So the earliest traceable but unidentifiable Nuttall maternal ancestor was a woman we know as Eve – not her name, and emphatically not the Biblical Eve. In terms of mitochondrial haplogroups, the mt-MRCA (mitrochondial Most Recent Ancestor) is situated at the divergence of macro-haplogroup L into L0 and L1–6. As of 2013, estimates on the age of this split ranged at around 155,000 years ago, consistent with a date later than the speciation of Homo sapiens but earlier than the recent out-of-Africa dispersal.

The maternal haplogroup (mtDNA) of Christopher James Nuttall is: H7a1C.

From the root in what is modern day Kenya in East Africa, descendants of Mitrochondrial Eve spread north to modern day Sudan where there was a mutation from Haplogroup L to L3. A further mutation to N migrated through Egypt and across to Sinai. Another mutation to R and up through Turkey, round the Black Sea to Serbia, where another mutation (HV) migrated to Northern Spain.

Haplogroup L3 arose close to 70,000 years ago, near the time of the recent out-of-Africa event. This dispersal originated in East Africa and expanded to West Asia, and further to South and Southeast Asia in the course of a few millennia, and some research suggests that L3 participated in this migration out of Africa. Soares et al. suggest that L3 most likely expanded from East Africa into Eurasia sometime around 65–55,000 years ago.

The coastal route theory proposes that early modern humans, some of the bearers of mitochondrial haplogroup L3, arrived in the Arabian peninsula about 70,000-50,000 years ago, crossing from East Africa via the Bab-el-Mandeb straits. It has been estimated that from a population of 2,000 to 5,000 individuals in Africa, only a small group, possibly as few as 150 to 1,000 people, crossed the Red Sea.[12] The group would have travelled along the coastal route around Arabia and Persia to India relatively rapidly, within a few thousand years. From India, they would have spread to Southeast Asia (“Sundaland“) and Oceania (“Sahul“).

Haplogroup N is a human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) clade. A macrohaplogroup, its descendant lineages are distributed across many continents. Like its sibling macrohaplogroup M, macrohaplogroup N is a descendant of the haplogroup L3.

All mtDNA haplogroups found outside of Africa are descendants of either haplogroup N or its sibling haplogroup M. M and N are the signature maternal haplogroups that define the theory of the recent African origin of modern humans and subsequent early human migrations around the world. The global distribution of haplogroups N and M indicates that there was likely at least one major prehistoric migration of humans out of Africa, with both N and M later evolving outside the continent.

This haplogroup (N) appears in Northern Europe, Central Europe, and throughout both the European and Asian parts of Russia.

Soares et al. (2009) estimate the age of haplogroup R to 66.8±14.2 kya (95% CI),[1] that is, between roughly 80,000 and 50,000 years ago, with a most likely age near about 65,000 years.

This is consistent with an emergence in the course of the Coastal Migration out of East Africa to West, South and Southeast Asia.[3] It has been suggested that the early lineage of haplogroups M, N and R along the coastal route during the period of roughly 70,000 to 60,000 years ago.[7]

Haplogroup R has wide diversity and antiquity in the indigenous population of South Asia. Tribes and castes of Western and Southern India show higher diversity than the other regions, possibly suggesting their autochthonous status.[2] Larruga et al. (2017) found mtDNA R spread out to Eurasia and Australia from a core area along the Southeast Asian coast.[6] The Ust’-Ishim man fossil of Siberia, dated ca. 45,000 years old, belongs to haplogroup R* (formerly classified as U*).

Haplogroup HV originated at least 25,000 years ago, perhaps during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) like many other top-level haplogroups. The oldest evidence of haplogroup HV in Europe comes from the testing of a 13,000 year-old sample from La Pasiega in Cantabria (northern Spain), dating from the Magdalenian period (18,000-10,000 years before present) as analysed by Hervella et al. (2012), which could have belonged to haplogroup R0 or HV.

