Ovum Act 5 Option B Hallstat C culture. Eastern Alps, Europe 800 BCE

Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

My 105 times great-grandmother in 800 BCE. Hallstatt C culture, in the Eastern Alps (Austria ). As visualised by Google Gemini AI.

The Salt Kingdoms: From Bronze to Iron

These people descended from earlier Central European lineages—the Corded Ware and Únětice cultures—which evolved through the Tumulus and Urnfield traditions before crystallising into the early phases of the Hallstatt. The Hallstatt economy was bolstered by a sophisticated prehistoric salt-mining industry and the expansive trade networks it triggered. The creamy, translucent mineral salt they produced has been preserved deep within the Alpine peaks for millennia, serving as both a vital preservative and a high-value currency.

As the Urnfield period gave way to the Hallstatt culture around 800 BCE, this salt-driven wealth sparked a social revolution. The "Hallstatt phenomenon" was not merely a change in pottery style, but the birth of a new, ostentatious aristocracy. Control over the salt mines allowed local chieftains to trade with the Mediterranean world, swapping Alpine minerals for Greek pottery, Etruscan bronze, and silken finery. This influx of luxury goods transformed the social landscape, shifting the focus from communal Urnfield burials to the monumental "princely" mounds that define the Hallstatt period.

The phenomenon was also defined by a technological leap: the mastery of iron. While the earlier Unetice and Urnfield cultures were masters of bronze, the Hallstatt elite were among the first in Central Europe to wield long, heavy iron swords. These weapons, along with the iconic four-wheeled wagons found in their tombs, suggest a society geared toward status, ritual, and territorial control. It was a culture of "conspicuous consumption," where wealth was not just hoarded, but displayed in life and buried in death.

Yet, even as these iron-wielding elites built their hillforts and established their trade routes, the underlying genetic story remained one of slow, steady continuity. The grand political shifts from the Bronze Age to the Iron Age were like waves on the surface of a deep ocean; beneath them, the maternal lineages—the mtDNA—remained anchored to the land. The "Hallstatt Celt" may have been a new cultural mask, but the faces behind it were the descendants of the same salt-miners and farmers who had walked those Alpine valleys for generations.


The Matriarch of the Salt Mines: A Hallstatt Lineage

I have chosen to envision my Hallstatt and La Tène female ancestors not merely as witnesses to history, but as high-status participants within it. This perspective provides a compelling explanation for the later dispersal of their genetic signature as far afield as the British Isles. Here, I trace the journey of my 105th great-grandmother—a high-ranking member of the Hallstatt C community, a society built upon the glittering wealth of the Alpine salt trade.

I propose that it was within this influential region, or its immediate spheres of interest, that the mtDNA haplogroup H6a1a mutated into the specific subclade H6a1a8. The Hallstatt culture, with its vast networks of prestige and power, was perfectly positioned in both time and space to act as a catalyst for this distribution. This was a world of "white gold" and "black metal"—salt and iron—the twin engines of an economic revolution that demanded constant movement and connectivity.

Through the mechanism of elite marriage alliances and the protection of trade corridors, this maternal thread was pulled across the continent. It travelled West to the tin-rich coasts of Britain and Ireland, South-East into the Hungarian plains, and North toward the Baltic and Finland. While the men may have fought for territory, it was the women—moving between hillforts and salt-halls to cement tribal bonds—who carried the H6a1a8 lineage into the fabric of the European fringe. In this light, salt and iron were more than just commodities; they were the impetus for a genetic legacy that survives to this day.


The Celtic Paradox: Blood, Art, and Identity

The Hallstatt culture is frequently heralded as the grand flowering of the early Celts. Yet, this raises a fundamental question: what, exactly, is a Celt? Is "Celticity" defined by a specific school of art, a shared linguistic root, or a distinct biological population?

