Genetic genealogy of the Kindt family

800 AD, Viking Age…

Context

According to Ragnarssona þáttr, the famous Ragnar Lodbrok was captured by the king of northumbria and put to death, thrown into a snake pit.

What would have led his sons Halfdan, Ivar the Boneless and Ubba to lead the Great Heathen Army to invade Northumbria. York felt in November 866. Ivar’s vengeance was complete with King Ælla blood eagle.

Ivar also conquered a part of Mercia. He returned to York to strengthen his bases after ratifying a treaty that left him master of Nottingham. Ivar eventually broke the treaty by surrendering King Edmond of East-Anglia to martyrdom, after which Ivar would have suddenly left England.

According to the annals of Ulster, in 870, the two Norman kings Olaf and Ivar arrived at Dublin from Scotland, bringing back a great variety of English, Breton and Pictish slaves. Ivar died two years later at Dublin.

Godfrid ravaged Flanders using Ghent as his base. In 882, Godfrid ravaged Lotharingia and the cities of Maastricht, Liège, Stavelot, Prüm, Cologne, and Koblenz were devastated. After the Siege of Asselt forced him to come to terms, Godfrid was granted the Kennemerland, which had formerly been ruled by Rorik of Dorestad, as a vassal of Charles, according to the Annales Fuldenses. Godfrid swore oaths to Charles promising never to again lay waste his kingdom and accepted Christianity and baptism, at which Charles stood as his godfather. In return, Charles appointed him Duke of Frisia and gave him Gisela, daughter of Lothair II, as his wife.

However, Godfrid did nothing against a Danish raid which pillaged large parts of the Low Countries. In 885, he was summoned to Lobith for a meeting after being accused of complicity with Hugh, Duke of Alsace, in an insurrection. In an act of treachery he was killed by a group of Frisian and Saxon nobles at the connivance of Henry of Franconia. The local count Gerulf took over the West Frisian coastline from the Danish after the murder.

Rikiwulf (“The rich and powerful wolf” or “The Ruler of the wolves”) was a member of the Wulfing dynasty, mentioned in the Beowulf saga. In 880 AD, he sailed with his Viking warriors from Ghent up the river Lys in Flanders, and settled in succession Rikiwulfinga-haim near Tielt, Rekkem near Menin, and Richebourg, Reclinghem, Racquinghem and Erquinghem-Lys in present Artois, France.

Kind family would have been part of the vikings who settled in Rikiwulfinga-haim, near present-day Tielt (tiletum, tilia, linden which means “shield” in skaldic poetry) and would have stayed there ever since. The first written traces of a Kint “dictus puer” (the child) in Tielt date from 1284.

Kind, in old Norse, means: child, baby, offspring, family, parents, clan. The name is often found in the nomenclature of “the hundreds of sweden”. Vikings were using skaldic poetry to name. Therefore “kind” could also be standing for “child of the wood” which was a skaldic kenning for “wolf”.
Read more about the origin of the name.

The wolf clan

The Wulfings, Wylfings or Ylfings (the “wolf clan”) was a powerful clan in Beowulf, Widsith and in the Norse sagas. Scandinavian sources define the Wulfings as the ruling clan of the Geatish petty kingdom of Östergötland. According to the Getica of Jordanes, Götland is the origin of the Gothic civilisation. The name Got- from old norse *Gautr is one of Odin’s epihets. Traditionally, Viking Kings claimed to be descended from the furious God. Some facts suggest that the Jutes who settled in Kent are a related people to the Geats.

We've come a long way...

Haplogroup I-M253

The ancestors of this haplogroup were part of the Middle East clan who moved from the Arabian Peninsula to the west and reached Central Europe through the Balkans. The M170 marker, which caused the division of haplogroup I, was transmitted to its current representatives during the Ice Age. When the ice masses retreated, this haplogroup played a decisive role in the recolonization of Europe. The Vikings probably came from this haplogroup, which explains the extension of their group on the British Isles and in the south of France.

Kindt genetic lineage

M-168

The CT haplogroup defines one of the major ancestral lineages common to humanity along the male lines from father to son. The most recent common patrilineal ancestor of all CT men today is probably older than the first anatomically modern human migration out of Africa, to which some of his descendants participated. It is therefore believed that he had lived in Africa before this highly presumed migration.

M-89

Haplogroup F is the “brother” of haplogroup C and the “parent” of haplogroups G, H, I, J, K, F1, F2, F3, F4 and F *, as well as their offspring. This is a relatively old haplogroup in line with anatomically modern humans, which appeared either in the Indian Subcontinent or in the Near East about 50,000 years ago. We find it or its “offspring” (subclade) in nearly 90% of the male population, being only a minority in Africa, Kazakhstan, Tibet, Mongolia, Japan, Polynesia and among the Aborigines of Australia.

M-170

Haplogroup I is the oldest major lineage in Europe and perhaps the only one born there. Haplogroup I is thought to have arrived from the Middle East about 30,000 years ago. In other words, Cro-Magnons probably belonged to I (alongside the oldest haplogroups like F, C1 and IJ 3. The I1 branch separated from I2 20,000 years ago and evolved independently in Scandinavia during the late Paleolithic and Mesolithic periods. Haplogroup I is divided into many subgroups and was born in the Balkans more than 30,000 years ago.

M-253

Haplogroup I-M253 descends from haplogroup I-M170. It has long been recognized that I-M253 was born 20,000 years ago in the Iberian Peninsula. However, in 2014, Hungarian archaeologists update the remains of 9 people dating from the linear pottery culture. One of them was carrying the SNP M253, characteristic of haplogroup I1. it is thought that this culture would date between -5500 to -4700. A new study, in 2015, this time estimates the origin of -3470 to -5070. with geographical origin a dispersion from present-day Denmark. I-M253 is found in higher density in northern Europe and countries where there was invasion of the ancient Germanic and Viking peoples.

i1a

DF-29

DF29 is the main branch of m253 and represents 99% of its offspring.

Y-14628

Bogøvej Langelands – Burial ground from Viking period. The cemetery is located on small drumlins of very mixed moraine material with a high chalk content; there were thus varying, but often good, conditions for the preservation of skeletons. 49 graves have been excavated, Dated to 10th century, possibly with few graves dated to the early 11th century AD.

VK367 Denmark_Bogovej D was reported I1 in preprint. YFull have placed this sample at I-Y14628. FTDNA have place this sample at I-BY67827, with comment that VK506 and VK367 split the I-BY67827 branch. Derived for 2 SNPs total. They also share one unique marker (26514336 G>C). New branches = I-Y16449>I-BY72774>I-FT382000. Average sequencing depth 1.053x.

i1a7

Y-16449

In Salme, Estonia, two boat burials have been excavated – Salme I is a partially destroyed boat burial while Salme II discovered later and comprised practically the whole ship contour. Salme I was probably a rowing ship approximately 11.5m long and ca 2m wide. Fragments of three swords and other weapons, a lot of gaming pieces etc. were found as grave goods. Skeletal remains of seven individuals were found, including some partial skeletons and also a lot bones of domestic animals, and the remains of goshawk and sparrow hawk were found. Results of isotope analysis show that the warriors buried in the mass graves in the ships came from Central Sweden.

VK506 Estonia_Salme_I-3 SM10601:III was reported I1a (corresponds to I-DF29) in preprint. YFull have placed this sample at I-Y16449 branch. FTDNA have placed this sample at I-BY67827 with comment that VK506 and VK367 split the I-BY67827 branch. Derived for 2 SNPs total. They also share one unique marker (26514336 G>C). New branches = I-Y16449>I-BY72774>I-FT382000. Average sequencing depth 1.233x. Carbon 14 dated to 1320±30 BP (Hela-1915), i.e. 650–780 cal AD

i1a7a

Y-16530

Today, according to the Family Tree DNA database, we find 10 occurences of the Y-16530 so far: 1 is the Kindt in Flanders, 1 in North Carolina, 1 in London and 4 in Sweden including at least one in Östergötland, Sweden. The last 3 have unknown origins.

If we are to believe the latest archaeological finds locating Y-16449 in central Sweden, this would corroborate the hypothesis of the Viking invasion-colonization as Rikiwulf, founder of Rikiwulfinga-heim (present-day Tielt, Belgium), was a member of the Wulfing clan, originated in Östergötland.

Genes & genealogy

Origin of the name

The name “berserkers“, warriors who purportedly fought in a trance-like fury, is literally rendered as “bear-coats”, along with úlfhéðnar (“wolf-coats“).

In old Norse, “kind” means: child, baby, offspring, family, parents, clan. Still today, it retains this meaning in several Germanic languages.

The name is often found in the nomenclature of “the hundreds of sweden” (legal divisions in Östergötland in application since the Viking Age): Bankekind, Hammarkind, Hanekind, Kinda, Skärkind and Östkind and in Kinds, a district in southern
Västergötland.

Its recurrence in this region suggests that it is related to the Geats.

This Geats identity leaves another possible meaning as we know vikings were using skaldic poetry to name. Therefore “kind” could be standing for “child of the wood” which was a skaldic kenning (metaphorical circumlocution) for “wolf” as is the case for the name ot the famous Saxon leader Widukind. This could be the link between the clan and the rulers of Östergötland at that time: the Wulfings, the wolf clan. The name “kind” is also found in “Gavelkind”, a kent succession law inherited from the jute colonization.

The onomastic particle: the “t” at the end of the name was probably added later in Belgium to attest the origin of a filiation from a family (clan) in the sense of “son of, daughter of”.

Along our genealogical research in Belgium, we have found the name Kindt, as early as the 13th century, spelled in different ways: kind, kint, kinde, kindt, kyndt, kints, skints, skins, Tkind, tkint, tkinds, … even within the same family. this is probably due to several factors (illiteracy, translation, interpretation, writing conditions, etc.).

Under the impetus of the Ragnar’s sons and the Great Heathen Army, Sea-King Godfrid ravaged Flanders using Ghent as his base. Rikiwulf “The Ruler of the wolves” sailed with his Viking warriors, the Kindt ancestor among them, up to the river Lys and founded Rikiwulfinga-haim near Tielt.