Since most Mesolithic samples from central and northern Europe tested to date were found to belong to haplogroup U (mainly U5, with some U2 and U4), it is more likely that haplogroup HV, H and V evolved from the populations of Mediterranean hunter-gatherers and only spread northward from the Neolithic period onward.

There is ample evidence that HV was found at low frequencies among Neolithic farmers both in the Near East (in Pre-Pottery Neolithic Syria) and in Europe. HV has been found in ancient samples from the the Linear Pottery culture and its descendants (Schöningen, Baalberge) in Germany and the Cucuteni-Trypillian culture in Ukraine. No HV sample other than HV0 (i.e. haplogroup V) has so far been found in the Starčevo culture, nor in the Cardium Pottery or Megalithic samples from France, Spain and Portugal though.

The Bronze Age Indo-Europeans do not seem to have carried a lot of HV lineages (i.e. other than H and V). Out of over 100 Early Bronze Age samples that have been tested to date, only one HV6’17 from the Corded Ware culture and one HV6 Unetice culture were identified, but none in the Proto-Indo-European homeland in the Pontic-Caspian Steppe.

Hughey et al. (2013) analysed 34 samples from the Minoan civilization and found three HV samples, a remarkably high 8.8% of all samples, a percentage more typical of Mesopotamia than of anywhere in Europe, except perhaps Calabria. This, along with the presence of other typically Middle Eastern lineages such as R0, I5, H5, H7, H13a1a and others, suggests that the Minoans moved straight from the Middle East to Crete during the Bronze Age. Modern Greeks have much lower levels of haplogroup HV.

Haplogroup HV appears to have prospered in Mesopotamia, and was probably an important Assyrian and Babylonian female lineage. The modern distribution of mtDNA HV is particularly reminiscent that of Y-DNA haplogroup T. Haplogroup HV is found as far south as Ethiopia and Somalia, which are also hotspots of Y-haplogroup T. This strongly suggests that maternal HV and paternal T lineages spread together from the Fertile Crescent, and notably Mesopotamia, to Egypt and the Horn of Africa, as well as to central and eastern Europe. This is especially true of the HV1 subclade. (=> See also Correlating the mtDNA haplogroups of the original Y-haplogroup J1 and T1 herders).

(Information on haplogroup HV from eupaedia.com.)

Haplogroup H7 is estimated to be up to 10,700 years old (Behar et al., 2012). Although haplogroup H as a macrohaplogroup is considered dominantly European, your subclade most likely originated in the Near East (Pereira et al., 2005). Haplogroup H7 is a rare lineage, which is in part the reason why it is difficult to pinpoint the exact age and location of origin. Today, your motherline is found across the Near East, Europe, and Africa at low frequencies. However, the frequency peaks at its highest amongst the Berbers of Tunisia in North Africa (Ennafaa et al., 2009).

Although not confirmed for certain, it has been suggested that the carriers of haplogroup H7 were involved in the migrations across Europe from the Ice Age refugium locations. Populations carrying haplogroup H7 could have been involved in the recolonisation of the western and central regions at the end of the Ice Age. They likely migrated from a refugium between northern Spain and southern France. Other arguments have suggested that H7 did not enter Europe until the Neolithic (New Stone Age) during the expansion of agriculture across Eurasia (Pereira et al., 2005).

So the earliest traceable but unidentifiable Nuttall maternal ancestor was a woman we know as Eve – not her name, and emphatically not the Biblical Eve. In terms of mitochondrial haplogroups, the mt-MRCA (mitrochondial Most Recent Ancestor) is situated at the divergence of macro-haplogroup L into L0 and L1–6. As of 2013, estimates on the age of this split ranged at around 155,000 years ago, consistent with a date later than the speciation of Homo sapiens but earlier than the recent out-of-Africa dispersal.

The maternal haplogroup (mtDNA) of Christopher James Nuttall is: H7a1C.