While countless volumes romanticise the Hallstatt and La Tène periods as a "Golden Age," many scholars now wonder if this identity is a relatively modern invention—a product of 18th-century romantic patriotism. Genetically, there is little evidence of a singular "Celtic" ethnic group. Instead, we see a mosaic of populations emerging from the crucible of Bronze Age Europe. These peoples were a complex fusion of much older lineages: the Steppe pastoralists (Yamnaya), European Neolithic farmers, and Western Hunter-Gatherers.

Some purists distance themselves from the Alpine Hallstatt origins, preferring to seek the "true" Celtic spirit in the "Insular" traditions of the Atlantic fringe. They look to the rugged coasts of Ireland, the Scottish Highlands, Wales, Cornwall, and Brittany—the lands where La Tène art and Brythonic or Goidelic languages took their final stand against the Roman tide. Others argue a more pragmatic view: that Western Europeans are simply a varied mixture of those three ancient ancestral foundations, regardless of the labels we fix to them.

However, a different perspective emerges through the study of mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA). While archaeologists define cultures by the silent remains of pottery, jewellery, and earthworks, mtDNA whispers a story of biological persistence. These modern categories are often rigid, yet the maternal line slips effortlessly across the artificial barriers of "culture" and "era." Even in times of migration, conquest, and societal collapse, the women remained. They are the unbroken thread, weaving the disparate patches of our history into a single, enduring fabric.

Source ©  OpenStreetMaps Modified by myself.

GO TO NEXT ACT OPTION B - Earlier Iron Age South East Britain. 550 BCE


Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

Odyssey of Y Act 11 The Western Front. John Henry Brooker. 1916 CE

Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

John Henry Brooker on the Western Front. Based on his military service record, an existing photo and family traits. Visualised by Google Gemini.

The Genetic Ghost: An Ancient Odyssey

My paternal lineage carries a rare genetic ghost within its Y chromosome—Haplogroup L-FGC51036. This signature survived the winds of prehistory in the Zagros region of Southwest Asia before being swept westwards toward the Levant. By the close of the medieval period, it surfaced in the English counties of Hampshire and Berkshire.

How did it arrive? Perhaps it was carried to the port of Southampton by a Venetian galley. By 1746, the lineage officially entered the records of my surname line, represented by a copyhold tenant of a North Berkshire manor. This Asian lineage, rooted for centuries in English soil, eventually transitioned from the rural fields of Oxfordshire to the urban bustle of London, and finally to the mud of the Western Front.

From Soil to City: The Brooker Roots

The story of the "Man of Mystery," my great-grandfather John Henry Brooker, begins with a break from the past. During the 19th century, his father, Henry Brooker Sr., grew up on Oxfordshire farms as a poor labourer. Henry eventually turned his back on the rural poverty that had plagued his ancestors since they were made landless by the Enclosure Acts.

Seeking a new life, Henry arrived in the East End of London. He brought with him a countryman’s mastery of horsemanship, finding work as a carman—a carter driving horse and cart to move goods. Records show he briefly served as a coachman, swapping cargo for passengers, before ending his career as a storeman for a haulage business.

The Scholar and the Soldier

Henry’s skills were passed to his son, John Henry, but the boy was destined for more than the driver’s seat. Moving further east to Deptford and Lewisham, John Henry excelled in school. By 1901, his academic prowess earned him an appointment as a pupil-teacher, a role that usually led to a professional teaching career.

However, the Royal Field Artillery (RFA) barracks at Woolwich were near his neighborhood. Whether drawn by the draught-horse craft of his father or his own mathematical aptitude, John Henry traded the classroom for the gun carriage. In 1906, while serving as a Gunner in the 65th Battery RFA, he married Faith Eliza Baxter, a Norfolk maid working in London.

A Marriage in the Shadows

The marriage was short-lived and shadowed by tragedy. Faith had recently given birth to a daughter; John Henry, raised in the strictures of Edwardian working-class morality, likely married her to "do the right thing." It was a misguided judgment that would haunt him.

Family lore, told from Faith’s perspective, whispered of an assault in Ireland. However, DNA matching has provided a clearer, if more complex, picture. I share genetic segments with numerous descendants of Henry Brooker, confirming John Henry was indeed the biological father of my grandfather, born in 1908. While Faith—whose parents were born in the Gressenhall Union workhouse—lived by a different, perhaps survivalist moral standard, John Henry remained a man of quiet virtue, deeply concerned with his reputation. The two were fundamentally incompatible.

The "Twelve-Year Man": War and Survival

To trace John Henry’s military life is to follow the trajectory of the British Army itself, moving from the polished professional ranks of the "Old Contemptibles" to the industrial carnage of the Great War.

The Professional Prelude (1911–1914)

By 1911, John was a seasoned specialist stationed in Ireland. At the Kildare Curragh, he mastered the 18-pounder quick-firing gun. By the outbreak of war, he was a Corporal—a man of muscle and mathematics capable of directing lethal fire with precision.

The Baptism of Fire (1914–1917)

  • Mons & Le Cateau: Landing at Le Havre on August 16, 1914, John was thrust into the retreat from Mons. At Le Cateau, his battery stood their ground against overwhelming odds to cover the infantry.

  • The Great Attrition: He endured the first gas attacks at the Second Battle of Ypres (1915) and the horror of The Somme (1916). Here, his mathematical mind was vital for the "creeping barrage," a wall of fire that required absolute synchronization.

  • The Italian Front: In late 1917, he was dispatched to the River Piave to bolster Italian forces after the disaster at Caporetto.

The Final Act (1918–Post-War)

John returned to France to stall the 1918 German Spring Offensive. By then, his administrative aptitude had likely moved him into "Battery Office" roles. This logistical experience became his bridge to civilian life, securing him a post-war position as an Admiralty Clerk.

A Legacy Reclaimed

A portrait, as visualised by Google Gemini, based on the only surviving photo taken of John Henry Brooker in 1933.

The war left its marks—the likely hearing loss of a career gunner and the psychological weight of four years of bombardment. Following the period working for the Admiralty as a clerk at Whitehall SW, John Henry eventually settled in Sidcup, Kent, working as a clerk for Post Office Transport. In 1945, on reaching retirement, he was a higher clerical officer, responsible for transportation, as the Post Office were building up their national telephone network.

Though long estranged from my branch of the family, he built a stable life with Mabel Tanner. In his final years during the 1950s, he traveled back to Norfolk to visit his son, Reginald, and his grandchildren. He is no longer the "Man of Mystery" or the young gunner in a broken marriage, but a survivor of the most technologically demanding era in human history—the living vessel for a "genetic ghost" that had traveled from the Zagros Mountains to the quiet suburbs of Kent.


GO TO NEXT ACT - The Finale. Summary of this time travel across a timeline of a Y-DNA patrilineage.


Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

Odyssey of Y Act 7 Baalat Gebal, Byblos 64 CE

Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

The Guardian of the Lady’s Ledger: 64 BCE

The air in the inner sanctum of the Temple of Baalat Gebal is heavy with the scent of age-old incense and the sharp, resinous tang of fresh cedar. Outside, the Mediterranean sun beats down on the harbor of Byblos, but here, behind thick limestone walls, it is cool and quiet.

The Treasurer sits at a heavy table of polished cedar. He is a man of precise movements and quiet authority. He does not wear the armor of the Roman legions now marching through the streets, nor the tattered silks of the dying Seleucid court. He wears the fine, pleated linen of a high-ranking Phoenician administrator, secured with a signet ring of carnelian that has been in his family for generations.

He could be the carrier of my L-FGC51036 line—a lineage that has always thrived in the spaces between empires. His ancestors were the Hurrians who followed the gods of the mountains to the sea; he is the result of their survival. He is a man of two worlds: he speaks the local Phoenician tongue of his neighbors, the Greek of the educated elite, and is already learning the harsh, rhythmic Latin of the newcomers.

Physical Description and Presence

  • The Face of the Levant: He possesses the features of a true Levantine crossroads—deep-set, observant eyes that have calculated the weight of a thousand silver shekels, and a neatly trimmed beard in the Phoenician style. His hands are calloused not from the sword, but from years of handling clay tablets, papyrus scrolls, and the rough bark of the timber that built the world.

