Looking at Eurogenes w/oracle today and having already recognized much to my father's horror that I have no central European (more than 45% of his composite) it was odd to see a component of projected populations owing to that area. Immediately I was thinking of a small research I did on the Wismer family, my grandmother Lucienna's maiden name, regarding the orientation of that name. Commonly it is assumed to be a amalgamation of anglicized Germanic words meaning "wise-person". I haven't had a reason to doubt this presumption until DNA became available. The two interesting results were, Ukrainian_West 15.33%, Erzya 8.18%, Russian 5.80%, three populations not previously attributed to my admixture. I'll continue here with my previous research...
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"Wismer Family Morphology"
Two interpretations of the origion of the Wismer clan have existed. Anglo saxonry dictates that the name is a germancised account of a trait name "wise-man". Recent admixture however points to a genetic source outside of the North Sea. The term Wismer is a placename given to the inhabitants of the port town called Wismar in the german state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The small historical town is formed by a natural harbor to its north from the baltic sea. While Wismar was under Norwegian control for some time and rests in northcenteral germany is was origionally colonized by Palobian Slavs from the eastern Baltic region.
Palobian Slavs are unfortunate to be extinct in language. As a group of Lechtite people their genetic heritage exists still in other members of the same cluster notablly the Polish. The Sorbs of Lusatia remain the only unique cultural descendants of Palobian Slavs still maintaining those language and physical cultural traits such as dress. As a coastal region the town of Wismar was prone to genetic drift from resulting neighbor groups as well as bleed through from its closest relation Poland. Notably Poland itself is a conglomeration of the Lechite tribes assembled under the Duke of Poland, Mieszko I. Therefore the Wismer family heritage represents a north eastern slavic peoples and more recently german adjunct influence not that of Britain.
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...More onto the recent identity of the Wismer descendants as German that is a over simplified fact. Only three of the men born before the immigrant ancestor came from Baden-Wuerttemberg, Germany. Hidden inside the older generations is a large amount of Austro-Bavarian, Swedish, and Danish. It is a important reminder to the genealogist, especially any amateurs reading my blog, that birthplace doesn't always convene with genetic population. Obviously this might be the case of African american individuals researching there family who are surprised to find relatives in Spain or the like which was simply a host nation to many generations. A subject I'd love to breech is that of a African cousin in my ancestry.com match maker I did not know I had. Upon my last visit reviewing genealogy with my father he conveyed to me this was not news to him. A great uncle of his had returned to Europe and as a sailor had taken a wife from the north African coast. Somethings are just beautiful discoveries of the amazing global culture we all share.
