THE ANCESTORS OF THE ENGLISH, FRENCH, ECT. ARE:

God, talk about a can of worms. Got a can opener, Boss?

To quote Ah-nold: "Ah'll be back . . . "

crikey! We all came from africa. I know that with DNA testing and research that scientists are more and more able to map the human geneology.

mapleleaf

Even Ameicans know that the might be English, Scottish, Irish, Itakian, German, Polish ...

I think, both, littlk and Setanta, gave the right answers: either a can of worms or Africa. :wink:

Going back a couple centuries, you're probably referring to the Celts. Go back far enough, and we're all cousins under the skin. c.i.

OK, the celts seemed to rule from the british isles to hungary. In 400 BC they displaced the romans (the Etruscans were another euro-ancester, in italy from elsewhere) from around the Po. The roman empire fought back.

There was the ottoman empire and the mongol kingdoms (Merkits, the Keraits, the Khitai, the Naimans, the Qaidu, and the Tatars) later in eurasia's history.

We can't forget the moors

Oho! This is cool. A human ancestry table based on DNA testing. The base group were the irish. Following is a list of ethnic groups and their relation (in steps away from) the irish. From that list we can assume that the debate about where Black Irish got their coloring - from black africans, spaniards, etc - is now over. Looks likely that the coloring comes from spaniards (if it isn't just a genetic mutation).
Table

Spanish dna is only 16 steps distant from irish dna. Here are some other stats:

Scottish 8
French 34
Italian 43
Norwegian 63
Slovakian 79
N African 109

Omigod - I love that website! You can plug in one ethnitic group and get a list of 41 other peoples and closely they are related together.

Good stuff, LittleK.

Northern Amerinds are more closely related to mongolian groups and eskimos are more closely related to japanese groups.

Thanks, I'm having a little too luch fun with it. So, you can compare DNA within 42 world pops or 26 european pops. mtDNA and y-chromosome analysis can be countrsted with old-fashion physical anthro!

littlek, I've always had that gut feeling that Eskimos were closely related to the Japanese - by their facial features. c.i.

c.i., that can be explained by Asiatic tribes crossing the Bering Straight into Canada and settling there. Hey, where is that Steve dude from Mapleleaf's other thread? I was having fun there...we are all indeed human under the skin.

Steve's a good guy, Cav, with a very short fuse . . . you'll find that it's easy to get a rise out of him . . .

c.i., I suppose that also explains their fondness for sushi...

Actually, 'Eskimo', meaning 'raw flesh eater' is considered a tad derogative these days. 'Inuit', meaning 'The People' is preferred, I believe.

yes, cav, but the site said eskimo, so I stuck with the term

cav, "Raw flesh eater" connotates a lot of things. I'm sure that term was created to identify their eating habits of uncooked foods when "fire" was scarce. They're pretty good at cooking salmon feasts in the great north-west. We participated in such a meal on our cruise to Alaska some years ago. c.i.

Just piping in, being a Canuck and all, we get this info...

Cool c.i. That is true, in terms of where the word came from, but for some reason, they don't like it. Don't ask me why, perhaps because it was the evil white man who gave it to them. Setanta, I noticed that about Steve (in fact, I wasn't even sure what his point was, but I went along with it free-style)...I am just worried I might get too tempted, heh heh...I promise to be good.

As i've read it, Esquimeaux is the way the French rendered the term of contempt with which the Algonquian-speakers denoted the Inuit . . . and they did indeed eat raw flesh--there ain't a lotta fire wood on the perma-frost prairies . . . for those interested, Kabloona, by a French anthropologist, is fascinating. He spent a good deal of time with the Inuit in the 1930's, as they were on the verge of converting from the "time immemorial" culture of their ancestors to one heavily modified by access to western artifacts . . .