. "BRCA1:185delAG found in the San Luis Valley probably originated in a Jewish founder." Journal of Medical Genetics 42 (2005): e27. Some Hispanics living in the San Luis Valley - "a large, isolated valley situated on the border between New Mexico and Colorado" - carry the "hereditary breast cancer mutation, BRCA1:185delAG". The authors state that many of their ancestors had lived in Spanish settlement areas in northern New Mexico. The authors are aware of the partial Sephardic Jewish roots of the inhabitants of this area and therefore suggest that Sephardic origins explain the presence of this mutation among Hispanic Catholics, as they explain this is much more likely than imagining that an Ashkenazic migrant came to the area long ago.

Talia Bloch. "New genetic evidence links Spanish Americans of Southwest to Jews." Jewish Telegraphic Agency (September 28, 2011). Excerpts:

"In 1995, Demetrio Valdez, his wife, Olive, and some of their neighbors in Conejos County, Colo., started a kosher food co-op. ... Since childhood he had heard rumors that his family had Jewish ancestors dating back to colonial New Spain when, as historical records show, a good number of Converso Jews -- Jews and their descendants forcibly converted during the Spanish Inquisition -- came to the New World. Many of the Conversos who had made the trek over had become Catholics in name only. ... Now a new study in the Journal of Human Genetics has turned up fresh scientific evidence that the Spanish Americans of the Southwest must have had some Jewish forbears. A group of researchers in the United States and Ecuador analyzed DNA from two communities who trace back to Spanish colonial times: one in the San Luis Valley of southern Colorado and northern New Mexico, which includes Conejos County, and one in the Loja Province of southern Ecuador. The study found 'observable Sephardic ancestry' in both communities and calculated Jewish ancestry among the Lojanos at about 5 to 10 percent and among the Spanish Americans, also called Hispanos, at about 1 to 5 percent. 'This study provides firmer evidence for what people have been conjecturing for up to 20 years now,' said the study's director, Dr. Harry Ostrer..."

"Genetic Hebrews of Southern Colorado." Forward (February 24, 2012). Excerpt:

"Genetic markers reveal Conversos of the American Southwest..."

David Kelly. "DNA Clears the Fog Over Latino Links to Judaism in New Mexico." Los Angeles Times (December 5, 2004). Excerpts:

"He [Father William Sanchez launched a DNA project to test his relatives, along with some of the parishioners at Albuquerque's St. Edwin's Church, where he works. As word got out, others in the community began contacting him. So Sanchez expanded the effort to include Latinos throughout the state. Of the 78 people tested, 30 are positive for the marker of the Cohanim, whose genetic line remains strong because they rarely married non-Jews throughout a history spanning up to 4,000 years. Michael Hammer, a research professor at the University of Arizona and an expert on Jewish genetics, said that fewer than 1% of non-Jews possessed this marker. That fact - along with the traditions in many of these families - makes it likely that they are Jewish, he said. ... It also explained practices that had baffled many folks here for years: the special knives used to butcher sheep in line with Jewish kosher tradition, the refusal to work on Saturdays to honor the Sabbath, the menorahs that had been hidden away. In some families, isolated rituals are all that remain of a once-vibrant religious tradition diluted by time and fears of persecution. ... 'We believe a fairly high percentage of first families [arriving] in New Mexico were nominally Catholic, but their secret religion was Judaism,' he [Bennett Greenspan of Family Tree DNA] said. "We are finding between 10% and 15% of men living in New Mexico or south Texas or northern Mexico have a Y chromosome that tracks back to the Middle East.' They are not all Cohanim, and there's a slight chance some could be of African Muslim descent. But Greenspan said the DNA of the men is typical of Jews from the eastern Mediterranean."

