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."
IMO, this all ocurred after the Black Sea was flooded in 5600BC. They also moved into China and they are known as the Tocharians along with their extinct language (Indo-European), Tocharinan.
Same here. And the link to spain has long been known to scientists as well. Most believe the Irish and scots are related to a celtic people inhabiting the spanish peninsula who emigrated to the British isles roughly 2500 to 2800 years ago. They are called the celtiberians. Nothing new from what I have read on the subject for years.
CC
There are associations with other languages. I think one is Finnish and I've even read that there is an association with an American Indian language. It's apparently a very ancient language that is believed to have been wide-spread at one time.
The latest Celtic conquest occurred about 700 BC when the sons of Mir (the three brothers) sailed to what is now Ireland and named it Scotia, after their great goddess called Scota.
These folks had come from the Black Sea area to Spain at about the same time as the creation of Solomon's Israel (if you want a Biblical frame of reference).
The Celtiberian people (who lived much further South) were subjected to genocide by a Roman general who was tried for his crimes.
Unlikely.
The "origin" of a racial, ethnic, national or religious group is normally considered to be that where they became distinguishable from ancestral groups.
For instance, Americans obviously all came from elsewhere. But none of their ancestors were Americans before their arrival and melding into a unique group.
Similarly, linguistic analysis shows that the Polynesians are primarily descended from a rather small group that spread out across the Pacific from Taiwan. Obviously, they weren't even really "native" to Taiwan, as their ancestors had come there from elsewhere. But at some point they developed a group of characteristics that was recognizably what we today call Polynesian.
My post was meant to point out that the Celts first became recognizable as Celts in Central Europe, probably somewhere around Bohemia. They migrated elsewhere, partly pulled by the desire to conquer others, and partly pushed by other groups coming into the areas they were leaving.
Which is pretty much the same history as every other group of humans.
Ioan's eyes are light, hazel color. The dark hair, light eyes and fair skin is a nice combination. My Dad's people were Welsh, and they had dark hair and blue or brown eyes. My Dad had coal black hair but blue eyes. I always thought that if you had coal black hair, you were Italian or Hispanic, but the Welsh share that coloring, too.
Well, if the Irish and Welsh are the same, the Paddy's were the ones that must have run screaming out of Wales, to avoid the god awful close harmony singing! :-)
And on a cheery note! Ireland hammered the shite out of Wales in the six nations rugby today in Landsdowne Road! :-)
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