  • The Weight of Office: He is the man who oversees the "Lady’s" wealth—the vast stores of grain, the jars of precious oil, and most importantly, the timber contracts.

  • The Negotiator: As he looks up from his ledgers, his expression is one of calm calculation. He is currently watching the transfer of power to Rome not with fear, but as a logistical challenge. To him, the Roman General Pompey is simply a new, formidable "customer" for the Temple's cedar.

Source ©  OpenStreetMaps Modified by myself.

His Mission at the Gateway

In this moment of 64 BCE, he is the anchor of our lineage. As the Seleucid Empire collapses into anarchy, he ensures that the Temple—and by extension, his family’s status—remains indispensable. He is currently overseeing a massive shipment of cedar beams destined for the Roman shipyards, ensuring the paperwork is flawless so that when the Roman tax collectors arrive, the Temple's ancient privileges remain untouched.

He is the "Ghost" made manifest: a rare genetic signature that has survived by being smarter, more organized, and more essential than the warriors who fight over the soil above him. He represents the moment my DNA became woven into the very administrative fabric of the Roman Mediterranean.

The temple Balaat Gebal in 64 BCE as visualised by Google Gemini AI.

And so, my ghost yDNA lineage has settled along the Levantine coast. There it may stay for centuries. A rare variant inherited from Ice Age ibex hunters of the Zagros. Ancient survivor.

Which Act Next?

Here, you have a choice in hypotheses. You may follow the early route to Britain via the Roman Empire (Option A), or

You may follow the late route to Britain via Late Medieval Venetian Galleys (Option B).

GO TO EARLY ROUTE OPTION A - Act Severan Roman bureaucrat in Londinium. 220 CE.

or

GO TO LATE ROUTE  OPTION B - Act Late Medieval Venetian Galley Merchant, Southampton. 1490 CE


Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

Odyssey of Y Act 2 Zarzian culture. Zagros. 13,000 BCE

Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

The Zarzian Return: 18,000 BCE I visualize the Zarzian hunter-gatherers of the Zagros and ask: is this my great-grandfather?

The unbearably harsh conditions of the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) once drove the Baradostian Ice Age hunters out of these mountains and into lower-altitude refuges. However, after 20,000 years ago, the climate began to stabilize, permitting a slow return to the Zagros valleys. Unlike many other groups of the era, my paternal ancestors do not appear to have traveled far; they remained rooted in the Zagros or South Caucasus region for an immense span of time. I would conjecture that they return to the same valleys:

13,000 years ago. Zagros Mountains and valleys (now in Iran) South West Asia

The Zagros and South Caucasus mountains (now in Iran), South West Asia. © OpenStreetMap contributors".

The Zarzian Way: A Prelude to Farming The Zarzian culture was the eastern equivalent of the Epipalaeolithic Natufians in the western Fertile Crescent. While their Baradostian predecessors had sustained themselves primarily by hunting caprines—wild goats and sheep—life after the Last Glacial Maximum shifted toward a broader strategy.

Post-glacial humans enjoyed a far greater diversity of food. Their diet expanded beyond the ibex and mouflon to include onagers, gazelles, crustaceans, fish, birds, and—as visualized above—tortoises. They also gathered a wide array of wild plants, including legumes, nuts, and grass seeds. Evidence of grinding stones suggests they were processing these into porridges or primitive flatbreads.

This period likely represented a critical, early stage in the journey toward agriculture. Accidental selection processes were already in motion. By gathering seeds from plants with firmer rachises (the stem holding the grain), they were unconsciously initiating the shift toward domestication. A similar, unintended process was occurring with their prey. By managing their herds—selecting specific animals to hunt while preserving others—they began the long transition toward animal husbandry. They weren't intentionally trying to "invent" farming; rather, it was nature at work, forging new, symbiotic relationships between humans and the species around them.