John Nova Lomax. "Who's Your Daddy? Track your true identity along a DNA trail left behind by your ancestors." Houston Press (April 14, 2005). Excerpts:

"Growing up in the Rio Grande Valley, Danny Villarreal had heard the stories from his grandparents. His ancestors, it was whispered, had come to Mexico from Spain under something of a cloud. Apparently, they were not purebred Castilian Spaniards, but members of a persecuted minority -- namely, Jews who had converted to Catholicism on pain of death at the hands of the Spanish Inquisition. ... FTDNA sent the test off to a genetics lab at the University of Arizona, and a few weeks later Villarreal got his results back. Although the company didn't find that he was related to anyone then in its database, it did have a few surprises for him. First, there was his haplogroup -- the genetic marker that goes back on his Y chromosome for tens of thousands of years. All humanity is divided into 18 of these, and Mexicans of European descent would likely be in either haplogroup R-1A or R-1B, the most common groups in Western Europe, or if they were primarily of Native American descent, Q or Q-3. Villarreal's was E-3B, which is a Semitic haplogroup that evolved in East Africa and then spread around the Mediterranean and is most common today in the Middle East and in North and East Africa. Then there were his closest genetic matches. All three of them were to Jews in places like Hungary, Belarus and Poland."

Simon Romero. "Hispanics Uncovering Roots as Inquisition's 'Hidden' Jews." The New York Times (October 29, 2005). Excerpts:

"When she was growing up in a small town in southern Colorado, an area where her ancestors settled centuries ago when it was on the fringes of the northern frontier of New Spain, Bernadette Gonzalez always thought some of the stories about her family were unusual, if not bizarre. Her grandmother, for instance, refused to travel on Saturday and would use a specific porcelain basin to drain blood out of meat before she cooked it. In one tale that particularly puzzled Ms. Gonzalez, 52, her grandfather called for a Jewish doctor to circumcise him... Ms. Gonzalez started researching her family history and concluded that her ancestors were Marranos, or Sephardic Jews, who had fled the Inquisition in Spain and in Mexico more than four centuries ago. Though raised in the Roman Catholic faith, Ms. Gonzalez felt a need to reconnect to her Jewish roots, so she converted to Judaism three years ago. ... These conversions are the latest chapter in the story of the crypto-Jews, or hidden Jews, of the southwestern United States and northern Mexico, who are thought to be descended from the Sephardic Jews who began fleeing Spain more than 500 years ago. The story is being bolstered by recent historical research and advances in DNA testing that are said to reveal a prominent role played by crypto-Jews and their descendants in Spain's colonization of the Southwest. ... Family Tree DNA, a Houston company that offers a Cohanim test to its male clients, gets about one inquiry a day from Hispanics interested in exploring the possibility of Jewish ancestry, said Bennett Greenspan, its founder and chief executive. Mr. Greenspan said about one in 10 of the Hispanic men tested by his company showed Semitic ancestry strongly suggesting a Jewish background. (Another divergent possibility is that the test might suggest North African Muslim ancestry.)"

Nathan A. Ellis, Susan Ciocci, Maria Proytcheva, David Lennon, Joanna Groden, and James German. "The Ashkenazic Jewish Bloom Syndrome Mutation blmAsh Is Present in Non-Jewish Americans of Spanish Ancestry." American Journal of Human Genetics 63:6 (December 1998): pages 1685-1693. The so-called "Ashkenazi" mutation blmAsh on chromosome 15 on the SNP rs113993962 appears to really be Sephardic in origin, since aside from Jews, it's only found in "non-Jewish persons ... [that] Each [...] has a Spanish-speaking Catholic family that has resided in the southwestern United States, Mexico, or El Salvador for many generations". They found 5 such affected Hispanics in the Bloom's Syndrome Registry. The authors suggest that the Hispanics are "descendents of a person who several centuries ago emigrated from Spain to New Spain and who most likely was a Sephardic Jew."

Felice L. Bedford, Doron Yacobi, Gary Felix, and Federico M. Garza. "Clarifying Mitochondrial DNA Subclades of T2e from Mideast to Mexico." Journal of Phylogenetics and Evolutionary Biology 1:121 (October 17, 2013). A particular branch of the mtDNA haplogroup T2e1 has been found among both Sephardic Jews whose families lived in the Ottoman Empire and Mexican Catholics from the states of Coahuila, Nuevo León, and Tamaulipas who descended from Conversos, as well as among Brazilian and Portuguese people.

