Your origins

[Malcolm]

Are you "100%" something, or do you have any foreign origins, that is do (did) your close ancestors have a different nationality than yours?
Here are my (complex) origins :
I was born and have always lived in France. I have dual British/French citizenship.
My father is Scottish, but his grand-parents on his mothers side were Irish.
My mother has more complex origins. She was born in Algeria, a former French colony. My grand-mother's parents were both Spanish. My grand-father's father was Maltese while his mother was Italian.
Therefore I'm 2/8 Spanish, 1/8 Italian, 1/8 Maltese, 2/8 Irish and 2/8 Scottish
What about you?

[Malcolm]

But that's only theory. Technically and officially I'm only half French from my mother and half Brit from my father

[FNORD]

Its is pretty hard to be "100% something". As far as I known, I'm part Portuguese, part Italian.

[JackFrost]

I'm American, it's quite unusual to find someone 100% something in this great land of melting pot.

My mom's side: Pennsylvania Dutch (German).
My dad's side: Slovak and Irish.

So therefore I am 1/4 Pennsylvania Dutch (German), 1/4 Welsh, 1/4 Irish, and 1/4 Slovak. So I am 1/2 Celtic, 1/4 Germanic, and 1/4 Slavic.

The nationality I look the most is Irish because I carry an Irish last name and I have black hair, kind of pale white skin, and deep blue eyes. That could be Welsh as well though, but then...let's say I have Celtic looks.

[Rob P]

My dad is "full" Italian, though his family has been in the US for two generations beyond him. My maternal grandfather is 50% Slovak, 50% Polish. My maternal grandmother is English, Irish, Scottish, Dutch, German, and French Canadian. I have no clue about those percentages because my grandmother's family has been in the US for a very long time.

I most look to my Italian heritage, because:

I have an Italian last name.
I have somewhat Italian features.
My dad is full Italian.
My family still keeps some Italian traditions.

Robert

[magyar chunsa]

As far as I know, I'm just Hungarian. My parents are Hungarian, my grandparents on both sides are Hungarian, and we were all born in Hungary.
But surely many many generations back there was some mixing w/ other ethnicities in the area.

[Moonshadow]

My best estimate at this time is that my ancestry is 7/8 German and 1/8 Irish. But my German ancestors likely came from various parts of what is now Germany.

[Psi-Lord]

I'll just quote a message I sent to reflexsilver86 some time ago:

[...] I'm not totally sure on the proportions, but, on my father's side, there's some Dutch, some Italian, some Portuguese and, probably, some native blood; on my mum's side, there's some Italian, some African and, possibly, some Portuguese blood.

- The Dutch branch has probably arrived to Brazil by the time the Dutch invaded the Northeastern coast of the country, in the 17th century, but I've only got registers from the time [my ancestors had] already reached the Southeast, by the end of the 19th century.

- The Portuguese parts are more like supositions based on ancesters' surnames, as it's almost impossible to trace back the wheres and whens.

- The African part, though not easy to trace back either, is because one of my great-grandfathers was black himself.

- The native part is also on the supposition field, because by the time the Dutch arrived in Brazil, Europeans still commonly found wives among the natives (or just 'one-night stands', so to speak, hehe), and chances that one of my ancestors is a child of such relationships are pretty high.

- The Italian part is the easiest to spot. I don't have the details on my father's side (my parents are divorced and I rarely get to talk about this with my family on his side), but my grandfather's parents on my mum's side were both Italians—his father, Remo Cherubini (or Remolo Cherobino, as some papers have it) arrived in Rio with his parents in 1898, coming from Pistoia, Toscana. My grandfather even kept in touch with Italian relatives in the past, but the Second World War interrupted it and he never heard of them again. I don't have the details of my grandfather's mother, though, only that her name was Tereza Borsoni and that she arrived in Brazil around the late 19th century, too, with her parents.

If I'm to look to only one of such branches, though, I (and my cousins, for instance) always say 'Italian'.

[Saaropean]

My case is quite boring. My parents were born and raised not far from where I live now. My mother's parents come from different parts of the same state (Saarland). And so do my father's parents, although his mother was born in the state of NRW. Her family lived in Duisburg during the 1920s, but they were originally from Saarland.

I have part of my family tree. From my maternal grandmother's side everyone seems to come from the south-west of Saarland. And that data goes back to the 18th century. Some of them have French surnames, but that's not unusual, since that region is at the French border, and it belonged to France several times throughout its history.

