National Geographic’s Genographic Project is a five-year study that used Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA to chart human migrations from African; through Europe and Asia to the establishment of the “genetically homogenous communities” of the present day.  This was done by the study of genetic markers in DNA which are organized into groups of similar genetic mutations called “haplo-groups.”  By studying these haplo-groups, the Genographic Project was able to trace what might be thought of as “tribes” of genetically related peoples as they migrated from one place to another over a span of some 50,000 years.

Most of us are genetic mutts, carrying DNA from all over Europe if not all over the world.  Some DNA markers though do not change - or change very slowly over tens of generations.  Specifically a mother’s maternal DNA (mitochondrial) and a father’s paternal DNA (Y-chromosome).  With the recent advent of affordable DNA testing, family genealogists – and unfortunately for-profit genealogical research companies – recognized a new opportunity to connect lost relatives.  The Y-chromosome is passed from father to son remaining essentially unchanged with changes or mutations occurring rarely over many, many generations.  In this way when combined with a surname, Y-DNA testing can be used to confirm relationships between males.  And so began surname specific Y-DNA studies.  Through DNA research we have one very reliable method to confirm our relationship to other Deans.  Literally the Deen Gene.  Before reading on, if you’d like to learn more about DNA testing please visit http://www.familytreedna.com. 

There are Surname Y-DNA studies for many families including of course the Deans.  This Dean study includes surnames Deen, Dene, Deane, Dien, Denning, Denny, Dane, Dayne, Dunn - and many other spellings.  This broad reach is important because as we know the standardized spelling of surnames is a recent phenomena.  During his lifetime Benjamin Deen’s name was variously recorded as Dane, Dunn, and Dean, no doubt due to the combination of his accent, his handwriting and the general lack of literacy at the time. 

Although Benjamin had five sons, we have limited information on the male descendants of sons James, Enoch and John.  None of those lines are recorded beyond the 19th century, which means our only Deen surname relatives are descended solely from Samuel and Enos. In other words there aren’t many of us out there. Over the last few years three direct male descendants of Samuel and Enos, and therefore Benjamin, have taken Y-chromosome DNA tests and participated in three DNA studies - the Dean and Denning surname studies as well as a general Irish Y-DNA study. 

Results from our tests revealed first that we are in fact related to each other.  Despite being seven generations removed our Y chromosomes match.  It also revealed that we belong to what is know as Haplogroup  I.  A haplogroup is  literally and simply a group of people who share a common genetic origin. Haplogroup I people left the Middle East approximately 27,000 years ago and founded what is known as the Gravettian culture.  These are the ancient people who carved the small stone Venus sculptures that have been unearthed in France, Germany and Czechoslovakia.  Haplogroup I represents approximately 20% of the European population and is known as the Viking haplogroup because of its predominance in Scandinavian countries.

Haplogroups can be further broken down into subgroups or “clades” which are defined as “a group of organisms classified together on the basis of homologous features traced to a common ancestor.”   These features may be thin noses, or eye and hair color, etc. We are part of a clade I1a, a group which spent the last Ice Age on the Iberian peninsula and later populated north western Europe aka Scandinavia.  As you can imagine this clade was for a long time found primarily among Norwegians, Swedes, Finns, Danes and through conquest and invasion, the Germanic Anglo-Saxons and the Jutes of England, Scotland, Ireland and the Netherlands.

Each clade is further broken down into “modal haplotypes” or “demes” - that is - "a group of related organisms living in a single location.”  Which is to say that if the members of a clade share a common ancestor, the members of a deme share a common ancestor and a common location for an extended period of time.  A deme is also described as a stable population implying a great degree of interbreeding.  The I1a clade breaks down into six Anglo-Saxon demes (the most common),  six Norse demes,  three Norse-Bothnian demes, and three Ultra-Norse demes.

Our male line is descended from the deme I1a-uN1, also called the I1a Ultra-Nordic Type 1.  This deme is most common in Norway and Denmark.  All of this means is that our earliest male ancestor was of Scandinavian origin, and probably part of the Norse expansion into the English Isles.  This common male ancestor lived before there were surnames, between 12 and as much as 40 generations ago. 

