DNA says you’re related to a Viking, a medieval German Jew or a 1700s enslaved African? What a genetic match really means

Genealogical and genetic ancestors aren’t the same thing. A DNA match − or a lack of one − may not tell you what you imagine it does about your family tree.

By: Shai Carmi, Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Harald Ringbauer, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, The Conversation

Outlets: The Conversation

Published: April 25, 2026

Words: 1,476

Last Updated: 3 months ago

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By Shai Carmi, Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Harald Ringbauer, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology

In 2022, we reported the DNA sequences of 33 medieval people buried in a Jewish cemetery in Germany. Not long after we made the data publicly available, people started comparing their own DNA with that of the 14th-century German Jews, finding many “matches.” These medieval individuals had DNA fragments shared with thousands of people who have uploaded …

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