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Thu 19 Mar, 2015 03:46 am
Quote:The Romans, Vikings and Normans may have ruled or invaded the British for hundreds of years, but they left barely a trace on our DNA, the first detailed study of the genetics of British people has revealed.
The analysis shows that the Anglo-Saxons were the only conquering force, around 400-500 AD, to substantially alter the country’s genetic makeup, with most white British people now owing almost 30% of their DNA to the ancestors of modern-day Germans.
People living in southern and central England today typically share about 40% of their DNA with the French, 11% with the Danes and 9% with the Belgians, the study of more than 2,000 people found. The French contribution was not linked to the Norman invasion of 1066, however, but a previously unknown wave of migration to Britain some time after then end of the last Ice Age nearly 10,000 years ago.
Prof Peter Donnelly, director of the Wellcome Trust Centre for Human Genetics at the University of Oxford, who co-led the research, said: “It has long been known that human populations differ genetically, but never before have we been able to observe such exquisite and fascinating detail.”
The study found that people’s ancestral contributions varied considerably across Britain, with people from areas of Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland emerging as separate genetic clusters, providing a scientific basis to the idea of regional identity for the first time.
Source
Source:
Nature: The fine-scale genetic structure of the British population
More reports / other aspects about the nature study at:
Science 2.0 com:
Sorry U.K. Celts, You're Probably Not
genome web:
Fine-scale Genetic Map of Britain Gives Clues to Ancient Population Movements
That's some very fascinating material, Walter. I think it also shows that at the time of a "conquest," the native population in situ survives as a majority if there is no attempt to exterminate them.
You're a subversive, aren't you, Walter?
@Walter Hinteler,
Perhps this reflect the makeup of the various cultures before and during the last glacial maxima (MAGLEMOSIAN, kOHNGEMOSE). The geologic structure and makeup of DOGGERLAND shows that the area had been connected to N Europe and Norway (with a series of rivers that connected the ancient Danube to the Thames basin.
I vaguely recall readingthat tool patterns in areas of E Britain (DOGGERLAND submerged areas dredged by archeologists) showed combinations of European source flint and Scandanavian style notched bone spear points.
@Walter Hinteler,
PS, that genome web site was only a "call to membership" and didn't allow me access without selling my car.
@Walter Hinteler,
It was given a different spin by the BBC.
Quote:A DNA study of Britons has shown that genetically there is not a unique Celtic group of people in the UK.
According to the data, those of Celtic ancestry in Scotland and Cornwall are more similar to the English than they are to other Celtic groups.
The study also describes distinct genetic differences across the UK, which reflect regional identities.
And it shows that the invading Anglo Saxons did not wipe out the Britons of 1,500 years ago, but mixed with them.
Published in the Journal Nature, the findings emerge from a detailed DNA analysis of 2,000 mostly middle-aged Caucasian people living across the UK.
The individuals included had all four of their grandparents living close to each other in a rural area.
This selection criterion enabled the researchers, led from Oxford University, to filter out 20th-Century immigration and to peer back to migration patterns more than 1,000 years ago.
According to Prof Peter Donnelly who co-led the study, the results show that although there is not a single Celtic group, there is a genetic basis for regional identities in the UK.
"Many of the genetic clusters we see in the west and north are similar to the tribal groupings and kingdoms around, and just after, the time of the Saxon invasion, suggesting these kingdoms maintained a regional identity for many years," he told BBC News.
Prof Donnelly and his colleagues compared genetic patterns now with the map of Britain in about AD 600, after the Anglo Saxons had arrived from what is now southern Denmark and Northern Germany. By then, they occupied much of central and southern England.
"We see striking similarities between the genetic patterns we see now and some of these regional identities and kingdoms we see in AD 600, and we think some of that may well be remnants of the groupings that existed then," he explained.
A map of different genetic groupings reveals subtle but distinct differences between those sampled in West Yorkshire and the rest of the country.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-31905764<br />
@Setanta,
Setanta wrote:You're a subversive, aren't you, Walter?
That's what we Saxons are known as
@izzythepush,
izzythepush wrote:It was given a different spin by the BBC.
And that's why I gave the link to the original report.
