Igbo DNA Matches

One thing we have been interested in ever since our Haitian parent's 23andme results came in was the Igbo connection with Haiti. As we have indicated through our exploration of notarized records mentioning slave origins in the Sud-Est of Haiti, the "Ibo" were a consistent presence among the enslaved African population in Bainet in the 1700s. Perhaps many if not most were acquired via smuggling with the British in Jamaica, since the coast of southeastern Nigeria was not frequently used by the French slave traders of the 18th century. One also notices that Igbo matches are the most frequent sub-Saharan group for both our parent and myself. Indeed, my parent and I even share one Igbo match, the only sub-Saharan African we match with at least 20 cM of shared ancestry among our matches. Intriguingly, our Haitian parent likewise matched 4 members of a single Igbo family on Ancestry. 

An additional plus of Ancestry's match features is the ability to view posted family trees. Perusing these trees indicated that most of our parent's Igbo matches have roots in 3 parts of Igboland: Abia, Imo and Anambra. Unfortunately, some family trees were not public or were not posted at all, but the results are suggestive enough as is. These three regions, all contiguous or nearby each other, may suggest our Igbo forebears hailed from the same region. Of course, people have moved around since the 1700s and there could be other factors at play here. However, some of these matches appear to have deep roots in these areas, particularly 4 matches from a single family with roots in Abia. If their family tree, which seems to stretch back into the 1800s, is a reliable indicator, they likely have roots in this part of southeastern Nigeria in the 1700s. 

On 23andme, Our Haitian parent only had 5 Igbo matches we could find (plus 2 individuals whose surname suggests Ibibio origins). We foolishly did not keep a record of birthplaces for specific areas or regions of southeastern Nigeria, but the Ibibio matches appear to have roots in Akwa Ibom and were higher matches than any of the Igbo. We wonder if this could also indicate Ibibio ancestry, although we lack any matches with chromosome browser features to explore the connection.