Felice L. Bedford. "Sephardic Signature in Haplogroup T mitochondrial DNA." European Journal of Human Genetics 20:4 (April 2012): pages 441-448. First published online on November 23, 2011. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"A rare combination of mutations within mitochondrial DNA subhaplogroup T2e is identified as affiliated with Sephardic Jews, [...] It was found that the rare motif belonged only to Sephardic descendents (Turkey, Bulgaria), to inhabitants of North American regions known for secret Spanish-Jewish colonization, or were consistent with Sephardic ancestry."

Inês Nogueiro, João Teixeira, António Amorim, Leonor Gusmão, and Luis Alvarez. "Reply to letter from Felice L. Bedford and Doron Yacobi." European Journal of Human Genetics 23 (2015): pages 994-995. First published online on November 5, 2014. Excerpts:

"[...] as for T2e1b, a new branch in the PhyloTree build 16 (van Oven and Kayser6) was included. This branch was defined based on a mitogenome (GenBank accession number: KF657641) from Bedford et al5 as can be observed in PhyloTree build 16 search. This is a sample from Mexico: Nuevo Leon and together with three other samples from Bedford et al4, 5 (KF577587, KF577589 and JN819272) establish a clade where the Portuguese Sephardic Jews are included (T2e1a1a1) [...] With the exception of JN819272, a Sephardic Jew from Salonica, the other two samples are from Mexico, Tamaulipas and from Texas, USA and could have an eventual Iberian/Sephardic origin. The fact that we have observed two Jewish Sephardic sequences in the NE Portugal sharing the same motif described by Bedford et al,4, 5 plus two further distinct variants, m.13135G4A and m.7133C4T not previously described, can help to clarify if the putative Iberian origin of the Mexican/USA samples is indeed owing to Sephardic ancestry. It is remarkable that T2e1b and U2e1a clades include mitogenomes from both Sephardic and Ashkenazi origins. [...] either the defining variants for each branch could have arisen before the separation between the two Jewish groups, or there may have been recent admixture between them. However, in Nogueiro et al1 it is stated that: '[..] it must be said that although not frequent, marriages between the two communities [Sephardic with Ashkenazic] occurred (especially) in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, namely among the elite sugar traders, with the descendants assimilated into the Ashkenazi community.' [...]"

Bernard Secher, Rosa Fregel, José M. Larruga, Vicente M. Cabrera, Phillip Endicott, José J. Pestano, and Ana M. González. "The history of the North African mitochondrial DNA haplogroup U6 gene flow into the African, Eurasian and American continents." BMC Evolutionary Biology 14:109 (2014). Published online on May 19, 2014. Supplement 1 lists GenBank samples carrying the mtDNA haplogroup U6a7a1b. They include 2 Jews with maternal-line roots in Poland, 2 people with maternal-line roots in Ukraine (one of them being a Jewish line from Kiev), 1 person from Germany, 1 person from southern Italy, 2 people from Spain (one a known Jewish lineage, another from the city of Jaen in south-central Spain), 1 from Algeria, 1 from Mexico, and 1 from Havana, Cuba. Excerpts:

"Six of them are grouped into a Sephardic cluster [mtDNA haplogroup] U6a7a1b, of diverse geographic sources with another five sequences of possible Jewish maternal descent. This wide spread testifies to the extent of the forced exile of this community of Hispanic origin. [...] There are only four complete sequences with Spanish American origin in our tree (see Additional file 1). Two of them are included in U6a7a1b, a Sephardic Jewish cluster."

