The Oldest Ancestor
A genealogical orphan is not someone without parents, but someone whose ancestors left no footprints in the record, leaving their descendants stranded in time. Considering this, I definitely qualify as such an orphan. I know my grandparents well, but after that it gets a bit hazy, since I can only recollect bits and pieces. I know my great-grandfather on my mother’s side was a New York City policeman. On my father’s side, my great-grandfather owned a candy store. My father, as a boy, appreciated this choice of profession; it meant he would get free sweets from time to time. So I marvel at what it takes to preserve a genealogical record that traverses the millennia.
So who has the longest “verified” traceable lineage? Confucius, the most famous member of the Kong family. For the West, Arnulf of Metz (c. 582–640 CE) is the record holder. These two lineages, East and West, spanning the millennia, are a triumph in disciplined record-keeping.
Although Arnulf of Metz isn’t nearly as well-known as Confucius, he was an influential nobleman of his time. Married to a noblewoman, he was a Merovingian civil administrator who had "six distinct provinces under his care." Later, he pursued a monastic life in the Vosges mountains. Early chroniclers classified Arnulf of Metz as a saint—a very useful political device used by his great-great-great-grandson, Charlemagne. Because of this dynastic connection, most of Europe’s royalty and millions of people of European descent who trace their lineage to Charlemagne ultimately lead back to Arnulf.
Unlike China’s continuous, unbroken path—which was by no means smooth and placid—the West was defined by the fall of the Roman Empire. The records of the 400s and the 500s were too sparse to prove a lineage to the Roman world. That didn’t stop the rulers of Europe from creating legendary links to important rulers. Monarchs during the early medieval period needed all the legitimacy they could muster. So they had no problem believing that Arnulf of Metz was descended from Merovingian kings (such as Chloderic the Parricide; it just rolls off the tongue, doesn’t it?). If that wasn’t enough, they decided to press their luck and connect to legendary Trojan origins via Aeneas. It was inventions like these that made finding Arnulf of Metz’s ancestors so frustrating; so as of now, Arnulf of Metz is as far back as genealogists can go.
These lineages can be considered “verified,” but what does that mean exactly? In the case of Confucius, the genealogy is quite organized. The family-run Confucius Genealogy Compilation Committee (CGCC) oversees the measurement and maintenance of Confucius’s lineage. The resultant fifth edition, published in 2009 to coincide with the 2,560th anniversary of Confucius's birth, expanded the registry exponentially to over two million individuals across an 80-volume set. However, they only rely on historical records and eschew the use of DNA evidence. Even so, independent researchers have tackled this aspect and have come up with compelling evidence.
Human beings have 23 pairs of chromosomes in the nucleus of their cells, consisting of 22 pairs of autosomal chromosomes and 1 pair of allosome chromosomes—the sex chromosomes. Women have two X sex chromosomes, and men have an X and a Y chromosome. The Y chromosome is passed on from male to male almost untouched. (There are extremely minor mutations over the centuries, but that’s beyond the scope of this article.) That means a male descendant from Confucius has practically the same Y chromosome that Confucius himself had. For female descendants, since women do not have a Y chromosome, if their brother, father, or uncle has this chromosome, then they could be verified as a descendant.
Obviously, DNA can’t be retrieved from the long-dead Confucius, so a clever workaround had to be created: reverse engineering. Using the extensive documentary evidence of the Kong lineage, thousands of Asian men had their DNA sampled. Then, samples of men whose common ancestor lived 1,000 to 2,000 years in the past were compared. Because Y-chromosome mutations accumulate at a steady, predictable rate, scientists can use them like a ticking clock to estimate when a family’s common ancestor lived. Genetic software analyzed these mutations in living Kong men and calculated that the founder of their specific branch lived roughly 2,200 to 3,600 years ago. Because Confucius lived 2,500 years ago, this timeline fits, confirming that the core family tree is anchored in genuine ancient history.
Considering my own very limited paper trail, knowing only as far back as a candy shop and a policeman’s beat, it is easy to envy the certainty of the lineages of the Kong clan or the Carolingian kings. Unlike the vast quantity of records preserved over time for these famous figures, as my ancestors passed away into obscurity, much of my history was irretrievably lost. So, like most human beings around the world, I grudgingly accept my “orphaned” status. After all, there is a certain freedom in starting with a clean slate, unburdened by ancient ghosts, free to concentrate on the here and now.
