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Moltke I, Korneliussen TS, Seguin-Orlando A, Moreno-Mayar JV, LaPointe E, Billeck W, Willerslev E. Identifying a living great-grandson of the Lakota Sioux leader Tatanka Iyotake (Sitting Bull). SCIENCE ADVANCES 2021; 7:eabh2013. [PMID: 34705496 PMCID: PMC8550246 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abh2013] [Citation(s) in RCA: 4] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 05/16/2023]
Abstract
A great-grandson of the legendary Lakota Sioux leader Sitting Bull (Tatanka Iyotake), Ernie LaPointe, wished to have their familial relationship confirmed via genetic analysis, in part, to help settle concerns over Sitting Bull’s final resting place. To address Ernie LaPointe’s claim of family relationship, we obtained minor amounts of genomic data from a small piece of hair from Sitting Bull’s scalp lock, which was repatriated in 2007. We then compared these data to genome-wide data from LaPointe and other Lakota Sioux using a new probabilistic approach and concluded that Ernie LaPointe is Sitting Bull’s great-grandson. To our knowledge, this is the first published example of a familial relationship between contemporary and a historical individual that has been confirmed using such limited amounts of ancient DNA across such distant relatives. Hence, this study opens the possibility for broadening genealogical research, even when only minor amounts of ancient genetic material are accessible.
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Affiliation(s)
- Ida Moltke
- Department of Biology, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
| | - Thorfinn Sand Korneliussen
- Lundbeck Foundation GeoGenetics Centre, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow, Russian Federation
| | - Andaine Seguin-Orlando
- Lundbeck Foundation GeoGenetics Centre, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Centre for Anthropobiology and Genomics of Toulouse UMR 5288, CNRS, University of Toulouse III Paul Sabatier, Toulouse, France
- Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse, University of Toulouse I Capitole, Toulouse, France
| | | | | | - William Billeck
- Department of Anthropology, Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History, Washington, DC 20560, USA
| | - Eske Willerslev
- Lundbeck Foundation GeoGenetics Centre, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark
- Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
- Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, Cambridge, UK
- Danish Institute for Advanced Study, University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark
- Corresponding author.
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The biological relevance of a medieval king's DNA. Biochem Soc Trans 2018; 46:1013-1020. [DOI: 10.1042/bst20170173] [Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 11/25/2017] [Revised: 03/27/2018] [Accepted: 04/04/2018] [Indexed: 11/17/2022]
Abstract
The discovery of the presumably lost grave of the controversial English king Richard III in Leicester (U.K.) was one of the most important archaeological achievements of the last decennium. The skeleton was identified beyond reasonable doubt, mainly by the match of mitochondrial DNA to that of living maternal relatives, along with the specific archaeological context. Since the genetic genealogical analysis only involved the DNA sequences of a single 15th century individual and a few reference persons, biologists might consider this investigation a mere curiosity. This mini-review shows that the unique context of a historical king's DNA also has relevance for biological research per se — in addition to the more obvious historical, societal and educational value. In the first place, the historical identification appeared to be a renewed forensic case realising a conservative statement with statistical power based on genetic and non-genetic data, including discordant elements. Secondly, the observation of historical non-paternity events within Richard III's patrilineage has given rise to new research questions about potential factors influencing the extra-pair paternity rate in humans and the importance of biological relatedness for the legal recognition of a child in the past. Thirdly, the identification of a named and dated skeleton with the known historical context serves as a reference for bioarchaeological investigations and studies on the spatio-temporal distribution of particular genetic variance. Finally, the Richard III case revealed privacy issues for living relatives which appear to be inherent to any publication of genetic genealogical data.
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