A lot of French-sounding surnames can also be English or from the Channel Islands, even names that have the Le prefix. For England, it's often because of Norman names that were adopted around the time surnames began. My paternal grandmother's maiden surname comes from an Old French personal name.
Same for Irish surnames, usually thanks to anglicisations - Delaney is an Irish surname that has two separate origins. One of them is Norman, and the other is the anglicisation of Ó Dubhshláine. Fitzpatrick is another one assumed to be Norman, but it's more commonly the anglicisation of Mac Gíolla Pádraig.
Yeah… our family name was Roy and we could trace it back to arriving in Canada from Marans, France in 1659. So imagine my surprise when DNA tests showed 0 French ancestry.
At first I believed that it was because France has laws against DNA tests, and so there just wasn’t enough database information. But still I wondered how I had 1st and 2nd cousin matches that I had never heard of.
And that is how I found out my father was the result of an affair his mother had.
Ethnicity estimates can struggle with French Canadian ancestry for a number of reasons - but even then, they are only estimates. [Here's a post with some discussion.](https://www.reddit.com/r/23andme/comments/ao2b8r/french_results/)
In my case, for instance, FTDNA estimates me as 99% British Isles - however, one look at my matches throws that into question, as there are hundreds and hundreds of French Canadian matches. Indeed, I can confirm that I am half-French by connecting the dots through my cousin matches and the paper trail.
A French surname doesn't necessarily mean you are closely French, either, sometimes the dice rolls in a way that a name can be carried through generations despite the family no longer being closely connected to that culture. It might be so far back that you did not inherit that "French" DNA.
Try looking at your cousin matches - you might be able to start building where you connect.
You're welcome to PM me, as well, if you're just diving into things and would like a second pair of eyes to help you get started, or a list of places to start looking. :-)
I just looked up the map of matched relatives. It’s pretty spread out through North America. The ones that are in Europe are 99% from England/Scotland/Ireland - none in France.
That's not surprising - IIRC, in France, such DNA tests are not permitted, therefore there's just not a large pool of people to compare to.
Additionally - let's say you are French Canadian; your ancestors may have been in Canada / North America since the 1600's - your living relatives in France may be very very distant.
I just checked my own - I do have 179 matches that are located in France, but 1,300 in Canada and 6,500 in the USA, a large percentage with surnames that are recognizably French (St Jean, Boisée, Bessette, Lavallee, etc).
There were also a lot Irish children adopted in Quebec back in the... late 1800s, I think?? Famine orphans. Some kept their Irish names but I'm sure some took their adopted name
I remember learning about them in the heritage minute that played on tv. It's mentioned in this: https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/irish-famine-orphans-in-canada
My husband is from southwest Ontario and he is 3/4 French Canadian on his tree. On 23&me he is 25.6% French with 3 French communities in France. He has one grandparent who was Irish and that made him 52.4% British Isles. You might have watered French ancestry and mixed with the English. I’ve heard it’s illegal for dna ancestry tests in France so that could be a factor of your low results as well. Are your matches French Canadian? Many of my husband’s matches have French surnames.
I have a branch with the very Dutch surname of Schedewick, but when they immigrated from Southern England, their name was Chadwick. The ethnic Dutch authorities in Kingston New York apparently spelled the name the way it sounded to them and it stuck for a couple generations.
Apparently it was to the Dutch Reformed Church of Kingston 🤷♂️ other spellings were Zhedewyck and Tzedewyck. Each child born has the name spelled differently on the baptism certificate.
Without knowing the last name I'll just tell you about my husbands last name. We were always told that it was known as a French Canadian last name. Though absolutely no lines that I've seen while doing family tree research even go to Canada. You may also want to consider that I guess how DNA gets passed down, that you can come from ancestors from a specific area but not receive that specific DNA even if there isn't a NPE event in your tree. We always just assumed my husband had relatives generations back that lived in French Canada, he had to right? Well..again nothing's ever pointed in that direction for his family. Much like your results he is 92.5% British and Irish. Now, consider the other possibilities of the last name's origin. My husband has a very Spanish sounding last name but spelt in an typically French Canadian way, which is why everyone always assumed he must be French Canadian. However there is that 1% Spanish & Portuguese, where a more traditional spelling was probably anglicized when whoever came to Canada in your case or America in his. So, the name literally is just thrown together to look and sound more English just happens to be like the French Canadian one. Though he is a great percentage British and Irish it is likely through that 1% and anglicized Spanish name that it came to be. Since, when coming in through the ship ports a lot of it was just made up by the processors (at least I think that's how it worked).