One of my father's grandmothers comes from Emsland in the far north-west of Germany, though. It was her who made that part of the family catholic. But that's hardly visible today.

Now the furthest place where I know I have relatives is Düsseldorf (capital of NRW), some 300 km north from here.
Actually there's also someone in Berlin. But he's a Düsseldorfer...

As for citizenship: I don't know anyone who emigrated to another country. My parents were born with Sarrois citizenship, but they automatically became German citizens when Saarland joined the FRG in 1957.
My maternal grandparents were born with Sarrois citizenship, but they automatically became German citizens when Saarland joined the Third Reich in 1935.
Those born before 1871 had Prussian or even French citizenship...

[Zoroa]

Mother's side :

My grand dad is Basque (born and raised in San Sebastian), though he has a German/Jewish name. He thinks (but he is not sure) that his grand father came from Germany, but he does not know. what we know for sure is that many of his uncles went to the US/Canada (called Amerikanoiak, Basque going to the New Continent), but that's another story (we recently received a mail from cousins in Quebec...).

My grandmother comes from Auvergne. Funny story : she was (and still is) a devout communist. As she was one of the only woman in the party, she wanted to do something different, so she went to school again when she was 30 to take Russian lessons, and became a translator for the party ! But she quit because she helped my grand father with his different businesses….

Father’s side :

My grandfather moved a lot : he is from Nantes and his name is one of the most famous in the region (that’s mine too hehe) and one of a notorious French « grand homme » (who was someone of my family, though not my direct ancestor). As a military he fought in the « maquis » (where he met my grand mother, cf infra) and had important responsibilities after the war (Indochina, Polynesia, etc…) and ended up in Morocco where he stayed for 17 years (that’s where my father grew up)

My grandmother is from the French Alps, in a small and remote village (remember that where she was born, people did not speak French, because Savoie became French only in 1860, but a mix of Franco Provencal from the Piedmont)

Zoroa

P.S. : By the way, I may have told you more than once, but when you refer to Basque, you use euskaldun, which refers to the language (the one who speaks basque). So anyone willing to learn and speak the language can say he is Basque !

[Luís]

My case is quite boring.

Not much thrill here either.

Both my parents come from the same town, in the interior mountainous area of the Algarve (southernmost Portuguese region, about 200km south of Lisbon, now a popular tourist destination). I could track my origins back to the late 18th century and everyone in the last 200 years, be it from my mother or father's side have always been born and have lived around that same town...

If I look at the surnames, two of my mother's surnames are typically from that area, the other one is a very common Portuguese surname. As for my father's surname, it can be tracked down to Andalusia (southern Spain). So, I guess I can be quite sure my origins are in southern Iberia... that said, I can expect to have some Moorish blood (this region was occupied by the Moors for over 5 centuries), as well as Roman and Celtic if we go a few millenia back.

[Patricia]

I was born in Argentina, so I'm Argentinian.

From my father's side: Romanian and Moldavian

From my mother's side: Ukranian, Spanish and Greek

[Zaduma]

My roots are Balto-Slavonic.
Most of my family come from the regions that don’t belong to Poland anymore (today’s Byelorussia or parts of Lithuania that were Polish during many centuries, before the XX century’s wars, pacts and evacuations) from Polish families, but I don’t always know what was before. I only know some pieces of information: there was a branch from Samogitia (Zemaitija / Żmudź, Lithuania), another branch was from Balcans, there might be some Czechs due to Czech-sounding grandmother’s surname, and there was a branch of Mazovian nobles who obtained grounds close to today’s Byelorussia (and in their surname, my mother's maiden name, there are some changes caracteristic for east-slavonic languages), who later mixed with a branch of local countrymen (who, as I like to believe, had some Sudovian and Kashubian blood, what is likely, especially the first option), another eastern noble branch was related to Narbutt’s and one of my grandgrandmothers was born in Warsaw. However, due to the constant wars that Poland suffered during the last 1000 years it is hard to find the material to start a deep, detailed research.

P.S. : By the way, I may have told you more than once, but when you refer to Basque, you use euskaldun, which refers to the language (the one who speaks basque). So anyone willing to learn and speak the language can say he is Basque !

but most of us are euskalgare And what about Basques that don't speak their language anymore? Are they called euskaldun as well?

[Varislintu]

Depends on how far back you're willing to go.