Their tools evolved alongside their diet. While the Baradostians excelled at manufacturing burins and regular blades, the Zarzians pushed flint technology further, creating even smaller, geometric microliths designed for complex, composite tools.

GO TO NEXT ACT - Aceramic Neolithic 7,500 BCE


Back to the Future: Time Travel and Haplogroup Index

DNA-4-Ancestry Test Comparison. Reviewing the DNA Companies. Updated to 2024


Comparing results from actual recorded ancestry, to that predicted by Ancestry.com, 23andme, My Heritage, Living DNA, FT-DNA and more.

Recorded Ancestry

I have researched my genealogy for circa forty years on and off. Since back in the day of interviews, visits to church yards, county archives, and London based archives. Before any internet genealogy, never mind genetic genealogy. Is it perfect? Of course not. I have a family tree of 6,000 family members. I've forgotten how many direct ancestors but certainly well over 300. Stretching back to the 16th century (1500s) in a number of places. The majority (thankfully) is very local to myself. Ancestry reports that I have based it on 19,600 records. I have certainly referenced my resources, and do not restrict them to the Internet. I still sometimes visit archives, etc.

Genetic Genealogy by DNA matches at Ancestry.co.uk, 23andme, Living DNA, FT-DNA and MyHeritage support the recorded tree very well over the past several generations on all sides. Plenty of support from centimorgans of shared DNA with other testers.

I base my Recorded Ancestry percentages on Generation 6. That is my great great great grandparents.

97% were English
Most East Anglian Norfolk, with some East Midlands and the Oxfordshire area.
3% Swiss.

No others. No Irish, Scottish, Scandinavians, Italians, Greeks, French, Turkmen, Balochi, etc.

So what did the DNA companies tell me?

Results

Ancestry.com/co.uk did very well only if you take the England & NW Europe category to be 'English'. They've been quite thoughtful in generating this category. Because the problem with the SE English is that we are too close to Dutch, Norman, and Danish to tell apart. This is because we have long, deep roots in those regions. The sub regions of their genetic communities is very good. But the community of E India might be down to having a tested family member with paternal roots in Sri Lanka? Maybe not.

My Heritage does very well. Although they have little bias towards Ashkenazi and SW Asia that just shows up. Still, not bad, they have improved.

Living DNA, an English business. Dear oh dear, what goes on there? They have even assigned my yDNA to the entirely wrong haplogroup!

FT-DNA, no better. Despite being the premier business for testing haplogroups, their autosomal test lets them down

23andme? Wtf. I know their problem. I'm convinced that their 'British & Irish' dataset is full of Irish or Irish American? It does not understand SE English DNA, and splits us with Continental datasets. As for their sub regions, I suspect based on dodgy DNA from health companies, collected from modern postcodes. That would explain that it shows where East Anglian ancestry has moved to over the past few centuries, not where it came from.

WeGene is convinced that I am French. Non.

They are all to various extents confused by medieval migration. Because with so much East Anglian ancestry, I have links across the North West European Continent from the earlier medieval. The East Anglians are probably very like Frisians etc. Our DNA is all so similar that these tests cannot tell us apart.

Well the tests were ALL very good for assigning my ancestry as a European. And pretty good at seeing it as primarily NW European. That's good. BUT, below that level, none of these tests could be described as accurate.

Fanboys of these tests beware.


The above is a fan chart of my direct ancestry, that I made in 2018. The coloured areas are supported by DNA matching (genetic genealogy) although I have had volumes of additional matches since then.

Attleborough Ancestors

St Mary's, parish church of Attleborough, Norfolk.

Whites Directory of Norfolk, 1854, reported that:

"ATTLEBOROUGH, or Attleburgh, is an ancient market town, pleasantly situated on the Norwich and Thetford turnpike, 15 miles S.W. of the former place, and 14 N.E. by E. of the latter, and on the north side of the Norfolk Railway, which has a neat station here. In the Saxon era it was the seat of Offa and Edmund, successively Kings of the East Angles, who fortified it against the predatory incursions of the Danes. These fortifications may still be traced in the ridge called Burn Bank. It was afterwards the seat of the Mortimers, whose ancient hall, (now a farm house,) is encompassed by a deep moat. The parish contains 501 houses, 2,324 inhabitants, and 5,247 acres of land. The Rev. Sir Wm. B. Smyth, Bart., is lord of the manor of Attleborough Mortimer, and its members, (fines arbitrary ;) and Mr. C. Cochell is the steward. S. T. Dawson, Esq., is lord of Chanticlere manor, (fines arbitrary,) and the rectory has two small manors, subject to a fine of 2s. per acre on land, and to arbitrary fines on the buildings. The town is comprised chiefly of one long street, with several good inns and shops ; and the market on Thursdays is well attended. The old market cross was taken down many years ago. Fairs are held on the Thursday before Easter, Whit-Sunday, and on Aug. 15th, for cattle, pedlery, &c. A pleasure fair is also held on the day before the March assizes. A stone pillar on the Wymondham road commemorates the gift of £200, by Sir E. Rich,Knt., in 1675,for the reparation of the road, which is said to be the first turnpike made in England, being formed under an Act passed in the 7th and 8th of William and Mary..."

It was also home to many of our family ancestors - with a recorded family line going back to at least 1577 in this small Norfolk market town.

Here they are, first our Attleborough Ancestors on my late father's side, starting with that line going back to 1577:

My father descended from Attleborough ancestors via his mother, Doris Brooker nee Smith.  When my grandmother Doris was alive, I interviewed her several times.  She was born in 1904 in Norwich, but she remembered her father taking her on a horse and cart to Attleborough, where he visited a pub with a grapevine outside.  I realised that this was his parent's old Attleborough beerhouse, the Grapes, but my grandmother herself didn't pick up on this family history.  Since then, I've revealed a very old family history in Attleborough.  It starts as I said, with an uninterrupted line from Robert Freeman, who had three children baptised in Attlebough between 1577 and 1581.  The family may well have - most likely did have, much earlier connections to the market town - but on record, they start here, not long after parish registers were first introduced by Thomas Cromwell, following the church split with Rome.

The baptism of Ann Freeman in Attleborough, 1577, daughter of Robert Freeman.  Robert fathered at least three children at Attleborough.  He was my 11th great grandfather.

William Freeman, my 10th great grandfather, was the son of Robert Freeman, baptised at St Mary's Attleborough, in 1581.  He was to go on and father a son:

My 9th great grandfather, Robert Freeman was baptised at St Mary's, Attleborough, in 1610, the son of William Freeman.  He married an Elizabeth.

My 8th great grandfather John Freeman, the son of Robert and Elizabeth, was baptised at Attleborough in 1639.  He married Agatha, and they had two sons in Attleborough between 1674 and 1675.

My 7th great grandfather, Thomas Freeman was baptised in Attleborough in 1675.  He married Elizabeth, and they had five children between 1695 and 1707.

My 6th great grandfather, John Freeman, was baptised at Attleborough in 1699.  He married Elizabeth.

My 5th great grandfather, named after his father, John Freeman, was baptised at Attleborough in 1734.  He married Anne.

My 4th great grandmother ends the Freeman dynasty for our tree.  Elizabeth Freeman was baptised at Attleborough in 1779. In 1803 at St Mary's, she married Robert Hewitt, a farmer - but most likely, not a prosperous one.  Agriculture was changing, and many small farmers were losing their land, being squeezed into the ranks of labourers and paupers.  They had five children at Attleborough, between 1805 and 1814.  Elizabeth died age 52, leaving Robert a widower.

My 3rd great grandmother, Lydia Hewitt, was baptised at Attleborough in 1807.  She married Robert Smith at St Mary's, Attleborough, in 1827.  Robert Smith was also born in Attleborough.  He had also farmed land, but the times were changing, and the family fell on hardships.  They had six children born in Attleborough, before Lydia died age 37.

