English And Welsh Are Races Apart

BBC ^ | 6-30-2002

[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."

[nickcarraway]

You mean infamous Galicians.

[agrarianlady]

I recently saw a show that said genetic differences were a probable cause of why some survived the bubonic plague and others didn't.

I'm too lazy to look it up right now but I wonder how the Welsh population fared.

[muawiyah]

The Galicians are the same people as the folks on the other side of the Bay of Biscay.

As soon as you get it into your mind that the Bay of Biscay was a major ancient trading area, you realize that the Britons, Bretons, Galicians, Cornish, Southern Welsh and a good deal of the Irish are the exact same people culturally and in terms of blood relationships.

[blam]

"I recently saw a show that said genetic differences were a probable cause of why some survived the bubonic plague and others didn't."

I don't know about this but, I don't doubt it either. There were many, many plagues and some would have had immunity.

[blam]

Some interesting info here

[agrarianlady]

delta 32

http://www.pbs.org/wnet/secrets/case_plague/

Local Eyam lore tells befuddling stories of plague survivors who had close contact with the bacterium but never caught the disease. Elizabeth Hancock buried six children and her husband in a week, but never became ill. The village gravedigger handled hundreds of plague-ravaged corpses, but survived as well. Could these people have somehow been immune to the Black Death?

Dr. Stephen O'Brien of the National Institutes of Health in Washington D.C. suggests they were. His work with HIV and the mutated form of the gene CCR5, called "delta 32," led him to Eyam. In 1996, research showed that delta 32 prevents HIV from entering human cells and infecting the body. O'Brien thought this principle could be applied to the plague bacteria, which affects the body in a similar manner. To determine whether the Eyam plague survivors may have carried delta 32, O'Brien tested the DNA of their modern-day descendents. What he found out was startling ...

[siems]

Actually we refer to ourselves as 'Cymru' (The people) and to Angleland as 'Lloegyr' (The Lost Lands).... and while we are on it, its the Free Welsh Army and Meibion Gln Dwr (Sons of Glyndower).

"Come home to a real fire, by a cottage in Wales"

Cymru am buith....

[Renfield]

' "Bo" is just another Celtic honorific, '.....

You have solved a mystery for me. In rural areas of the coastal plain of South Carolina, an area populated first by Scots-Irish, then by Highland Scots after the highland clearances, men who are friends often address each other as "Bo". I used to live there, and I haven't heard this anywhere else. You don't hear this in the city, only in the country. Now I understand.

[Sam Cree]

Haven't had a chance to read all of this long thread yet, but am a little disturbed by the use of the phrase "ethnic cleansing" being applied to the Anglo Saxons, I'm suspicious of the motivation.

As far as I know, our heritage (the English heritage) of individual freedom and personal liberty is traceable in large part to Anglo Saxon custom and tradition.

My personal ancestry is divided pretty equally between Celtic and Germanic.

[srs8ctd]

The people of Cymru seek the support of brave American patriots in Wales' fight for freedom. Support us online, read what the English Crown are doing to republican heroes!
www.welshrepublican.com

[srs8ctd]

SUPPORT THE WELSH REPUBLICAN ARMY! INDEPENDENCE NOW! Fe godwn ni eto! We shall rise again!

[Barset]

thanks for posting this. b.

[Ciexyz]

"Ioan Gruffudd" bump.

[blam]

Welsh Republican Action

[Myrddin]

I was involved with a Welsh language group on a daily basis in the early 90's. At some point the topic of conversation turned to politics. The Plaid Cymru people exposed themselves as rabid socialists. The participants in the group asked whether there was any room for people with a pro-Welsh leaning that were not interested in socialism. The result was like farting in an elevator. The group disbanded within hours.

I would love to see Wales operate as an independent, sovereign nation again. It is likely that the politics that derive from such an event would make the place undesirable for anyone with a conservative point of view. It's already far too leftist for my taste.

[blam]

Didn't know that, thanks.

[Zionist Conspirator]

The English are the true abstractions of humanity. While everyone else feels rooted to an ancient homeland, the English (who came to England from elsewhere) have swarmed throughout the whole world, imposing their language on everyone else to such an extent that everyone knows English (which might as well be called "Terran" or "Human") while native English speakers are the only people who know only their own language.

In addition to this the English seem to have a desire to be completely absorbed into other identities. It is the English-Americans who are "just Americans," the English Canadians who are "just Canadians," the English Australians who are "just Australians," and the English in England are "just British" (the Welsh, Scots, and Irish have no such desire to be absorbed into a greater entity). Even the very names "England" and "English" have become mere synonyms for "Britain" and "British" in away the identities of the other British peoples has not.

The real losers in all this are not the people colonized by the English over the centuries (who all now have Communist national liberation movements rooting for them). It is the simple common people of the English diaspora (and it is often forgotten that not all English are, or have ever been, monocle-wearing colonialists or nobles). Alone among all mankind we have no sense of identity, no sense of an ancient motherland, no nothing.

While Welsh and Scottish nationalists get all the news it is England that most needs to secede from the United Kingdom. For it alone has had its national identity totally annihilated. In fact, I'm not sure such an entity as "England" even officially (unlike Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, which do). Each of those countries has its own parliament/assembly (as well as being represented in the British parliament in London) while England has no parliament at all. Its parliament, the oldest in the world, morphed into the British parliament long ago.

Unfortunately, English nationalism doesn't exist. The English have invested all their capital in being "British." But I believe that an sovereign and independent England would give the peoples of the Anglo-Saxon diaspora the same things all other peoples have (an identity and an ancestral homeland) and might go a long way toward eliminating the racism and nativism so many Anglo-Saxons turn to while trying to satisfy this completely legitimate need.

[SunkenCiv]

Just updating the GGG information, not sending a general distribution.

Please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. Thanks.

Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on, off, or alter the "Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list --
Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
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[BelegStrongbow]

Clearly, this whole thread is just for the fun of it, but Offa was a Mercian king (I'm not quite sure what century, but definitely before Alfred). He built a wall in the west Country and it came to be known as Offa's Dyke. I think it was meant to keep the Cymry west not to keep the Angles east (Mercians were largely Anglian).

Hope that helps add a timy bit of light to what is otherwise a thread full of silliness.

Not that there's anything bad about that, but that period does deserve a bit of respect amid the hilarity.

Thanks.

[truthpls]

If you are really a Pict, then you must be less than 5 feet tall? I have read that the Pict's were very short, I know my grandmother was, but that is not what I am basing this information on. I think I read it in the preface of a dictionary. Incidentally that same reference stated that the word 'picture' was a result of the Picts painting their bodies with symbols. They were also very ferocious, and fended the English off for years by confronting them at the border. We could use some like them now in Arizona and Texas!