According to some deep probing into the lines of my family (done by others, not me) I have blood and non-blood (through marriage) relatives from all over Europe's royal houses and great families from the far past, including some Roman emperor (or was it Bysanthine ?). Apparantly this is not a difficult acchievement in Europe. The hard part is just doing the research and getting the tables straight. I think here, everyone is eventually related to everyone. Especially the upper classes loved to marry internally, and of course they are also the ones there are the most records of.

But more immediately, I believe the first foreigners in my family, when tracing it backwards, come from Sweden, Germany and Russia, but those are very distant, too.

So, to put it plainly, I guess I'm 100% Finnish . How boring.

[ego]

All of my ancestors have been Greeks so one could say I am 100% Greek. But we know there are no pure nations anymore, at least in Europe. Maybe some tribes in Amazonia or populations of isolated islands of the Pacific are pure.. My dad is from the centre of Greece, a region populated by Greek Aeolians at the antiquity, but also by large number of Slavs during the byzantine period. Those Slavs were known as Veleyizites or something like that according to http://knigite.abv.bg/en/pk/pkoled.html (a Bulgarian version of history) or http://cc.ece.ntua.gr/~conster/English/ ... /slavs.htm (a Greek version). -History seems to have a thousand faces especially in the Balkans
So I guess I must have slavic blood as well. Besides numerous regional names around my town are slavic.
My mother is from Crete. I guess she is more Greek than my dad
I don't think there was much mixture there. Some claim Cretans have some arabic blood but intermarriage with Muslims would be really difficult especially during older times of religious fanatism. That is the reason also why Greeks haven't any or at least much turkish blood, while there has been much mixture with Albanians and Slavs.
Thus I think I could be something like 70% Greek and 30% Slav. Buuuugiiiiiiii!!!!!!!!!

[NulNuk]

NulNuk is 100% mix :0P
my family comes from ,Italy ,Malta and Scottland (and allso Swiss I think
but the Italian and Swiss are probably the same )
and from Germany ,Austria and Poland (and theres a Dutch brandge allso).
I was born in Argentina ,live in Israel and I`m half Christian half Jewish
(the Christian part is part Catolic part Espiritist) .
and ofcours my Maltezian family is Noble (all Maltezians sime to have some
noble titel from somewere :0P )

by the way ,if some Scotish member can find information about the MCiba
or MacIba ,or MCIva or MacIva family ,it would be nice to know
(I heard their are conds or something like that in Scotland )

[Drochfhuaimniú]

I know one person who says they're 100% Welsh, and I believe her.

I, personally, am Irish on both sides of my mother's family and English (from Liverpool) and German on the other side. So that's half Celtic and half Germanic. wewt.

[lala]

as an israeli, there is no chance i'll be 100% something exept the fact that i'm 100% jewish if you see it as a nationality.
what i know about my family is this:
my dad was born in Latvia , his mother was born in Lita but grew up in Russia, his father was born in Poland. my mother was born in Israel, her older brother was born in Germany and their parents were born in Poland.
i know from history the jews came to east europe while traveling mainly from Spain {since 1492} into france and then all the way to east europe... so in that way, there could be a part in me from every country that they passed by... who knows...
i look like a europian with blue-green eyes and bright hair... many people think i am russian or german and some people were really surprised to know i am not french.

[Malcolm]

Depends on how far back you're willing to go.

The furthest i went back was to my great grand parents who were "100%" of the nationalities mentioned. I don't find it very relevant to go any further, because then it gets far too complicated
Like, would an Maerican whose ancestors settled back in the 17th century consider himself as someone with foreign origins?

[Lada]

So, some information about me

At first i d like to notice that there s an opinion that there s no such nationality as "russians", who are these people? During 240 years of mongolian occupation there were many mixed marriages as russian women love all exotic too much and then Russia appeared as a multinational state, and slavic part of it was just the most powerful, so everyone adopted slavic language, but it could be finno-ugric or an asiatic one possibly.

All relatives from my mother's part seem to be true Russians, at least all of them are from central regions of european part of the country and they have ordinary russian names and sirnames. My father's relatives are all from Ukraine, some of them are from west and some are from the east. so my paternal grandfather seems to be Polish. after some research i found out that i am a noble person Grandfather's anscestors were in POLSKA SZLACHTA and they even were entitled to use a court of arms (Herb nalecz)! (Poland - thank you for such beautiful sirname! )
My Paternal grandmother was born in the East of Ukraine, but there were also many Tatars(nation close to Turks), and i am sure i have also tatar blood, as i look like my greatgrandmother who looks like a true tatar. And then many people say that there s something oriental in me