From the root in what is modern day Kenya in East Africa, descendants of Mitrochondrial Eve spread north to modern day Sudan where there was a mutation from Haplogroup L to L3. A further mutation to N migrated through Egypt and across to Sinai. Another mutation to R and up through Turkey, round the Black Sea to Serbia, where another mutation (HV) migrated to Northern Spain.

Haplogroup L3 arose close to 70,000 years ago, near the time of the recent out-of-Africa event. This dispersal originated in East Africa and expanded to West Asia, and further to South and Southeast Asia in the course of a few millennia, and some research suggests that L3 participated in this migration out of Africa. Soares et al. suggest that L3 most likely expanded from East Africa into Eurasia sometime around 65–55,000 years ago.

The coastal route theory proposes that early modern humans, some of the bearers of mitochondrial haplogroup L3, arrived in the Arabian peninsula about 70,000-50,000 years ago, crossing from East Africa via the Bab-el-Mandeb straits. It has been estimated that from a population of 2,000 to 5,000 individuals in Africa, only a small group, possibly as few as 150 to 1,000 people, crossed the Red Sea.[12] The group would have travelled along the coastal route around Arabia and Persia to India relatively rapidly, within a few thousand years. From India, they would have spread to Southeast Asia (“Sundaland“) and Oceania (“Sahul“).

Haplogroup N is a human mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) clade. A macrohaplogroup, its descendant lineages are distributed across many continents. Like its sibling macrohaplogroup M, macrohaplogroup N is a descendant of the haplogroup L3.

All mtDNA haplogroups found outside of Africa are descendants of either haplogroup N or its sibling haplogroup M. M and N are the signature maternal haplogroups that define the theory of the recent African origin of modern humans and subsequent early human migrations around the world. The global distribution of haplogroups N and M indicates that there was likely at least one major prehistoric migration of humans out of Africa, with both N and M later evolving outside the continent.

This haplogroup (N) appears in Northern Europe, Central Europe, and throughout both the European and Asian parts of Russia.

Soares et al. (2009) estimate the age of haplogroup R to 66.8±14.2 kya (95% CI),[1] that is, between roughly 80,000 and 50,000 years ago, with a most likely age near about 65,000 years.

This is consistent with an emergence in the course of the Coastal Migration out of East Africa to West, South and Southeast Asia.[3] It has been suggested that the early lineage of haplogroups M, N and R along the coastal route during the period of roughly 70,000 to 60,000 years ago.[7]

Haplogroup R has wide diversity and antiquity in the indigenous population of South Asia. Tribes and castes of Western and Southern India show higher diversity than the other regions, possibly suggesting their autochthonous status.[2] Larruga et al. (2017) found mtDNA R spread out to Eurasia and Australia from a core area along the Southeast Asian coast.[6] The Ust’-Ishim man fossil of Siberia, dated ca. 45,000 years old, belongs to haplogroup R* (formerly classified as U*).

Haplogroup HV originated at least 25,000 years ago, perhaps during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM) like many other top-level haplogroups. The oldest evidence of haplogroup HV in Europe comes from the testing of a 13,000 year-old sample from La Pasiega in Cantabria (northern Spain), dating from the Magdalenian period (18,000-10,000 years before present) as analysed by Hervella et al. (2012), which could have belonged to haplogroup R0 or HV.

Since most Mesolithic samples from central and northern Europe tested to date were found to belong to haplogroup U (mainly U5, with some U2 and U4), it is more likely that haplogroup HV, H and V evolved from the populations of Mediterranean hunter-gatherers and only spread northward from the Neolithic period onward.

There is ample evidence that HV was found at low frequencies among Neolithic farmers both in the Near East (in Pre-Pottery Neolithic Syria) and in Europe. HV has been found in ancient samples from the the Linear Pottery culture and its descendants (Schöningen, Baalberge) in Germany and the Cucuteni-Trypillian culture in Ukraine. No HV sample other than HV0 (i.e. haplogroup V) has so far been found in the Starčevo culture, nor in the Cardium Pottery or Megalithic samples from France, Spain and Portugal though.

