The Viking Heritage

The Big-Y test shows unambiguously that my uncle's line is Norse—not Celtic—in origin. My Livingston ancestors were not ex-highlanders. In addition to the Livingston match, FTDNA identifies 10 Big-Y matches, 6 of which are Scandinavians (1 match to a Swede, 5 to Norwegians). There are 5 British matches, one of which is to a Shetlander (Shetland is a former Norse colony).

The world's leading Y-DNA analysis service, YFull, has supplied a list of the 100 closest Livingston matches, most of which are -again- to Scandinavians. YFull have a database of over 1000 ancient Y-DNA samples, and significantly, the closest of these matches is to a skeleton unearthed from a Viking grave in Orkney, an archipelago situated off the north coast of Scotland, which was annexed by the King of Norway in 875. Livingston matches to ancient Viking skeletons from various parts of the world:  

• VK205 (Orkney)
• VK35 (Sweden)
• VK551 (Estonia)
• VK493 (Estonia)
• VK237 (Faroe Islands, Denmark)
• VK-A26 (Iceland)
• VK129 (Iceland)

And my uncle apparently shares a considerable amount of DNA -although not a paternal ancestor- with another ancient Viking skeleton from Denmark (VK301):

The DNA extracted from the Orkney skeleton displayed 50% Danish ancestry, and we know the Danish Vikings settled mainly in England and France (Normandy). The Scandinavians who raided and ultimately settled in Normandy included Danes, Anglo-Danes, Norwegians, Norse-Gaels, Orkney-Vikings, and probably Swedes.