Tainos in the DR?

[Chip00]

[/IMG]

Oops I think this is it....

Jorge - nice family. Isn't it great that the kids came out looking a whole lot better than us? haha! You actually loook like you could be family of this one Ecuadorian friend that I have in Orlando. In fact both of youse guys could pass for Indian chiefs.

Also, as to the length of your threads, I personally have no problem - I started the thread for the purpose of learning more.

 

[Chip00]

Hey guys I'm so happy you found yourselves again, but lets get back to the subject of the OP. Nice families...congrats.:cheeky:

How 'bout yours primo? - don't be shy, we want to see if your part Taino!

 

[A.Hidalgo]

How 'bout yours primo? - don't be shy, we want to see if your part Taino!

There is a media gallery for this.:cheeky:

 

[Baracutay]

:chinese: Im perplexed!
Chip, Hidalgo, How can I send a private message on this thing. I would love to get your email address so I can send you some .....more pics! Seriously I want Chip to meet Dr. Lynne Guitar.
Peace

 

[Mirador]

Jorge,

I'm more than willing to have you meet some of my distant relatives and neighbors in La Maguana and Las Lomas, who after over five-hundred years since the Conquest have changed little their Taino ways and looks (except for a little natty-hair and darker skin picked up on the way).

 

[Rick Snyder]

Baracutay,

Click on the name of the poster in the upper left hand side of the post and that which you seek will be yours.

 

[Baracutay]

To Mirador:
Yes know of many places in Maguana where the Indian features are particularly strong. WhatI find even more interesting is the curanderos and practioners of Misterios, who very similar to other Amerindian peoples use the four directions in their prayers and often must ask plants or animals for permission to pick them. Maguana was a very important area for the Classic Taino and it seems that many traditions persist there to this day.

To Rick:
Thank you for the instructions!

 

[Mirador]

To Baracutay:

Jorge, you are looking for the Taino in the wrong places. Of course, you will find specimens that fit your idealized Amerindian physical features. However, it is not there where the Taino lives in the DR. The Taino is more a set of attitudes that has persisted in the island since the Conquest, and is visible in the particular way Dominicans feel about themselves, relate to each other in the community, and respond to authority...

 

[Chip00]

There is a media gallery for this.:cheeky:

Primo - your stalling! I didn't see any pictures in the media gallery! Don't worry if your ugly - remember the old saying "ugly is as ugly does" or something like that!

 

[Baracutay]

Jorge, you are looking for the Taino in the wrong places. Of course, you will find specimens that fit your idealized Amerindian physical features. However, it is not there where the Taino lives in the DR. The Taino is more a set of attitudes that has persisted in the island since the Conquest, and is visible in the particular way Dominicans feel about themselves, relate to each other in the community, and respond to authority...

Mirador, as a researcher and basically a hunter for the truth, I find Taino intertwined in every aspect of Dominican/Caribbean life. The idealized Amerindian physical features you mention are nothing in comparison to the many cultural aspects that persist to this day. Dominicans today are making Casabe bread from the poisonous Yuca or chola bread from the poisonous Guayiga or making Nasa's for fishing or using Amazonian style slash and burn techniques for farming , etc etc one thing becomes clear- never in the history of the planet have "Extinct" people left so much.
I particularly love this quote by Tony Yaguarix DeMoya :
We never disappeared as a people or as a culture. As a new people we made ourselves one with the European and with the African, and as a culture our customs and knowledge fused with theirs, creating an unreal but certain us. The Dominican Ta?nos still live 500 years later. Only knowing truly what we were can we see what we want. E. Antonio De Moya, In ?Animacion Sociocultural y Polisintesis en la Transformacion del Sistema Educativo Dominicano,? Revista de Educacion , Santo Domingo, 1993, P 10.
Baracutay

 

[Mirador]

Years ago, I was asked by a female acquaintance if I could help her raise one of her numerous children. The woman was going through hard times, and just like the little old lady of lore, she had so many children she didn?t know what to do. The particular child she asked me for help, was an extremely bright young girl with a particularly vivacious personality, but her most obvious features where physical, she looked like our idealized image of an Amerindian: straight black hair like a horse?s mane, wide slanting eyes framed by high cheekbones, and a dark metallic cast to her skin. She lived in my household for several years. It was many years later that I learned the circumstances of her origin. The girl was fathered by a Peruvian sailor in a one-night of passion in a Boca Chica hotel, when her mother had to resort to prostitution for survival.

 

[Baracutay]

Very intersting yet sad story Mirador,
Please note however that the recent DNA studies being conducted in the DR are more complicated than this story you shared.All American Indians from North or South America share similar mtDNA Haplo groups and these are A-B-C-D within these haplo groups are short tandem repeats (strs) called Halpo types. These haplo types run into the thousands. These are localized mutations within a specific group of people that occur overtime. In the DNA studies conducted in Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic so far less than 10 percent are from Halpo groups B or D and these are all from Indians who either were brought as slaves from the mainland or came in under circumstances much like your story.
It is the remainder of the Halpo groups A and C who's specific Halpo Types are not found anywhere outside of the Caribbean, in effect showing that these are local mutations that can only come from the original inhabitants of the islands.
Now to clarify a bit about the "idealized" Indian features: Many people with Native American Haplo groups do not look Indian in the least! Many of our test subjects looked very African or Very Caucasian with only slight resemblence to Indians. Other people showing strong Indian phenotypes had no Native mtdna! For the latter we needed use another DNA sequencing called bio-geographical nuclear dna testing(this type of test gives percentages of lineages within ten generations). Many of our test subjects then came out with genetic markers reaching up to 55 percent!
So it may be that although the subject of your story may have had a peruvian father, but maybe, just maybe her mother had a Taino ancestor somewhere in her gene pool.
Baracutay

 

[Mirador]

Baracutay,
My own ad hoc, in situ, investigations regarding the genetic structure of the population of the Dominican Republic, reveal through analysis of the Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) markers, specifically the 12 Y-chromosome biallelic polymorphisms, that there is a high level of gene diversity and haplotype frequencies that were consistent with source populations from South and North America. The genetic distances revealed that the low mtDNA differentiation among Dominicans that there is a relatively high proportion of sequence types shared among the population. The most common mtDNA haplogroups were M* and B, followed by D and F, which are prevalent in North and South America.. However, there is a limited degree of admixture observed, and, in general, the analysis of the genetic data indicated affinities to South American and North American aboriginal population, which is consistent with historical records.

By the way, can you please provide the sources for your genetic analysis of DR population.

 

[Baracutay]

Very intersting Mirador,
Somehow we seem to be getting different results aye!
From our studies conducted by Juan Martinez Cruzado of the Univeristy of Mayaguez and the late Fernando Luna Calderon showed very low incidence of either B or D. of the samples that we were able to collect in the intial study (150) only 33 percent showed Native Mtdna and most of these were either A or C. The C haplo group and Haplo types were identical to those found in Puerto Rico while the A seems to be from a much older population. We know today from acheological sources that the first people to enter the region were actually from the Yucatan and these later merged with the waves of various Arawakan speakers from the Orinoco river basin.
Just as in Puerto Rico Halpo's B and D were very minute and these were almost always found in the coastal cities. Our findings were confirmed for Puerto Rico (not enough samples have been taken from the DR yet) by FamilytreeDna. There study confirmed that up to 70 percent of PR's had mtdna and A and C were the highest.
I have a few questions for you:

Do the historical records mention what specific tribals were being brought to the island? It is my understanding that only the Indians that were brough en mass to the island were from the Bahamas and these of course were Taino.
To get such a high degree of the same B and D you mention I would assume that these people must have been brought over in very large numbers and I just dont have historical sources that indicate this.

Who conducted these DNA tests you mention in the DR? Our people have been working on this since 2003 and we have yet to get enough samples to give a definate amount. What we can say for sure is that the Taino influence is there and it is very substantial.
I heard of one small study done in Barahona where they tested 23 people. Of these 4 were haplo group C and the rest were from up to 11 different African populations. I find it curious that for a mix blood people we would have the consisitancy that you indicate from out side influence.
But yet again I must bring it back to the most logical. Just witnessing the overwhelming amount of Taino material culture that is found in the campo its hard not to see why its there aty all. The Yoruba people were the only Africans that were brought over to the Caribbean in huge numbers. It is clearly visible not just in the faces of many people of Dominican and especially and mostly Cuban extraction, but also in the amount of Yoruba culture, spirituality and linguistics that persist to this day. When measured with Taino influence that stand toe to toe.
Tell me, of all these Indians that you say came either from North or South America, which cultural influence do we enjoy in the DR today?

 

[juancarlos]

I took a look at Family Tree's Cuban DNA Project and the most common maternal haplogroup is A, followed by C. In this group there are only one B and one D . These refer only to the indigenous maternal haplogrous. So far, in total, there are 22 of these, followed by 21 European mtdna haplogroups and 15 maternal haplogroups of African origin.

I truly think it was shock to most of the Cubans who took the test to find out they had an indigenous maternal origin. The last thing they were looking for was "indian roots". Cubans don't look indian. And these are Cubans outside Cuba, yet the results do share light on the origin of the first Cubans after colonization began. It appears it was the same process of mestizaje between native females and European males, as existed in other Latin American countries. Also, a large percentage of Cubans have a European maternal origin, which means that a lot of Spanish females also settled the island.

Later, the mestizaje process expanded to include sub-Saharan African women and their descendants.

On the other hand, the paternal Y dna is overwhelmingly European or Mediterranean in origin. There are only two instances of native haplogroups: one Q3, which is definitely a New World mutation, and one Q, which is found both in Asians and Native Americans. There is one O2, which is a Chinese
haplogroup. The are two E3a sub-saharan African haplogroups belonging to two English-speaking Jamaican males who had settled in Cuba in the xix century. The most common paternal haplogroup among Cubans is R1b1, the most common Western European hg. Most other European/Mediterranean haplogroups are also represented. Almost all of the Cubans tested who had an indigenous, European or African maternal origin, had a European paternal origin. This means that European males who settled the island had native, Spanish and African women as their wives, or lived in common law unions with them, or simply had sex with women of all racial backgrounds. As was common among Spanish and Portuguese males. White female settlers, on the other hand, married, lived with or had sex with white males.

The Tainos lived in Cuba, Quisqueya and Borinquen. But Ciboney only lived in Cuba and some in Quisqueya. The Ciboney were in Cuba long before the Tainos arrived.

Here is a link to the site, with an explanation. When you scroll down, the first thing you will see are the paternal Y results. Keep scrolling down and you'll find the maternal results.

Cuba DNA Project - Family Project Website

 

[juancarlos]

I forgot to mention that the maternal Native American haplogroups are: A, B, C, D. While the the sub-saharan African maternal haplogroups are all the L ones. All the others on the list are European/Mediterranean maternal haplogroups. These are: H, J, V, W, U etc.

Also, in addition to white males, white female settlers and Cuban born white women could also marry mestizo males, who were European on the father side and Taino or Ciboney on the mother side. Their descendants would then have European haplogroups on boths sides. Mestizo females married European males as well as mestizo males, and their descendants would have a Taino or Ciboney maternal haplogroup and a European paternal haplogroup.

Black and mulatto males were restricted to black or mulatto females. Mulatto females, on the other hand, often chose, or were chosen by, white and mestizo males. This explains why most of those on the list who had an African maternal origin, had a European paternal origin.

 

[Baracutay]

Hola JuanCarlos,
Thank you for sharing that information. I was aware of the Cuban findings as well because I am in constant communication with Bennet Greenspan of FamlyTreeDNA. The people at FamilyTreeDNa are very generous with information. I failed to get deeper into the FTD results because of the relatively few Cuban and Dominican samples submitted thus far It is not easy to draw a complete picture of both islands indigenous makeup yet. Just as in the Cuban results FTD gave me the results for the DR and the results were almost mirror images of the Cuban except we had higher M.
My friend Juan Martinez Cruzado of the University of Mayaguez who did the mtDNA study in Puerto Rico is doing a wide study in the DR this summer and his hope is to then take his study to Eastern Cuba, especially to Caridad de los Indios and Baracoa where there are many Taino descendants. I have sent DR. Cruzado a list of places in the DR (mostly villages I have been to that are very inaccessible and remote) where I am sure there will be very favorable results.
Thank again JuanCarlos

 

[Baracutay]

On my way out to work but I thought I'd share this bit of information from Dr. Ana Oquendo Pabon:

From genetic studies on fossil remains, the Ta?no people are known to primarily belong to Haplogroups A and C. Consistently, throughout the history of our project, on viewing their match pages, those with Haplogroup A and C indigenous roots have, across the board, seen a list of people mainly from within our group or names of other Puerto Ricans not in the project. There have also been a few Dominicans and Cubans whose mtDNA have also matched our members. There are an overwhelming number of exact HVR1 and HVR2 matches among those within the Haplogroup A group as well as within the Haplogroup C group. Of 140 mtDNA participants, 83 or 59.3% have indigenous results. Within the indigenous group,

50 (60.2%) are in Haplogroup A (one group with 11 exact matches, two others with 7 and 10)

29 (35%) are in Haplogroup C (Largest group is one with 17 exact matches. This haplotype matches one of the fossil remains in the first article below)

3 (3.6 %) are in Haplogroup B (all 3 are exact matches)

2 (2.4%) are in Haplogroup D (both are exact matches)

Understandably, the reluctance to designate anyone at the outset in 2003 as being of Ta?no ancestry has been due to the fact that the indigenous roots may have been derived from one of the several natives known to have been brought to the island of Puerto Rico in the Post Colombian era. However, it is a historical fact that the overwhelming majority of this small group was native men brought from the surrounding islands brought to work in the mines to dig for gold. A very scant few were women. With such a large number of participants from families who have been endogamous from the 1500s to this day, our members represent indigenous mtDNA inherited from ancient maternal ancestors from every corner of our island. It is inconceivable that they be anyone other than the descendants of our "extinct" Ta?no people, the first to greet the European to the New World.

Cuba DNA Project - Family Project Website

 

[SuperConejo]

Baracutay thanks for all the information on the genetic testing. You say one of your studies of 150 people pointed to 33% of them having some native mtdna. My wild guess is that when large amounts of people are tested it will probably level down to 10 - 25% taino Mtdna, and about 1 - 3% taino paternal dna. This is because the majority of Dominican Mtdna is African. and the Paternal DNA is mostly either European or African. You are right that alot of Yoruba were brought to the "new world", specially to cuba. But this is not the case in the dominican republic. We do have some yoruba culture such as the Dominican Tambora, and words like Bachata, Chevere. But i think the African group that contributed in an overwhelming fashion is the various Kongo ethnic groups, which gave us words like Kamumbo, Bembe, Toto, and many others. Foods like Mofongo, Mondongo. The money saving system called the SAN. And the Music of Palos, Sarandunga, Congos de Villa Mella, Sarambo of the Cibao. All traditions from the Kongo kingdom. Your very right to say that the Dominican Republic and the carribean have traditions and culture from the Tainos/Arawaks. This is very evident as well. Haiti has plenty of Taino contribution as well, this is evident even in The Haitian Vodou/Dominican 21 Divisiones religion.
I like how you pointed out that some people who looked like they had Taino didn't at all, and some who didnt look it had the DNA. This is the truth. Thats why in my earlier post i posted pictures of West/Central Africans with high cheekbones, and the epicathic eyefold. Also i posted Barrak Obama, who has Pseudo-Taino features.
I respect your work and research Baracutay, keep up the good work.

I was wondering if you had a list of some if not all of the 800 Taino words, i know theres alot specially in the country side.
There is also a strong Kongo/Yoruba/Efek contribution to the Dominican language. Some scholars label Dominican spanish under the creoles category. Specially the countryside which retained lots of African/Taino words, phonetics and ways of speaking.

 

[Baracutay]

Hello SuperConejo,
Thank you for your reply I always welcome social intercouse that is based on science and not merely on romanticism or deep rooted beliefs based on "history" that was written by the conquerers and not by the conquered.
So let me start by responding to your post with the following:
(1) If we who have done dna testing and serious scientific study do not and cannot give as of yet anb accurate number of just how many Dominicans actually have Taino descent, then how can anyone who has not be so bold a state mater of factly that Taino is only 10% percent of the population?
As far as we are concerened there are places,very remote mind you where the dna sequencing has not been conducted and as of yet there is no way to know for sure.I can say that if of the 150 samples most of which were taken in Santo Domingo, are showing 33% then what will the percentages be when we go deep into the DR country side? Too soon to tell. But any good scientist will tell you that if we found ( as we did) 33% in a place where we did not expect it,then in the place where we do............the sky is the limit.
As far was the words are concerned, I wlll say that of the 55 rivers and tributataries we have in the DR only 3 have Spanish names, none have African names and 52 have Taino names. You mention words like chevere, mofongo and mangu and toto. Is that it?
I can give you 5 words in Taino that are recognisable by Dominicans for every african word you can give me. Take for example: Chin-Chin, Ciguato,Ciguapa, Guiro, Guira, Higuera, Casabe,Yuca, Guayiga, Chola, Mabi, Mani,Cahuil, macana, buren,hamaca, conuco,jataca, jacana, cacheo, bija, comejen, hicotea,, catua, carey, baguada, guaragua, etc etc. And this does not include the places names of much of our countryside, the names or flora and fauna, again etc.
Does it not strike you as rather interesting that the "extinct population would leave more linguistic and aspects of material culture more so than all the African Tribes combined? HOw can you discount all this and why?
When I mentioned that some people that did looked Taino did not have mtdna of native extraction, there is a very simple reason for this. MTDNA is passed down from mother to sons/daughters but only her daughters can pass down the mtdna, not the male children.Although they still pass on the Native genetic markers, another test is needed to determine if there is any Native makers in said subject. I myself took a nuclear dna test and my markers were 42 percent Indian.
As far as the high cheek bones of Africans and the eye epicathic fold is concerend, these observations you make are extremly superficial. Aside from Cheek bones there is the forehead slant, shovel shaped incisors, RH positive in O blood groups, that also indicate high levels of Indigenous genetic contribution. Are you familiar with Jose de Jesus Alvarez A-B-O blood group study conducted in the DR in 1948, all of which pointed to a hihgh level of Native genetci contribution to the population of the DR?
You mention as well many well known African musical contribution to the DR population. But for arguments sake, are you familiar with Dominican Jacana? Or Mahuita? These musical forms are also part of who we are and I dare anyone to give these forms with obvious Taino names an African genesis.
I find it interesting that in Haiti where the populations is 100 % more African than in the DR, they will readily tell you that "RA-RA" music is both African and INdian, yet we in the DR who have our own form of the music "ga-ga" claim that it is solely African. Makes you wonder why we want, or have an apologetic need to be more African Than we are and always, always at the expense of the Indian.
It may be that we domincans are more Indian/African than we would like to admit. IT is very intersting indeed how we argue over Indian versus African when both of these people of color who had very common cultura traits, would in turn make it either African/Spanish or Indian/Spanish and not what I believe it to be Afro/Indian. Its like yeah we black but hell we need to be white too and the indian? Lets keep it as minimal as possible. And on we go with our obviuos Taino material culture, and monumental linguistic and genetic contribution. Why?