The Bronze Age Indo-Europeans do not seem to have carried a lot of HV lineages (i.e. other than H and V). Out of over 100 Early Bronze Age samples that have been tested to date, only one HV6’17 from the Corded Ware culture and one HV6 Unetice culture were identified, but none in the Proto-Indo-European homeland in the Pontic-Caspian Steppe.

Hughey et al. (2013) analysed 34 samples from the Minoan civilization and found three HV samples, a remarkably high 8.8% of all samples, a percentage more typical of Mesopotamia than of anywhere in Europe, except perhaps Calabria. This, along with the presence of other typically Middle Eastern lineages such as R0, I5, H5, H7, H13a1a and others, suggests that the Minoans moved straight from the Middle East to Crete during the Bronze Age. Modern Greeks have much lower levels of haplogroup HV.

Haplogroup HV appears to have prospered in Mesopotamia, and was probably an important Assyrian and Babylonian female lineage. The modern distribution of mtDNA HV is particularly reminiscent that of Y-DNA haplogroup T. Haplogroup HV is found as far south as Ethiopia and Somalia, which are also hotspots of Y-haplogroup T. This strongly suggests that maternal HV and paternal T lineages spread together from the Fertile Crescent, and notably Mesopotamia, to Egypt and the Horn of Africa, as well as to central and eastern Europe. This is especially true of the HV1 subclade. (=> See also Correlating the mtDNA haplogroups of the original Y-haplogroup J1 and T1 herders).

(Information on haplogroup HV from eupaedia.com.)

Haplogroup H7 is estimated to be up to 10,700 years old (Behar et al., 2012). Although haplogroup H as a macrohaplogroup is considered dominantly European, your subclade most likely originated in the Near East (Pereira et al., 2005). Haplogroup H7 is a rare lineage, which is in part the reason why it is difficult to pinpoint the exact age and location of origin. Today, your motherline is found across the Near East, Europe, and Africa at low frequencies. However, the frequency peaks at its highest amongst the Berbers of Tunisia in North Africa (Ennafaa et al., 2009).

Although not confirmed for certain, it has been suggested that the carriers of haplogroup H7 were involved in the migrations across Europe from the Ice Age refugium locations. Populations carrying haplogroup H7 could have been involved in the recolonisation of the western and central regions at the end of the Ice Age. They likely migrated from a refugium between northern Spain and southern France. Other arguments have suggested that H7 did not enter Europe until the Neolithic (New Stone Age) during the expansion of agriculture across Eurasia (Pereira et al., 2005).

Evidence has pointed towards the earlier carriers of your motherline being a part of a huge milestone in migratory history:  the recolonisation of Europe. This event took place at the end of the Ice Age. The climate had a snowball effect, first changing the environment which in turn changed where people lived, what they ate, and how they hunted.

H7 has been linked to the Neolithic, which marked a change in humanity’s way of life indefinitely. Farming not only signified a new dietary pattern but formed the foundation to support more people on less land. People no longer had to solely forage and hunt to survive. Instead, they could set up permanent shelters and manipulate the land around them. This paved the way for populations to continuously grow and would ultimately support kingdoms and civilisations. H7 has been found amongst members of the Neolithic Unetice culture. This culture was affiliated with the emergence of metalwork and an increasingly politically structured society (Brotherton et al., 2013).

H7 is not limited to the Tunisian Berbers, but these people have the highest frequencies to date. They were no strangers to the Ancient Greeks, who encountered vast Berber Kingdoms governing the areas now in modern-day Libya and Tunisia. Today, most Berbers are Sunni Muslims, although they have retained their own unique culture and language.

Haplogroup H7a1c is a branch on the maternal tree of human kind. Its age is between and 5,900 years (Behar et al., 2012b). [haplogroup.org]