E.M. Warshauer, Paul Maier, G. Runfeldt, Ignacia Fuentes, Maria Jose Escamez, G. Hellenthal, A. Brown, Laura E. Valinotto, A. Hovnanian, Eli Sprecher, Karl Skorecki, and D.R. Roop. "857 Crypto-Jewish origins revealed in recessive dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa individuals carrying the prevalent c.6527insC mutation associated with Sephardic ancestry." Journal of Investigative Dermatology 143:5 (May 2023): S147. Excerpts:

"[...] In this study, a substantial global cohort of 124 RDEB individuals with the c. 6527insC founder mutation from Spain, France, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, and the USA were investigated by autosomal genotyping, pairwise identical-by-descent matching and a local ancestry analysis. Sephardic ancestry was identified at the haplotype spanning the c. 6527insC mutation in 85% of the individuals, [...]"

Dan Even. "Israeli researchers: Group of Colorado Indians have genetic Jewish roots." Ha'aretz (May 30, 2012). The "tribe" discussed in this article is "concentrated in the Mesa Verde area". They are actually properly called Hispanos instead of Indians. Excerpts:

"[...] Weitzel's discovery of the BRCA1 mutation in these Hispanics led him to suspect that there was a genetic connection between them and European Jews, [...] The mutation was also found in a group of Mexican Indians who had immigrated from Mexico to the United States over the past 200 years and settled in western Colorado. [...] all had a common ancestor: A Jew who immigrated from Europe to South America up to 600 years ago, [...] the mutation found in the Colorado Indians was found to be identical to that of Ashkenazi Jews, [...]"

Schelly Talalay Dardashti. "Genealogy is so much more than a list of names." New Mexico Jewish Journal (June 20, 2024). Excerpts:

"[...] the BRCA1 (mutation 185delAG) is prevalent in northern New Mexico and southern Colorado among descendants of colonial-era families known to have Sephardic converso roots. [...] Back in 2012, a spate of articles appeared in JTA, the Jerusalem Post, Haaretz, Ynet, and others, all bearing similar headlines along the lines of 'Colorado Indians, Jews share genetic marker,' 'Research unearths Jewish roots in Colorado Indians,' 'Group of Colorado Indians have genetic Jewish roots,' and others. The JTA story in 2012 indicated: 'Israeli geneticists have linked a Native American population in Colorado to Jews expelled from Spain during the Inquisition. Geneticists at the Sheba Medical Center in Tel Aviv discovered the genetic mutation marker BRCA1 in a group of Mexican Indians who had emigrated from Mexico to the United States over the past 200 years and settled in Colorado...' The 'Indians' were really a population of Hispanic families (who also had native Americans in their families) who had migrated from northern New Mexico (they arrived in 1598) to Southern Colorado – the San Luis Valley. Genealogical research proved they were converso descendants. [...]"

The Yaqui people originated in the Mexican state of Sonora, where most of them still live, though some later moved to Texas, Arizona, California, and Nevada in the 1800s and 1900s. A particular Yaqui from the United States of America is estimated to be 0.2% "Ashkenazi" by 23andMe, but this almost certainly represents Sephardic anscestry in reality. Their combined Native American and East Asian score is 93.5%, of which 80.2% is recognized by 23andMe as distinctively Native American. They also have a small amount of European/Spanish ancestry.

A particular Q'eqchi' Maya from the Belize-Guatemala border region is estimated to be 0.2% "Ashkenazi" by 23andMe, but almost certainly comes from a Sephardic ancestor(s). Their combined Native American and East Asian score is 96%, of which 83.6% is recognized by 23andMe as distinctively Native American. They also have a small amount of European/Spanish ancestry.

A particular Guatemalan is estimated to be 0.1% "Ashkenazi" by 23andMe, but again probably Sephardic in reality. Their combined Native American and East Asian score is 94.8%, of which 81.2% is recognized by 23andMe as distinctively Native American. They also have a small amount of European/Spanish ancestry.

In 2017, I used GEDmatch to find 3 Sephardic Jewish autosomal DNA segments in a person who was born in far-southern Portugal to a Catholic family. Most of his ancestors had lived in the area (Algarve) for generations but he additionally had an ancestral branch from Viseu in north-central Portugal.

