What it means to identify as Melungeon

I love that !! Can’t erase history, there is good and bad….can’t change it by ignoring it. I am so glad this gentleman was kind enough to give us his perspective. All people are beautiful.

I am melougeon. I might look white but I am glad I am melougeon. I am glad I was place by God this heritage.

I’m melungeon. This video is so validating and so important. So thankful that it exists.

It was so important to my GM to keep the heritage hidden, including not displaying and later destroying family pictures. However the DNA tells the truth.

I love learning this is amazing everybody not just black or white,you must know your history

70 Years old….Wow! He looks GREAT!!

I’ve been doing my genealogy and I have dna matches with the names Mullins, Williams and Goins! Interesting!!

Do all melungeons also defy the laws of aging?! Cuz when he said 70!!!!

Very interesting; I have partial Melungeon ancestry (only recently discovered) myself.

Everybody mixed up, it's pointless to worry about it. 🙂

If we got rid of being just “BLACK or WHITE” we would learn a lot of interesting DETAILS about our ancestry.

The tri-racial identity is common in Brazil, and there used to be all sorts of Portuguese terms for people of specific quantums of this background or that background.

I learned about the Melungeons while reading about the Maroons. One of the historians had noted that the DNA found in Melungeons is so varied, Spanish, French African American, Irish. He had only a theory, based on being from the area and knowing the history of the area well. They know Maroon communities were there from De Soto's march through Appalachia in the 1600s. Because those conquistadores didn't march without an army of slaves to do all the work for them. Along with indentured people. And nobody liked life under DeSoto, so his theory was, when the slaves made a break for it, more than likely a number of Spanish soldiers went with them. Irish run aways, or any runaways joined them later. Because when they were first mentioned by incomers in the 1700s, they were described as so successful and knowledgeable about guns. Not saying runaway slaves wouldn't be successful, I'm saying if you were escaping a ravaging psychopath like DeSoto, you're not likely to make it without a little army on your side. It's just a theory, but it seems a practical one.

Yes we are all tri racial my family is from Georgia

For Gods sake man change the batteries to the smoke alarm!!!

I don’t believe there is a dna group for Sicily, the south shares more African ancestry than northern Italy. He may be Sicilian ancestry, historical darker skinned, prior to losing independence

I’m sorry to say and shameful that Italian used the word melogean as a slur. In Italian melongean is an eggplant

Not a real thing