New DNA test can determine eye and hair colour from people who lived in the Middle Ages

A team of researchers from Poland and the Netherlands have developed a system that is able to answer what the hair and eye colour is from individuals who lived over 800 years ago.

 The HIrisPlex DNA analysis system was recently recreated for modern forensic research, but the researchers have now shown that this system is sufficiently robust to successfully work on older and more degraded samples from human remains such as teeth and bones. The system looks at 24 DNA polymorphisms (naturally occurring variations) which can be used to predict eye and hair colour.

 In their article, ‘Bona fide colour: DNA prediction of human eye and hair colour from ancient and contemporary skeletal remains’, the researchers examined the remains of Polish General Wladyslaw Sikorski (1881 to 1943) confirming his blue eyes and blond hair.

Click here to read this article from Medievalists.net

Is it King Richard III? We we will know in January

The DNA and scientific testing to confirm whether or not the remains of an individual discovered in Leicester is that of England’s King Richard III will be known early in the new year, according to officials from the University of Leicester.

DNA testing, environmental sampling and radiocarbon dating are some of the tests being undertaken to determine whether the skeleton found in Leicester was once Richard III – and there are also plans to do a facial reconstruction.

Lead archaeologist Richard Buckley, of the University of Leicester’s Archaeological Services, explains “We are looking at many different lines of enquiry, the evidence from which all add up to give us more assurance about the identity of the individual. As well as the DNA testing, we have to take in all of the other pieces of evidence which tell us about the person’s lifestyle – including his health and where he grew up.

Click here to read this article from Medievalists.net

Michael Ibsen: From cabinet-maker to kingmaker

His genetic profile holds the key to what could be one of the most remarkable archaeological stories of recent times.

 Experts have, against the odds, found bones beneath a Leicester car park which fit the known details of King Richard III's death at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485.

 And Michael Ibsen, a Canadian-born cabinet-maker from Paddington in London who is a descendant of Richard III's sister Anne, admits the link makes "the hair go up on my neck".

 If the DNA of the battle-scarred skeleton with a twisted back proves to be a close enough match to that of 55-year-old Mr Ibsen, a chapter in history will have a new ending.

Click here to read this article from the BBC

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I am a Viking! DNA test reveals shock result for Leicestershire villager

Little did village heritage warden Wayne Coleman realise what a simple DNA test would reveal about his family. He had just wanted to help build up a picture of the history of his home village of Kibworth Beauchamp.

For hundreds of years the Coleman family has been part of the rural life of the community. Mr Coleman, who has done much to protect the fabric of the village, readily took the swab of the inside of his mouth and sent off the sample.

But the test result was a surprise. It shows his DNA is full-blooded, axe-wielding Norse Viking.

Click here to read this article from the Leicester Mercury

Etruscans did not become the Tuscans, study shows

The current population of Tuscany is not descended from the Etruscans, the people that lived in the region during the Bronze Age, a new Italian study has shown.

Researchers at the universities of Florence, Ferrara, Pisa, Venice and Parma discovered the genealogical discontinuity by testing samples of mitochondrial DNA from remains of Etruscans and 27 people who lived in the Middle Ages (between the 10th and 15th centuries) as well as from people living in the region today.

While there was a clear genetic link between Medieval Tuscans and the current population, the relationship between modern Tuscans and their Bronze Age ancestors could not be proven, the study showed.

"Some people have hypothesised that the most ancient DNA sequences, those from the Etruscan era, could contain errors or have been contaminated but tests conducted with new methods exclude this," said David Caramelli of Florence University and Guido Barbujani of Ferrara University.

"The most simple explanation is that the structure of the Tuscan population underwent important demographic changes in the first millennium before Christ," they said.

"Immigration and forced migration have diluted the Etruscan genetic inheritance so much as to make it difficult to recognise."

The scientific data does not necessarily mean that the Etruscans died out, the researchers said.

Teams from Florence and Ferrara universities are working to identify whether traces of the Etruscans' genetic inheritance may still exist in people living in isolated locations in the region.

The new study, Genealogical discontinuities among Etruscan, Medieval and contemporary Tuscans, is published online by the scientific journal Molecular Biology and Evolution.

The Etruscans lived mainly between the rivers Tiber and Arno in modern-day Umbria, Lazio and Tuscany, in the first millennium BC.