Stuart GouldenA fascinating project to trace Viking ancestry in the North of England is placing particular emphasis on York as a potential hotbed of important DNA links to the past.
The Vikings left a lasting legacy on our language, landscape and place-names. But did they leave any genetic trace in today’s population?
To answer this question, Dr Turi King in collaboration with Professor Mark Jobling at the University of Leicester are wishing to obtain DNA samples from men with old local surnames from the north of England. Men carrying such names are very likely to have inherited them from ancestors who lived in the area only a few generations after the Vikings settled in the region.
Surnames are passed down from fathers to sons, and in Britain, this has been going on since heritable surnames were first established some 700 years ago.
Although the majority of sampling has been completed, there is a call-out for the remaining eligible surnames with a recruitment event in York on January 21st, 2012, at the New Earswick Folk Hall, Meeting Room between 10am-12 noon. A list of eligible surnames and what is involved can be found here: www.leicestersurnamesproject.org.uk
If you carry one of these surnames, and your father’s father was born in the North of England then you may well be of Viking ancestry!