Josh Lipson, from Ashkenazic Jewish family, found that he autosomally matches a person from a Crypto-Jewish family in the Trás-os-Montes region of northeastern Portugal. In 2018, using GEDmatch, I confirmed that the segment is valid and found a Brazilian who's a good match to both of them on the same segment.

Cnaan Liphshiz. "Portugal's secret Jews come out of hiding." Ha'aretz English Edition (Israel) (September 13, 2009). Excerpts:

"It is part of a national trend: The turning toward Judaism of thousands of Portuguese who believe they are descended from Jews who were forced to convert to Christianity hundreds of years ago. ... Many became crypto-Jews, practicing secretly. ... Recent genetic studies show that some 30 percent of Portugal's population has Jewish blood."

Susan M. Adams, Elena Bosch, Patricia L. Balaresque, Stéphane J. Ballereau, Andrew C. Lee, Eduardo Arroyo, Ana M. López-Parra, Mercedes Aler, Marina S. Gisbert Grifo, Maria Brion, Angel Carracedo, João Lavinha, Begoña Martínez-Jarreta, Lluis Quintana-Murci, Antònia Picornell, Misericordia Ramon, Karl Skorecki, Doron M. Behar, Francesc Calafell, and Mark A. Jobling. "The Genetic Legacy of Religious Diversity and Intolerance: Paternal Lineages of Christians, Jews, and Muslims in the Iberian Peninsula." The American Journal of Human Genetics 83:6 (December 12, 2008): pages 725-736. First published online on December 5, 2008. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"Considering the peninsula as a single population, the analysis unsurprisingly finds that the highest mean proportion of ancestry corresponds to the Basque parental population. However, this level is only 69.6%, leaving a remarkably high overall mean proportion of North African and Jewish ancestry forming the remainder. [...] Mean Sephardic Jewish admixture is 19.8%, varying from zero in Minorca to 36.3% in South Portugal (the value in Asturias is unlikely to be reliable, because of small sample size)."

Inês Nogueiro, João C. Teixeira, António Amorim, Leonor Gusmão, and Luis Alvarez. "Portuguese crypto-Jews: the genetic heritage of a complex history." Frontiers in Genetics 6:12 (February 2, 2015): eCollection 2015. Published online on February 2, 2015. This article explores the mtDNA of descendants of Conversos (people forced to convert from Judaism to Roman Catholicism) in Portugal. Over the centuries, these families had practiced aspects of Judaism in private in their homes while pretending to be devout Catholics to the wider community. They did eventually incorporate some aspects of Catholicism into their lives, creating a blended religious identity. Excerpts from the Abstract:

"[...] [Genetic] Data [focused on Sephardic descendants] from the Iberian Peninsula, the original geographic source of Sephardic Jews, is limited to two populations in Portugal, Belmonte, and Bragança district, and the Chueta community from Mallorca. Belmonte was the first Jewish community studied for uniparental markers. The construction of a reference model for the history of the Portuguese Jewish communities, in which the genetic and classical historical data interplay dynamically, is still ongoing. Recently an enlarged sample covering a wide region in the Northeast Portugal was undertaken, allowing the genetic profiling of male and female lineages. A Jewish specific shared female lineage (HV0b) was detected between the community of Belmonte and Bragança. In contrast to what was previously described as a hallmark of the Portuguese Jews, an unexpectedly high polymorphism of lineages was found in Bragança, showing a surprising resistance to the erosion of genetic diversity typical of small-sized isolate populations, as well as signs of admixture with the Portuguese host population."

Rita Gonçalves, Ana Freitas, Marta Branco, Alexandra Rosa, Ana T. Fernandes, Lev A. Zhivotovsky, Peter A. Underhill, Toomas Kivisild, and Antonio Brehm. "Y-chromosome lineages from Portugal, Madeira and Açores record elements of Sephardim and Berber ancestry." Annals of Human Genetics 69:4 (July 2005): pages 443-454.

Using GEDmatch, in 2017 I validated 4 autosomal DNA segments, each one shared by a different Sicilian and a different cluster of Ashkenazic Jews. One of those segments must be of Sephardic origin because it connects those two communities with: