> Edit: or of course they could have sent a saliva sample to one of the genealogy sites, assuming they had enough to part with some, and it was in suitable cond

> Edit: or of course they could have sent a saliva sample to one of the genealogy sites, assuming they had enough to part with some, and it was in suitable condition to work with the site's test equipment. That's unlikely without special arrangements. Have you ever done a 23andMe sample? The tube requires a lot of saliva. My understanding it's vastly more saliva than they need and the main reason is to make it impossible to surreptitiously collect enough saliva to genotype someone without their cooperation via 23andMe etc.