Meet the grandfather of all Britons: Ian Kinnaird, a 72-year-old retired lecturer of Scotland is directly descended from the first woman on Earth, who lived some 190,000 years ago, researchers claim.
Kinnaird, who undertook a DNA test to find out where his ancestors came from, was stunned when it was found that he inherits a genetic marker from his mother that traces his ancestry to an African lineage that has not been found before in Western Europe.
Researchers, who carried out the tests, said in genetic terms, the result meant that Kinnaird was a ‘thoroughbred’, and could be described as the ‘grandson of Eve, or the grandfather of everyone in Britain’.
They were so surprised by the results that they phoned Kinnaird, a widower who lives in the far north of Scotland, and told him that his mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA), which passed through the female line, was 30,000 years old and only two genetic mutations removed from the first woman.
Most men have a genome with around 200 mutations since the earliest humans.
"It is an astonishing result and means he could have been in the 'Garden of Eden'," said Alistair Moffat of St Andrews University and co-founder of the DNA project ‘Britain's DNA’.
"It's further proof that even white Anglo-Saxon Protestants are descended from a black Eve," Moffat was quoted as saying by the Daily Telegraph.
The tests also showed that Kinnaird's ‘fatherline’ is Scandinavian and he carries a YDNA marker which is found in a quarter of Norwegian men. The DNA project has now tested 2,000 people across the UK and most have markers that trace their ancestry back up to 3,500 years.
These defined them as descendants of various groups including the earliest Britons, the Ancient Irish, Vikings, hunter gatherers and cave painters. The project aims to map Britain's ‘family tree’ and has previously found that the actor Tom Conti shared an ancestor with Napoleon Bonaparte.
Speaking of the findings, Kinnaird, who taught at the North Highland College in Thurso, said he was interested in history but had no particular expectations when he paid 200 pounds for the test.
"I have led an unremarkable life until now but my computer has been red hot since I was told. This is a real gobsmacker," he said.