If their information is accurate (and i have no reason, nor expertise, to question it), those islands could have been the home of the last remnants of the Upper Paleolithic, pre-Kurgan, pre-Indo-European peoples. In the 1950s, Marija Gimbutas proposed the Kurgan hypothesis, which has become the majority hypothesis for the introduction of proto-Indo-European languages into Europe. (Kurgan is the Russian version of a Turkic word meaning a tumulus, or burial mound.) Gimbutas is also widely "accused" by lesser anthropological lights as having established the earth mother goddess cult concept into paleoanthropology. However, she explicitly denied that pre-Kurgan Europeans were either matriarchal or patriarchal. (It is likely the case that the accusation stems from her having emphasized that the Kurgan people were likely patriarchal, although the Sarmatians would be a notable exception. The Sarmatians, however, were at the tail end of the Indo-Iranian migrations into Europe, arriving about 2500 to 3000 ybp.) By the timetable of the Kurgan hypothesis, the last migration into the British islands took place before the Kurgan people arrived, and by the time they arrived, the North Sea floor was subsiding, and the islands were cut off from the mainland of Europe. The Kurgan people were good with horses, but i doubt that they were sailors of any kind. The Kelts arrive no earlier than about 3000 ybp, and their and all subsequent migrations into the islands can be viewed as invasions rather than migrations.
Talking about migrations from France,though, is misleading. I understand that it's a useful way of drawing people's attention, but the Franks only appear on the historical stage less than 2000 years ago. France did not exist until about 1500 years ago. The British islands had been cut off from the mainland for thousands of years by then.
@Walter Hinteler,
Walter Hinteler wrote:Quote:The Romans, Vikings and Normans may have ruled or invaded the British for hundreds of years, but they left barely a trace on our DNA, the first detailed study of the genetics of British people has revealed.
Doesn't this sort of assume that the comparative DNA samples from the other regions were "pure"?
For example, if the Romans or Vikings had already invaded Germany or Finland and made a large genetic contribution to those populations, then the Romans or Vikings would still have contributed to the British, just by way of a previous country.
Is it reasonable to simply define genetic samples from other countries as being "purely" from that country?
@rosborne979,
You're going to have some problems with that. For example, the Romans didn't invade what we now calle Norway, and may only have passed through what is now Denmark just about exactly 2000 years ago (and may not have). I doubt that there was any genetic contribution to those people by the Romans. Furthermore, by the time that Agricola was completing the conquest of Britain, the standard Roman heavy infantry legion was made up of Gallic Kelts--they were not likely to have been contributing very much new genetic material.
I don't know why you mention Finland. Vikings (not really a people so much as an activity) traded to the east through Finland. The Finns would not have been visiting Britain.
Personally, i find this interesting because it confirms a lot of speculation that i and others i know who are familiar with the history and the prehistoric culture of the British islands have indulged in. I'm not saying that i foresaw this. I am saying that i'm not surprised.
Ich bin ein Teegebäck!
(Tastier than a donut)
@rosborne979,
"Little DNA "packets" (called short tandem repeat alleles-STR's) are useful to connect the migrations of populations and settlemenst through several mutation sequences that allow us to "time" these wanderings. They go way back (and are reflected as "fossil' DNA). So these populational studies are potentially reflective of migration and settlement that goes back 70 to 100K years. The Danube/Thames could have been a Corridor for much of this migration nd the DNA studies (Im sure) are reflective of the last few "mutation clock" stories.
I hope this can stir up ome academic to do a complete geological/geographic/anthropological /genomic book on this. Seems that the pieces for interdisciplinary write-ups is now there.
Ich bin eine Krumkuche
@rosborne979,
rosborne979 wrote:For example, if the Romans or Vikings had already invaded Germany or Finland and made a large genetic contribution to those populations, then the Romans or Vikings would still have contributed to the British, just by way of a previous country.
Neither the Romans nor the Vikings had. We [Saxon tribes] had beaten the Romans quite a few times, and didn't mingle with Vikings but only later with the Franks.
@Setanta,
Setanta wrote:Personally, i find this interesting because it confirms a lot of speculation that i and others i know who are familiar with the history and the prehistoric culture of the British islands have indulged in. I'm not saying that i foresaw this. I am saying that i'm not surprised.
There has been a lot of speculations before - this is just another hint that they might be correct.
(For instance,it has been said that wealthy, noble Saxons left their homelands,while the "lower classes" had to stay here.That had to be corrected some decades ago - we even know today from frequent "relative visits". [Which stopped after some decades - very similar to the visits of distant relatives in today's life.])
@Walter Hinteler,
I disagree. I submit that these DNA studies predate the common culture designations associated with Neolithic and recent, and, instead, derive from the genetic sense of these being mere "populational haplogroups" to which we LATER assigned cultural designations.
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