Meagher/Maher/Mahar Surname DNA Tests Page

The Family Tree DNA table for this surname project is automatically updated with the latest test results. For more discussion of our results, see the comparison section that is a bit farther down on this page.

Ancestral homeland

Our project results may eventually provide hints for Meaghers/Mahers/Mahars still searching for clues about their geographical roots. Some of us may feel confident only in stating that our ancestor came from Ireland. The next step might be to try to determine the county of origin. On the map of Ireland to the right, the red area in the northeast corner of County Tipperary is the barony of Ikerrin, the ancestral homeland of the O'Meagher clan. Eight counties share a border with Tipperary. The two counties adjacent to Ikerrin are Offaly (formerly Kings) on the north and Laois (formerly Queens) on the northeast. The other neighboring counties: Kilkenny on the east; Waterford on the southeast, bordering along the River Suir; Cork and Limerick on the southwest and west; and Clare and Galway on the northwest, across the River Shannon. According to Hayes¹, “The mass emigrations of the 19th and 20th centuries and modern mobility have greatly widened the diaspora of the Meaghers and Mahers. Despite that, the descendants of the Ikerrin clan are still most numerous in Tipperary, where some 50 per cent of the 8,000 who bear the name in Ireland live.” Hayes proposes that the older Meagher spelling was more often retained by “descendants of members of the clan who settled outside the O Meagher tuath of Ikerrin before the Cromwellian confiscations.”

Reference

1. Hayes, William J., “O Meagher, Meagher and Maher — and their dispersal in Tipperary,” Tipperary Historical Journal 1993, pp. 160-166. An extensive extract from the Hayes article appears at the rootsweb Maher surname site.

Comparison with various haplotypes

This table lists our results in the same order as they appear in the Family Tree DNA table. There will be some delay before the latest results appear below. Also, only the first 37 markers appear in this first table. You can scroll down a bit to see a separate table with the remaining markers. (Four of our project members have upgraded beyond 37.) In either table, a blue link on the ancestral name takes you to a separate page with details and links to more information about origin, etc.

Our first fourteen results are in haplogroup R1b while the last three are in haplogroups I1 and I2. See the Family Tree DNA table for confirmed (#3, #4, #6, #16 and #17) and predicted haplogroups. At ysearch.org there are modal haplotypes for various haplogroups. These modal values are reproduced here for our first two haplogroups. A color box in our results indicates a match with the modal haplotype. Conversely, a white box indicates a mismatch with the modal value. In most cases the mismatch is only one step from the modal value. A two-step (or more) mismatch is signified by red-on-white. You can determine the genetic distance from the modal haplotype simply by counting the number of white boxes, counting red-on-white extra (but counting 389-1 and 389-2 only once).

Of the first fourteen results, the ones that are R1b, ten either match or are within one step (i.e., 25 vs. 24) of the Atlantic Modal Haplotype (AMH) as defined by Wilson et al.⁴ (only six markers were used in that paper). Being within one step, these ten results would fall under the Wilson et al. 1.15⁺ grouping, which is the same grouping labeled AMH+1 in Capelli et al.¹ Similarly, the two I1 results would fall under the 2.47⁺ grouping in those two papers.

For comparison and contrast with our results, the last line in the table is the haplotype specified at ysearch.org for “Niall of the Nine Hostages,” which has been in the news recently. Most of our results appear to be far removed from the descendants of Niall. There may be a closer connection with Niall for #5, #6 and #12.

Three of our members (#3, #4 and #6) have obtained Deep Clade-R test results. Both #3 and #4, and possibly also #6, are negative for M222, thus ruling out a Niall connection. All are positive for P312 (the branch labeled R1b1b2a1b). Additionally, #3 and #6 are positive for L21 (the branch labeled R1b1b2a1b5, which is immediately upstream from M222). Whether #4 is also positive for L21 is currently unknown, since that test was not available until late last year. To the extent that there is a connection between our R1b members, we might expect that most would be positive for L21.

