Posted on 07/04/2002 5:27:12 PM PDT by blam
Sunday, 30 June, 2002, 15:31 GMT 16:31 UK
English and Welsh are races apart
Gene scientists claim to have found proof that the Welsh are the "true" Britons.
The research supports the idea that Celtic Britain underwent a form of ethnic cleansing by Anglo-Saxons invaders following the Roman withdrawal in the fifth century.
Genetic tests show clear differences between the Welsh and English
It suggests that between 50% and 100% of the indigenous population of what was to become England was wiped out, with Offa's Dyke acting as a "genetic barrier" protecting those on the Welsh side.
And the upheaval can be traced to this day through genetic differences between the English and the Welsh.
Academics at University College in London comparing a sample of men from the UK with those from an area of the Netherlands where the Anglo-Saxons are thought to have originated found the English subjects had genes that were almost identical.
But there were clear differences between the genetic make-up of Welsh people studied.
The research team studied the Y-chromosome, which is passed almost unchanged from father to son, and looked for certain genetic markers.
Ethnic links: Many races share common bonds
They chose seven market towns mentioned in the Domesday Book of 1086 and studied 313 male volunteers whose paternal grandfather had also lived in the area.
They then compared this with samples from Norway and with Friesland, now a northern province of the Netherlands.
The English and Frisians studied had almost identical genetic make-up but the English and Welsh were very different.
The researchers concluded the most likely explanation for this was a large-scale Anglo-Saxon invasion, which devastated the Celtic population of England, but did not reach Wales.
Dr Mark Thomas, of the Centre for Genetic Anthropology at UCL, said their findings suggested that a migration occurred within the last 2,500 years.
Genetic links
It reinforced the idea that the Welsh were the true indigenous Britons.
In April last year, research for a BBC programme on the Vikings revealed strong genetic links between the Welsh and Irish Celts and the Basques of northern Spain and south France.
It suggested a possible link between the Celts and Basques, dating back tens of thousands of years.
The UCL research into the more recent Anglo-Saxon period suggested a migration on a huge scale.
"It appears England is made up of an ethnic cleansing event from people coming across from the continent after the Romans left," he said.
Celtic Britons
Archaeologists after the Second World War rejected the traditionally held view that an Anglo-Saxon invasion pushed the indigenous Celtic Britons to the fringes of Britain.
Instead, they said the arrival of Anglo-Saxon culture could have come from trade or a small ruling elite.
But the latest research by the UCL team, "using genetics as a history book", appears to support the original view of a large-scale invasion of England.
It suggests that the Welsh border was more of a genetic barrier to the Anglo-Saxon Y chromosome gene flow than the North Sea.
Dr Thomas added: "Our findings completely overturn the modern view of the origins of the English."
Let's Do It!
LOL
This statue was found by archaeologist while digging through the ruins of the Olmecs ( the big Negroid looking heads) in Vera Cruz, Mexico. Do you care to speculate what people are represented by this statue in North America in prehistoric times? (Phoenicians?)
This has been one of the most fascinating posts I have EVER read on FR! Thank you everybody! I have been sitting here mesmerized for more than two of hours reading all the threads. It has been a tremendous education and treat! Thank you again.
You're welcome. LT is the brains, I just stir the pot. There is a lot more at Gods, Graves, Glyphs that was set up by Ernest_at_the_Beach, but I can't tell you how to get there. lol. (Ernest will be along shortly and provide a link)
Is the Israel-Celt connection the reason that Irish Gaelic and Hebrew sound so similar? I was shocked the first time I heard someone speaking Gaelic on an audio tape my daughter had. I thought the language learning company had packed a Hebrew tape in the box by mistake.
I think the point must have been made about the people of Brittany, not Normandy. Norman dialect now is just a form of French. Originally, in the Middle Ages, Normandy was settled by Norsemen, but they quickly adopted French as their language. By the time they conquered England in 1066, I don't think there were any traces left of their original Scandinavian language.
Sorry, but as long as you insist on going exculsively down the language road and ignoring all the other facts of history and Bible you are going to be frustrated. Language is simply a VERY POOR INDICATOR of roots, especially over the long time periods we are examining. Ask any real linguist/archeologist.
It is astounding that you can be so cock sure the Norsemen totally lost their lingustic heritage IN ONLY THREE GENERATIONS or less, but everyone else you promote doesn't lose theirs in THOUSANDS OF YEARS! Don't you consider this ironic?
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