© The Right PerspectiveIcelanders in the southern part of the country have been found to have Beringian DNA.
New anthropology and genealogy studies indicate that "Native" Americans, more correctly known as Beringians for having entered the North American continent from Asia via the Bering Straits, accompanied Norsemen to Iceland 500 years before Christopher Columbus discovered America.
The controversial theory is put forward in the Master thesis of Sigrídur Sunna Ebeneserdóttir, who is studying anthropology at the University of Iceland (HÍ), and was conducted on behalf of deCODE Genetics. According to the study published in The American Journal of Physical Anthropology, some 350 Icelanders alive today carry genes characteristic of Beringians, and proves Europeans had been in North America more than 1,000 years ago.
Ebenesdóttir's work is the continuation of a study published in 2000 by HÍ and deCODE anthropologist Agnar Helgason, who served as her tutor. In his study, Helgason indicated that most of the women who settled in Iceland came from the British Isles, while most of the male settlers came from Scandinavia.
© The Right PerspectiveLeif Eriksson brought Beringian women back to Iceland.
Helgason said it is possible to trace mitochondria genotypes in direct distaff side many centuries back in time. That way it is possible to make conclusions on the combination of the group of settlers in Iceland.
"Based on deCODE's genealogy database, this genotype could be found in 350 individuals alive today. They all originate from four women who lived in the countryside in south Iceland. These women were all born before 1700 and their bloodline can be traced back to a woman who lived long before 1500," Helgason stated.
The study shows the Beringian woman came from a now-extinct line found in Markland, the name given to a part of shoreline in Labrador, Canada, by Leif Eriksson when he landed in North America.
The Icelandic Sagas state that Leif The Lucky sailed to what is known today as Newfoundland and Labrador in the year 1000, and founded the Vinland colony. The female ancestors of these 350 Icelanders were brought by Norsemen to Iceland from North America around the year 1000.
Up where I come from there is a god mix between pure "Germanic" and Fi nnnish-Ugric, and other eastern tribes, so I take the freedom to say, we cannot know which way those mtDNA's came to Iceland until further resaetrch is done...
Am I right? - I don't know...