Their son, my 2nd great grandfather, Robert (Hewitt) Smith, was born in the town in 1832.  Although he started out life in poor circumstances, he for many years, ran a beerhouse (the Grapes), and builders yard in the town, along with his wife, Ann (nee Peach) whom he married at St Mary's in 1857.  In 1879, the couple made the local new headlines, when they were burgled by an armed robber:

They had six children born at Attleborough, including:

My great grandfather, Frederick Smith, born in the market-town in 1860.  Fred served an apprenticeship as a wheelwright, and moved to Norwich - ending this part of the Attleborough Ancestors story.


Other Attleborough Ancestors of my Father

My paternal grandmother had other ancestors in Attleborough:

William Hewitt, my 5th great grandfather, was born near to Attleborough, at Great Hockham, about 1742.  However, with his wife, Elizabeth, they moved into the parish of Attleborough itself.  There, they had at least seven children, born at Attleborough between 1772 and 1783.

Their son, my 4th great grandfather, Robert Hewitt, married Elizabeth Freeman, as noted above.  Ten years after Elizabeth passed away, he married again, to Ann Batterby, in Attleborough.

We have a lot of Smith ancestors from Attleborough.  John Smith a 6th great grandfather, was born circa 1700, married Maria, and was buried in Attleborough in 1776.


Their son, my 5th great grandfather also John Smith, was baptised in Attleborough in 1731.  He married Judith Dennis at Attleborough in 1771.  They had four children there between 1771 and 1778.

Their son Raphael Smith, my 4th great grandfather, was baptised at St Mary's in 1775.  He married Mary Smith (yes, also a Smith before marriage) at Attleborough in 1798.  They had seven children born in the town between 1798 and 1813.


Their son Robert Smith, my 3rd great grandfather, was baptised in Attleborough in 1807.  He was an interesting character. He married Lydia Hewitt.  I believe that they had some land to farm, that they lost.  Robert joined the ranks of the labourers, and lead them in a riot during the "Swing Riots".  His mob attacked threshing machines, the local workhouse, then the parson at St Mary's, for refusing to drop tithe taxes.  Robert threatened the parson with a mattock.  The court quoted him as saying:


Somehow, he received a lenient prison sentence in Norwich Castle Gaol, and successfully appealed for early release.  Robert and Lydia raised six children at Attleborough, before she passed away.  He then married again, to a Frances Husk.  In his fifties, they moved to Sculcoates, Yorkshire, and founded more Smith lineages there.


Another Attleborough Smith ancestor - Richard Smith, 5th great grandfather.


and his daughter, my 4th great grandmother, Mary Smith, whom married Raphael Smith.  That wraps up my father's Attleborough Ancestry.  However... I also have some on my Mother's side!


Attleborough Ancestors of my Mother

John Page, my 10th great grandfather, fathered Robert Page at Attleborough about 1630.

My 9th great grandfather Robert Page, married Agnes.  Their son:


Thomas Page, my 8th great grandfather, was baptised at St Mary's in 1664.  He had a son:


Also named Thomas Page - my 7th great grandfather, baptised in Attleborough in 1690.  He married Maria Hynds.  They moved out of the town, to Besthorpe.  The family later moved to Wymondham.

There ends my Attleborough Ancestry - at least, that on record.

23 direct ancestors between 1577 and 1860.  The association still goes on.  We are still in Norfolk not far away.  I had a sister marry in Attleborough.  I work only a few miles from the town today.

Ancestry.com Updates - Updated Previews. DNA Beta Test Results

I recently had my Ancestry.com / Ancestry.co.uk results updated in the beta test - for myself and for my family.  The new results make AncestryDNA my most accurate DNA test so far.  Here are the screenshots for the latest results for my family kits:

My results before the Update:

Following the latest 2018 update:


My sibling's new results:

My Mother's:

I've updated my spreadsheet comparing different results for myself, from different vendors in order to reflect how well that the new Ancestry test is now working for myself and my family, compared to 23andme etal;

A few more screenshots: