From Kansas to the Rhine: a DNA Journey Through Europe's Rabbinic
From Kansas to the Rhine: A DNA Journey through Europe’s Rabbinic Capitals by Rachel Unkefer ay back when, starting out as genealogists research- thought there might be enough other descendants to create a W ing Jewish ancestry, we probably all had the experi- project. I also knew that the Bacharachs in Fellheim had a ence at least once of being chastened by a more seasoned surname as early as the 17th century, which was quite un- researcher when we asked if our ancestor from, say, Poland usual, so I thought there was a chance that an early surname could be related to his or her ancestor with the same sur- could have persisted over time and spread widely. name from, say, the west bank of the Rhine. Surnames, we For the purposes of this article I use the original German were told, came with Napoleon or later and were adopted spelling, Bacharach, although there are a number of known independently, coincidentally, by multiple families; only variants, including Bachrach, Bikrach, Bacherach, Bacher newbies would presume a connection between families and others. See Lars Menk for more information.1 from different geographical areas because of a shared sur- In 2009, I created the Bacharach DNA project at Family name. The Bacharach DNA Study is yielding results that Tree DNA and set out to recruit participants. At first, I challenge this conventional wisdom. The paper trails and planned to focus exclusively on Germany, but fortunately I the genetic markers on the Y- rejected that strategy. I ap- chromosome for this far-flung proached my husband’s third extended family show that the The paper trails and the genetic cousin (whom I had only re- probability of males with cer- markers on the Y-chromosome for cently located) who agreed, tain surnames sharing a com- after a few e-mails, to be the mon ancestor is higher than this far-flung extended family show DNA proxy for all the de- we might have expected.
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