A University of Granada study, published in 2019 in the journal Scientific Reports, found no significant North African paternal signal in men from Granada, Málaga and Almería. The results do not allow the claim that Andalusians, as a group, share more DNA with a Norwegian than with a North African, and the researchers themselves stress the limitations of the analysis.
The work examined 17 Y-chromosome markers in 146 unrelated men whose families had been settled in those provinces for at least three generations. The Y chromosome is passed down only through the paternal line and represents a small fraction of the genome, so the study describes only that specific inheritance. This methodological choice explains why the results refer to one particular lineage and not to the complete biological history of a person or a region.
The Andalusian samples fell within the Spanish genetic group and showed affinities with Iberian and Mediterranean populations. When compared with published data on Iberian, European and North African populations, the authors detected no relevant North African paternal contribution. The closeness to populations of northern Europe, including Norway, appeared only in specific markers and does not reflect a higher overall percentage of Norwegian DNA than North African DNA. In other words, a match in a few markers does not equate to a greater proportion of Norwegian ancestry across the genome.
The university itself stated that it found no significant North African paternal influence in the sample. However, the study does not cover maternal lineages or ancestry across the whole genome, so it cannot rule out North African mixing in other parts of the DNA. Nor can it be generalized to all of Spain or all of Andalusia, since the sample was limited in size and geographic origin.
The researchers also warn that migrations and expulsions following the Christian conquest may have reshaped the region's lineages. These population movements, which occurred over centuries, may have altered the genetic composition observed today, so the current analysis cannot precisely reconstruct each historical episode. Genetics, they note, cannot measure the cultural legacy of Al-Ándalus, which is not reducible to biological inheritance: language, architecture, science and customs are transmitted through channels other than genes.
Finally, the United States' National Human Genome Research Institute reminds that different analyses answer different questions. A result on one type of marker is not a conclusion about the complete ancestry of a population, and comparing figures obtained with different methods calls for caution. That warning best summarizes the real scope of the Granada work: it contributes one specific piece to the genetic map of Andalusia, but it does not settle the question of the origin of Spaniards' DNA.