Surname Y-DNA tests tell us about lineage, specifically if males are related to each other.  The tested members of our family from the lines of Benjamin’s sons - with seven generations separating the living descendants in the two lines - confirmed our common ancestor, with no mutations over 37 markers (Y-DNA tests typically cover 12, 25 and 37 markers but can be up to 67 markers).

Are we related to other people who spell there names Deen or Dean?  Unfortunately as of this writing we do not share a single common male ancestor with any other Dean men taking part in the Y-DNA surname studies.  While I wrote that there were four distinct Dene families at the time of the writing of the Domesday book in 1085, genetic testing has revealed over 27 distinct and unrelated Dean surname families.  None of these share a common male ancestor with us and most are not even within the same Haplogroup. In fact our closest Y-chomosome genetic relatives have Scottish and Scots-Irish surnames, and none of them Dean.

At the same time we have to understand that there is a lot that Y-DNA testing doesn’t tell us.  As I mentioned Y-DNA tracks only the direct male line.  This means only one of the two parents, and only one of four grandparents, and only one of eight great-grandparents and so on.  So while DNA can tell me a lot about my male Deen relatives, it tells me nothing about my Robinson, Hite or Carbuhn grandparents; or my Clark, or Burmeister great-grandparents, or my Pitt, Wayne, Lenz and Hartz great-great grandparents.  This is a funny point because as Fordice descendants we have a traceable connection to Ulric de Dene, just not his surname.

The phenomena of our actual genetic make-up is unique to each nuclear family.  There is a lot of genetic diversity even between cousins.  To really learn about our genetic make-up we each would have to take a DNA Admixture test, which would reveal something different for each generation, and different for the parents and for their children.

CONCLUSIONS

The homogenization of disparate place names and names referring to tribal or regional origin suggests that the Dean surname - in any of its forms - never referred to one specific people let alone one specific family.

Oral tradition in our family states that we're of Scotch-Irish descent, and while I don’t believe we're related to the Deanes of the Ulster Plantation, or the Deans of the famous 14 Tribes of Galway, it is possible that we’re Scotch-Irish on the male side through a more circuitous route. We're certainly Scottish through our Fordice grandparents and Scots-Irish through Lucretia Deen. Even though our peculiar spelling of the name - Deen - is common in the south of Ireland, in Counties Kerry and Kilkenny, how our Deens got there from Scandanavia is not known.

This said, many Scottish and Irish dialects pronounce both Deen and Denn as Dane. The various spellings of Den, Denn, Deen and Denne all have a similar pronunciations. This may explain why in 1776, Benjamin Deen's quartermaster wrote his name as Dane. Is it what he heard from Benjamin's Irish accent?  So it's possible we simply descended from a Dane (Norwegian) whose name was anglicized to Dene or Denn.

Can we ever know for sure? We have no records of Benjamin before he came to America. Our only record of his arrival is an interview with his grandson Eli who related that Benjamin arrived as a boy aboard an English ship as an indentured servant.  At some point we hope to find a record of his arrival in Peter Coldham’s The Complete Book of Emigrants in Bondage, 1614-1775.  It’s a difficult book to find, but is carried in the Library of Congress.

BEYOND GENES

The story of a family is not just about a surname, and certainly not a single line of DNA.  This family was made up of individuals who join together, who make decisions and live their lives, sometimes under extraordinary conditions.  We have such stories in our family, because we’re descended from a very hearty, adventurous group of individuals.  People who in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries made the decision to hazard a voyage, who then choose to brave the frontiers and cultivate raw lands.  People who developed a bond so strong that they traveled together by wagon train, and settled the Ohio Territory, then Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, Idaho, Nebraska - and who didn’t stop until they had faced the Pacific Ocean along California, Washington and Oregon.

This story is not just about the Deens and Deans, but also Fordices, Wests, Normans, Graggs, Andrews, Dimmicks and many others.

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