Posted on 01/17/2006 9:53:58 PM PST by neverdem
Listen more kindly to the New York Irishmen who assure you that the blood of early Irish kings flows in their veins. At least 2 percent of the time, they are telling the truth, according to a new genetic survey.
The survey not only bolsters the bragging rights of some Irishmen claiming a proud heritage but also provides evidence of the existence of Niall of the Nine Hostages, an Irish high king of the fifth century A.D. regarded by some historians as more legend than real.
The survey shows that 20 percent of men in northwestern Ireland carry a distinctive genetic signature on their Y chromosomes, possibly inherited from Niall, who was said to have had numerous sons, or some other leader in a position to have had many descendants.
About one in 50 New Yorkers of European origin - including men with names like O'Connor, Flynn, Egan, Hynes, O'Reilly and Quinn - carry the genetic signature linked with Niall and northwestern Ireland, writes Daniel Bradley, the geneticist who conducted the survey with colleagues at Trinity College in Dublin. He arrived at that estimate after surveying the Y chromosomes in a genetic database that included New Yorkers.
About 400,000 city residents say they are of Irish ancestry, according to a 2004 Census Bureau survey.
"I hope this means that I inherit a castle in Ireland," the novelist Peter Quinn said by phone from the Peter McManus cafe in Chelsea. Some McManuses also have the genetic signature. ("I hang out with kings," Mr. Quinn said.)
He said his father used to tell him that all the Quinn men were bald from wearing a crown. But he added, "We spent 150 years in the Bronx, and I think we wiped out all the royal genes in the process."
The report appears in...
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
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Gods |
Just updating the GGG info, not sending a general distribution. |
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Yeah, and I’m wonderin’ how I stand being from the Maloney’s out of County Claire.
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