The Mayflower

[O'Callaghan]

There are reasons for that. My understanding is that DNA testing doesn't support their claims as NA.

Native Americans, or 'Indians', are not one ethnic group, but many. Early photos show a huge range of skin colour and facial features. I was struck by old photos of the Fox tribe that appear completely caucasian. You don't hear about that particular tribe anymore, but I assume they became assimilated, because they looked like us. It's apparent that Native Americans came to America from more than one place, but if they were here before European settlers then they are Native American.

The difficulty is how do you classify, say, someone whose ancestors were here before 1600, but who seems ethnically European? There have been remains found that date as prehistoric but which appear to be caucasian, and they may have left descendants. How also would you distinguish those people from the descendants of lost colonies of settlers? Are they settlers if they came within our recorded history and NA if they came in prehistory? And how do you know which is which?

[gilmore]

Native Americans, or 'Indians', are not one ethnic group, but many. Early photos show a huge range of skin colour and facial features. I was struck by old photos of the Fox tribe that appear completely caucasian. You don't hear about that particular tribe anymore, but I assume they became assimilated, because they looked like us. It's apparent that Native Americans came to America from more than one place, but if they were here before European settlers then they are Native American.

The difficulty is how do you classify, say, someone whose ancestors were here before 1600, but who seems ethnically European? There have been remains found that date as prehistoric but which appear to be caucasian, and they may have left descendants. How also would you distinguish those people from the descendants of lost colonies of settlers? Are they settlers if they came within our recorded history and NA if they came in prehistory? And how do you know which is which?

Simple. DNA. Physical characteristics may be misleading, and one's family may have been lying about their ancestry for generations, but Y chromosome DNA, mitochondrial DNA and autosomal DNA neither mislead nor lie. In fact the results of testing them are quite straightforawrd.

As was mentioned above, genetic testing of the group in question shows less than 10% native American ancestry, with the vast majority of their ancestors having come from Europe and Africa.