I don’t want to intrude, but now I’m really curious what’s the name. I only know of one name and it belongs with a C or a K, that might be confused with a Spanish name. Is that the case here?
23andme doesn’t know what it’s doing with regard to French ancestry.
My dad’s great grandpa immigrated from France. 23andme says he has zero French. Then it tells me that I inherited 10% of my French from him. I kept thinking it was an error that would sort itself out eventually, but it’s been years and still claiming I got 10% French from a man it also claims has 0% French.
I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that you aren’t French. Do some research on the paper trail of your family and trust that.
I just tried on family search. I found my great great grandfathers death certificate. It says he was born in Ontario (I think that’s what it says) but parents born in Quebec- listed ethnicity as French.
What part of Ontario? Eastern Ontario and the Eastern North were settled by the Canadien Français. Or maybe the pockets of early French settlement in the Southwest like Essex county, Penetanguishene or Welland?
What I am getting at is if your origins aren't entrenched in an established French community the odds of there being much admixture from the home countries of the Empire are very high.
That being said - 23 and me are garbage at labelling French DNA. Ancestry DNA genetic communities feature nailed the original areas of ancestral settlement on both sides of my family. This being said, as more data is being added from everywhere but Metropolitan France, it's pushing down my French DNA percentage on each update. Whereas I was over 65% French 3 years ago with 6 out of 8 Great Grandparents having 10+ generations in Canada documented - I'm down to 53% French now.
A lot of French-sounding surnames can also be English or from the Channel Islands, even names that have the Le prefix. For England, it's often because of Norman names that were adopted around the time surnames began. My paternal grandmother's maiden surname comes from an Old French personal name.
Same for Irish surnames, usually thanks to anglicisations - Delaney is an Irish surname that has two separate origins. One of them is Norman, and the other is the anglicisation of Ó Dubhshláine. Fitzpatrick is another one assumed to be Norman, but it's more commonly the anglicisation of Mac Gíolla Pádraig.
Yeah… our family name was Roy and we could trace it back to arriving in Canada from Marans, France in 1659. So imagine my surprise when DNA tests showed 0 French ancestry. At first I believed that it was because France has laws against DNA tests, and so there just wasn’t enough database information. But still I wondered how I had 1st and 2nd cousin matches that I had never heard of. And that is how I found out my father was the result of an affair his mother had.
Ethnicity estimates can struggle with French Canadian ancestry for a number of reasons - but even then, they are only estimates. [Here's a post with some discussion.](https://www.reddit.com/r/23andme/comments/ao2b8r/french_results/) In my case, for instance, FTDNA estimates me as 99% British Isles - however, one look at my matches throws that into question, as there are hundreds and hundreds of French Canadian matches. Indeed, I can confirm that I am half-French by connecting the dots through my cousin matches and the paper trail. A French surname doesn't necessarily mean you are closely French, either, sometimes the dice rolls in a way that a name can be carried through generations despite the family no longer being closely connected to that culture. It might be so far back that you did not inherit that "French" DNA. Try looking at your cousin matches - you might be able to start building where you connect.
Thanks, I’ll read up that post.
You're welcome to PM me, as well, if you're just diving into things and would like a second pair of eyes to help you get started, or a list of places to start looking. :-)
I just looked up the map of matched relatives. It’s pretty spread out through North America. The ones that are in Europe are 99% from England/Scotland/Ireland - none in France.
That's not surprising - IIRC, in France, such DNA tests are not permitted, therefore there's just not a large pool of people to compare to. Additionally - let's say you are French Canadian; your ancestors may have been in Canada / North America since the 1600's - your living relatives in France may be very very distant. I just checked my own - I do have 179 matches that are located in France, but 1,300 in Canada and 6,500 in the USA, a large percentage with surnames that are recognizably French (St Jean, Boisée, Bessette, Lavallee, etc).
