The Hiley Y-DNA Project - Joining the Project

You are invited to join our family history project if your surname is Hiley or Highley. This is an opportunity to make discoveries about your family tree, your surname, and the distant origin of the male line of your surname. By including your family tree in our project, you will learn more about your family history, as well as help us to find answers.

Questions

The Hiley Family History Project is global, and we are trying to answer these questions:

. How many different family trees exist in the world for the Hiley/Highley surname?
. Where was the most distant ancestor of each family tree located?
· As a result of historical migrations, where are branches of each family tree today?
· Which family trees are related?
· Where did the surname originate for each group of family trees that are related?
· How many different surname origins are there for the surnames in the project?
· What is the "distant" origin of the male line of each tree? This would be the time period before surnames.

Over a number of years I have built up a collection of family trees and I would like to invite you to include your own family tree in our project. This is an opportunity to make discoveries and contribute to the knowledge about your surname. The primary surnames in the project are Hiley and Highley. Other surnames may be included in the project if they are either known or suspected variants. A variant is a surname that developed from another surname.

There are two opportunities for you to participate.

Research

Our first step is to research the direct male line of your family tree. A direct male line is a male with the Hiley or Highley surname, his father, his father, and so on back in time. I will need some basic information to get started with the research component of the project. The purpose of the information is to correctly identify your family tree, out of all the Hiley/Highley family trees so far identified. For living persons, only basic information is needed, like name and birth year. For prior generations, whatever you know is usually sufficient to get to work.

The direct male line will be researched. Since we are focused on the Hiley/Highley surname the other branches of the family tree are not researched. You will be provided with a summary of my research. The goal is to identify each Hiley/Highley family tree, worldwide. This information will enable me to determine how many different family trees exist. You will be provided with a summary of my research.  

Which Trees are Related

The second component of our project is a genealogy DNA test, which tells us which trees are related. Participation in the genealogy DNA testing portion of the project is limited to those family trees which have not yet tested. The research step, besides identifying each family tree, tells us if a tree has tested.

If your tree hasn’t tested, then a male with the Hiley/Highley surname in your tree is invited to participate and take a genealogy DNA test to represent your family tree. The result is a string of 37 numbers representing locations on the Y chromosome, which is passed from father to son, typically unchanged. Since the surname follows the Y-chromosome, this genealogy test is used to determine which family trees are related and to verify the associated genealogy research. Only men have a Y-chromosome, so only men can take this test which contains no personal information. He will be a match or close match to those men to whom he is related. The result contains no personal information and an example is shown below. This is my own result.

13 23 14 10 13 14 11 14 11 12 11 28 15 8 9 8 11 23 16 20 28 12 13 15 16 10 10 19 21 14 14 17 22 35 37 12 10

The testing is done by Family Tree DNA of Houston, Texas, USA. A test kit is sent to you in the mail, and you swab the inside of your mouth and return the kit. When your results are ready, Family Tree DNA will provide you with a secure Personal Page, where you can log in and click Match, to see whom you match. Your matches will only see your name and email address, if you have one, and you will only see their name and email address. If you do not have Internet access, I will mail you a printout of your Match page, as well as other informational pages. Participants will receive a DNA summary along with their Research summary, explaining their matches and distant origin.

The cost of testing is paid for those males representing family trees which have not tested yet, or where additional males are needed to test in a family tree.

This is an exciting opportunity to make discoveries and contribute to the knowledge about the Hiley/Highley surname.

The Hiley Y-DNA Project - Family History and DNA

The Hiley Y-DNA Project was set up in November 2020 by Susan Meates, the DNA Advisor  for the Guild of One-Name Studies. 

The next few posts will look at Family History and DNA, the Hiley Project, and what we have discovered so far about the origins of the various Hiley/Highley families.

Family History and DNA

DNA testing for genealogy, known as genetic genealogy, is the latest technology available and a very powerful tool for use with family history research. The advantage of DNA testing for genealogy is that you can discover information not in the paper records, which will ensure the accuracy of your family tree. By testing males with the surname of interest, such as Hiley or Highley, you can determine if the males are related, and approximately when their common ancestor existed. This information is extremely valuable in making accurate connections in your family history research.

This harmless genealogy DNA test is for males, since males have an X and a Y chromosome, making them male, and the Y chromosome is passed from father to son, typically unchanged. The test result is a string of 37 numbers, which represent the count of short repeats of DNA located on the Y chromosome at specific locations. Males who match or are a close match, and share a surname or variant, are related in a genealogical time frame.

The surnames Hiley and Highley arose at multiple locations at different times, so there are multiple different genetic results in the Hiley/Highley population spread around the world.

The formation of surnames varied depending on the country. The major period of surname formation and adoption in England was 1250-1450. This process occurred first in the major population centres and the south, and gradually moved north and to rural areas. Over time, the surnames evolved to different forms. The majority of the population was illiterate, and their surname was only spoken, and then written down by another person, such as the clergy recording a baptism. Migrations had an impact on the recording of surnames, due to differences in pronunciation. As a result of these factors, variant forms of a surname arose over time.

The objective with our Family History and DNA Project is to test each family tree, determine which trees are related, and hopefully, eventually, discover the origin for each group of related family trees. Most documented family trees only go back to the 1800s or 1700s. DNA testing will take you back to the origin of the surname, typically approximately 500 years prior. And during these 500 years that can’t be covered by documents, variant forms of the surname arose, so we may find other surnames matching Hiley.

The DNA test result will also tell you about your distant origins. Since you will match those to whom you are related, the test result contains no personal information.

If you are male with the surname Hiley or Highley or know a male in your family tree with one of these surnames, please contact me. The cost of testing is paid for those males representing family trees which have not tested yet, or where additional males are needed to test in a family tree.

With thanks to Susan Meates