*There are interesting R1b trends for two of our markers. We have more 25's than 24's at DYS390. DYS390 is the only marker where our “Meagher R1b modal” seems to be diverging from the general R1b modal. DYS390 and DYS439 are among 17 markers studied in a series of papers published by the group at Trinity College, Dublin. They report (in 2005) that, of their 17 markers, the most variable are DYS390 and DYS439. Contrary to TCD's general trend for Irish surnames, and contrary to FTDNA's red highlighting, our DYS439 is—so far—very stable.

In our very limited sample, the proportion of R1b (14 out of 17) is about the same as what Hill et al.² found for Ireland as a whole, but slightly lower than the rate they found for Gaelic surnames in Munster, i.e., surnames like ours.

Figure 1C of Rootsi et al.³ shows the geographic frequency distribution of I1 (formerly known as I1a), particularly the concentration around the Scandinavian Peninsula. It is often assumed that I1 arrived in the British Isles during the Viking invasions. There may be other explanations related to earlier migrations, conceivably before adoption of the O'Meagher surname. Nordtvedt suggests an Anglo-Saxon origin for haplotypes close to our #16. Rootsi et al. state that France could be the source region of the early spread of I1. More and up-to-date information can be found at the wiki site for the I haplogroup.

References

The first three can be downloaded from the “Library” link on the main page for the Family Tree DNA web site.

1. Capelli, Cristian, N. Redhead, J. K. Abernethy, F. Gratrix, J. F. Wilson, T. Moen, T. Hervig, M. Richards, M. P. H. Stumpf, P. A. Underhill, P. Bradshaw, A. Shaha, M. G. Thomas, N. Bradman and D. B. Goldstein, “A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles,” Current Biology, 13 (27 May 2003), pp. 979-984
2. Hill, Emmeline W., M. A. Jobling and D. G. Bradley, “Y-chromosome variation and Irish origins,” Nature, 404 (23 March 2000), pp. 351-352. This paper predates the current, standardized nomenclature system. Their Hg 1 is mostly Hg R1b, and their Hg 2 is mostly Hg I.
3. Rootsi, Siiri, C. Magri, et al., “Phylogeography of Y-Chromosome Haplogroup I Reveals Distinct Domains of Prehistoric Gene Flow in Europe,” Am. J. Hum. Genet., 75 (2004), pp. 128-137.
4. Wilson, James F., D. A. Weiss, M. Richards, M. G. Thomas, N. Bradman, and D. B. Goldstein, “Genetic evidence for different male and female roles during cultural transitions in the British Isles,” Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 98 (Issue 9, 24 April 2001), pp. 5078-5083.

Should you take the 12-marker or the 25-marker test? Maybe 37 or more markers?

If you start with the 12-marker test, you can of course always upgrade to 25, or more, markers at a later date. Odds are that your 12-marker results will come close to matching the R1b haplotype. You may come close to matching, or even match other R1b's in our project, and you will probably exactly match several R1b's outside of our project. Going to 25-markers would reduce the number of potential matches, and would help identify any common patterns in our results. If you are not R1b, the 12-marker test will likely be enough to establish that. In that case, your results will probably look something like the I1 haplotype, and unlike the R1b group, you will have a smaller number of potential matches. Yet an advantage in going to 25 markers would be inclusion of the DYS455 marker. According to Athey¹, a marker value of 8 for DYS455 is, “fairly convincingly diagnostic” for the I1 haplogroup.

Four of our project members have upgraded beyond 37 markers. Those results are shown in the following table. So far, no obvious trends have emerged

Reference

1. Athey, T. Whit, “Haplogroup Prediction from Y-STR values Using an Allele-Frequency Approach,” Journal of Genetic Genealogy, first issue.

Contact Information

		(My mother's mother was Irene Meagher.)
	5700 N. Paseo Niquel Tucson, AZ 85718-3924

About my own YDNA test results.