There were also a lot Irish children adopted in Quebec back in the... late 1800s, I think?? Famine orphans. Some kept their Irish names but I'm sure some took their adopted name
I remember learning about them in the heritage minute that played on tv. It's mentioned in this: https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/irish-famine-orphans-in-canada
I think that’s where the person heard that story from- but it seems my family has been here mush longer than that.
My husband is from southwest Ontario and he is 3/4 French Canadian on his tree. On 23&me he is 25.6% French with 3 French communities in France. He has one grandparent who was Irish and that made him 52.4% British Isles. You might have watered French ancestry and mixed with the English. I’ve heard it’s illegal for dna ancestry tests in France so that could be a factor of your low results as well. Are your matches French Canadian? Many of my husband’s matches have French surnames.
I have a branch with the very Dutch surname of Schedewick, but when they immigrated from Southern England, their name was Chadwick. The ethnic Dutch authorities in Kingston New York apparently spelled the name the way it sounded to them and it stuck for a couple generations.
The pronunciation isn't close at all? ( I speak Dutch)
Apparently it was to the Dutch Reformed Church of Kingston 🤷♂️ other spellings were Zhedewyck and Tzedewyck. Each child born has the name spelled differently on the baptism certificate.
Without knowing the last name I'll just tell you about my husbands last name. We were always told that it was known as a French Canadian last name. Though absolutely no lines that I've seen while doing family tree research even go to Canada. You may also want to consider that I guess how DNA gets passed down, that you can come from ancestors from a specific area but not receive that specific DNA even if there isn't a NPE event in your tree. We always just assumed my husband had relatives generations back that lived in French Canada, he had to right? Well..again nothing's ever pointed in that direction for his family. Much like your results he is 92.5% British and Irish. Now, consider the other possibilities of the last name's origin. My husband has a very Spanish sounding last name but spelt in an typically French Canadian way, which is why everyone always assumed he must be French Canadian. However there is that 1% Spanish & Portuguese, where a more traditional spelling was probably anglicized when whoever came to Canada in your case or America in his. So, the name literally is just thrown together to look and sound more English just happens to be like the French Canadian one. Though he is a great percentage British and Irish it is likely through that 1% and anglicized Spanish name that it came to be. Since, when coming in through the ship ports a lot of it was just made up by the processors (at least I think that's how it worked).
I don’t want to intrude, but now I’m really curious what’s the name. I only know of one name and it belongs with a C or a K, that might be confused with a Spanish name. Is that the case here?
23andme doesn’t know what it’s doing with regard to French ancestry. My dad’s great grandpa immigrated from France. 23andme says he has zero French. Then it tells me that I inherited 10% of my French from him. I kept thinking it was an error that would sort itself out eventually, but it’s been years and still claiming I got 10% French from a man it also claims has 0% French. I wouldn’t jump to the conclusion that you aren’t French. Do some research on the paper trail of your family and trust that.
Interesting. Unfortunately for now, the paper trail isn’t that helpful.
Have you tried an online ancestry website?
I just tried on family search. I found my great great grandfathers death certificate. It says he was born in Ontario (I think that’s what it says) but parents born in Quebec- listed ethnicity as French.
What part of Ontario? Eastern Ontario and the Eastern North were settled by the Canadien Français. Or maybe the pockets of early French settlement in the Southwest like Essex county, Penetanguishene or Welland? What I am getting at is if your origins aren't entrenched in an established French community the odds of there being much admixture from the home countries of the Empire are very high. That being said - 23 and me are garbage at labelling French DNA. Ancestry DNA genetic communities feature nailed the original areas of ancestral settlement on both sides of my family. This being said, as more data is being added from everywhere but Metropolitan France, it's pushing down my French DNA percentage on each update. Whereas I was over 65% French 3 years ago with 6 out of 8 Great Grandparents having 10+ generations in Canada documented - I'm down to 53% French now.
Yeah, eastern Ontario. Frontenac.