The current haplogroup map (wiki )
To be a Carruthers or a derivative of our name means that you are part of a Border Reiver family with a proud history. We originated in Annandale, Scotland and our existence in one shape or form goes back in the area for thousands of years. As such, we believe our name is something to be celebrated and this must always be based on the current evidence available to us.
With the progression of our y-DNA research programme, which you as a Carruthers can become involved in, the picture of who and what Carruthers are is becoming increasingly more clear.
Again, through either a misrepresentation or misunderstanding of the facts, there are some who simply tag names onto Carruthers because it may sound the same or because they do not feel that our rich heritage is good enough for them. The Celtic War Chief Caratacus who lived in Southern England during the Roman occupation, is a very typical example.
So why is it important? Well using the analogy of drinking whisky, many like their’s straight ie only whisky in the glass, some like it with a dash of water, some even with ice or even a mixer. But if you dilute something too much it simply loses both its character and substance, but again its a personal choice.
The use of the name Carruthers is not such a personal choice but the same analogy applies. Dilute our name too much and our individuality as proud border Reiver family of the West March of Scotland disappears out of all recognition.
However, as you can see below, in the search for truth it is not simply our own family that follows the facts as others remain just as proud of their name as we are of ours and therefore their claims are also based on evidence rather than fiction.
The story of Carruthers and Cruddas link.
Based on the fact that Thomas (the Clerk), 1st of the name of Carruthers of Mouswald, had his lands and titles removed for bending the knee to Edward III in 1334. This led to a forfeit of his lands and titles which were passed to his brother William by David II. Based on Thomas’s disappearance from tyhe family tree, there is supposition that Thomas moved over the border and became the progenitor of all Carruthers and it’s derivations in the North of England.
This collective includes the English family of Cruddas, and possibly the variation Croudace for whom the commercial outlets, as they wrongly did making Carruthers a sept of Bruce, have linked them as a derivative of our Name for a great many years.
But is it true or is it again simply a way to bolster commercial sales?
Based on the coat of arms these enterprises have assigned to Cruddas, one would think they are part of us. So as is our want, looking at the facts, are they actually a branch of our family or are they, in a similar vein to Carrick and Carruth, a separate and distinct family on their own right.
Well if the blurb from two separate bucket shop sites on the Cruddas name is true, they are definitely part of our family;
• This surname is derived from a geographical locality ‘of Carruthers,’ a hamlet in the parish of Middlebie, Dumfriesshire.
• In ancient Scotland, Cruddas was a Strathclyde-Briton name for someone who lived in the land of Carruthers in the parish of Middlebie, Dumfriesshire. Interestingly in that area, the name is pronounced “Cridders.”
Sound familiar, well it should as it describes the origins of Carruthers.
DNA evidence comparing Cruddas and ourselves.
Join the Carruthers y-DNA study here
Ok so the assumption is that they are, but what does the DNA research tell us?
In 2018 our Research Director assisted in the Cruddas-Carruthers yDNA study group, to definitively locate the Cruddas yDNA haplogroup and try to prove any possible links with the Carruthers name.
Through their own research it was soon clarified. What their DNA researchers had found confirmed that the Cruddas and Carruthers families were not actually related via yDNA but are definitely separate and distinct families, even though they had been linked with us for just as long as we had been linked with Bruce.
As such the evidence showed that the haplogroup I-M253 is Carruthers and R-M269 is Cruddas.
As such Cruddas are not related to Carruthers.
Updated information on I-M253
I-M253’s paternal line was formed when it branched off from the ancestor I-L840 and the rest of mankind around 4250 BCE. The possible place of origin is considered to be Northern Europe, which would fit with our Swedish ancestor. However, a study in 2014 uncovered remains of 9 individuals from the Linear Pottery culture, one of whom carried the M253 snp.
Haplogroup I is the oldest major haplogroup in Europe and in all probability the only one that originated there. It is thought to have arrived from the Middle East as haplogroup IJ sometime between 40,000 and 30,000 years ago, and developed into haplogroup I approximately 25,000 years ago.
It has been speculated that I1 evolved in isolation in Scandinavia during the late Upper Paleolithic and Mesolithic periods, when hunter-gatherers from southern Europe recolonised the northern half of the continent from their LGM refugia. The oldest attested evidence of postglacial resettlement of Scandinavia dates from 11,000 BCE with the appearance of the Ahrensburg culture.
However, evidence has emerged (Scécsényi-Nagyetal.2014) from the testing of Early NeolithicY-DNA from western Hungary, that haplogroup I1 was in fact present in central Europe at the time of the Neolithic expansion. A single I1 sample was identified alongside a G2a2b sample, both from the early Linear Pottery (LBK) culture, which would later diffuse the new agricultural lifestyle to most of Poland, Germany and the Low Countries.
It is therefore possible that I1 lineages were among the Mesolithic European hunter-gatherers assimilated by the wave of East Mediterranean Neolithic farmers (represented chiefly by Y-haplogroup G2a). There is also evidence from the Neolithic samples of the Early Neolithic Starčevo and Cardium Pottery cultures that haplogroup I2a lived alongside G2 a farmers both in south-east and south-west Europe.
Research and discovery continues
About Haplogroup R-M269
R-M269 is seen as the major European Y chromosome haplogroup. It is the most frequently occurring Y-chromosome haplogroup in Western Europe and the most common haplogroup in the genetic genealogy databases. R1b1a2 (R-M269) is the dominant branch of R1b in Western Europe.
However in a study published by the Royal Society (Busby, Brisghelli, Danchez-diz et al from Oxford University), they suggest that the existing data and tools are insufficient to make credible estimates for the age of this haplogroup, and conclusions about the timing of its origin and dispersal should be viewed with a large degree of caution. They further suggest that rather than European origins as listed, this may not now be the case.,
We therefore await further developments; but what we do know is that all humans are inter-related as we are all Homo sapiens and all part of the same species.
But, what is really important to remember is that not all humans can claim to be Carruthers and shouldn’t.
Facinating to start seeing the fruits in the DNA studies now producing factual evidence.