Wayuu Match

Whilst playing around with Gedmatch, we came across some more recent kits for Wayuu peoples of South America. Since they appear to have been in contact or at least interacted with the Taino (or the ancestors of the Taino) based on linguistic evidence, we have always wondered if any Wayuu would match Caribbean peoples with indigenous ancestry genetically. Well, we seem to have encountered one we share 6.1 cM of DNA with on a segment of our second chromosome. Assigned to "Indigenous Puerto Rico" by Ancestry, this seems to suggest the indigenous component of Puerto Rican ancestry is similar to the genetics of the Wayuu and other Arawakan speakers of this part of South America. In order to confirm our findings, however, one must thoroughly check the segment and see if any other matches can be found there for indigenous segments in Puerto Ricans and Wayuu. Of course, one must also consider the large-scale slave trade of indigenous captives from the circum-Caribbean into the Caribbean by the Spanish during the 1500s. From the limited tools of Gedmatch, the shared segment appears to be "Amerindian" if one trusts admixture chromosome painting tools. However, there is only one Wayuu sample we share at least 6 cM of DNA with. 

Indigenous Americas Update (2025)

In terms of Indigenous Americas ancestry, the algorithm used by Ancestry still inflates "Taino" ancestry in Puerto Ricans. The overall "Puerto Rico" estimate remained at 9%, but the "Bolivia & Peru" decreased slightly to a fraction of 1%. The appearance of "Central America" was the new aspect of this update. Like the case of indigenous peoples of the Andes, we assume this is capturing some of the component parts of the genetic makeup of the "Tainos." The Central America region as defined by Ancestry seems to emphasize El Salvador, Honduras, and Nicaragua and is possibly related to the "Taino" through ancient pathways or migrations from Central America into South America (or vice-versa). It would be very useful for Ancestry to tell us which indigenous groups from Central and South America they're using here.  

23andme Update for Indigenous Ancestry

A close relative from Haiti took 23andme and shared their updated results with us. The update for ancestry composition focuses on Europe and the Indigenous Americas while eschewing "Broadly" categories. In the case of our relative, who as a Haitian, only has minor indigenous origins, their assigned to the "Central Andean and Amazonian" category. This is interesting since AncestryDNA's algorithm assigned this person's indigenous ancestry to the "Indigenous Bolivia & Peru" category. Unfortunately, there are no historical matches for this person from any indigenous background and we have no paper trail for Amerindian ancestry in our Haitian lineage. Is this ancestry from the Taino of Hispaniola? If so, why no historical matches with Pre-Columbian samples? Or is this something else, perhaps from the French colonial period when indigenous people from other parts of the Americas were brought to Saint Domingue?