Above photo taken by myself of the Ring of Brodgar, Orkney
I've modified this from a post that I made on a DNA forum, in response to people discussing out-dated origin stories, in response to a thread looking at ancestral composition for the English. There is so much misinformation out there, and few people actually try to look at the latest evidences.
It starts by looking at the key points of a recent Irish study.
Cassidy, Martiniano, Murphy etal Study
of Neolithic and Bronze Age migration to Ireland
http://www.pnas.org/content/113/2/368.full.pdf
https://www.theguardian.com/science/2015/dec/28/origins-of-the-irish-down-to-mass-migration-ancient-dna-confirms
Key points.
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Ancient DNA from earlier Neolithic
farmers suggests an origin from the Near East.
-
Later DNA from Bronze Age suggests
a new population had arrived and dominated, with origins from the
Eurasian Steppes, including the present day predominance of Y
haplogroup R1b, lactose tolerance, and blue eyes. This displacement
event appears to have occurred throughout much of Western Europe.
The founder population on the Steppes has been linked to the
archaeological population known as the Yamna or Yamnaya.
A background to the Yamna hypothesis to
help people understand what the above study supported:
The Yamnaya were a population that
existed across the Pontic and Caspian Steppes from what is now
Ukraine, to Kazakhistan. They themselves were an admixed population,
with ancestry from various different groups of Eurasian
hunter-gatherers, and from the ANE (Ancient North Eurasian). They
carried a number of successful adaptations, including the use of the
wheel, improved selective breeding of horses for both riding and
haulage, lactose tolerance, use of horse drawn wheeled carts, and a
very successful pastoral based economy revolving around the
herding of a number of species of livestock.
They are strongly figured to have
carried an Indo-European language into Europe and elsewhere (South
and Western Asia). That Indo-European language being the ancestor of
the vast majority of modern European languages today. They may have
also carried many of the most common haplogroups of modern Europeans,
including Y hg R1a, R1b, and some mt hg H types among others.
There is a hypothesis that the earlier
peoples of Europe, the Early Neolithic farmers, who had largely
descended from early farmers in the Levant / Anatolia, had been
suppressed by a number of possible environmental and climatic events.
This might have paved the way for such a successful displacement of
European populations.
As the descendants of the Yamna swept
westwards into Europe during the Copper Age, so they spawned a series
of new archaeological cultures including the Corded Ware of Eastern
and Central Europe, and the Bell Beaker culture of Western Europe.
The Bell Beaker culture spread from
Central Europe to the Western Atlantic Seaboard, and from Portugal up
to Scotland. Classic artifacts include archer burials in round
barrows, the bell beaker ware pottery, round scrapers, and barbed and
tanged arrowheads. It was the dominant culture of Early Bronze Age
Europe.
One suggestion is that it spawned the
later Iron Age Celtic cultures, including the classic Western
Atlantic Seaboard Celtic Culture. This culture may have simply
evolved locally and through trade links along that seaboard.
The Irish study above supports the
Yamnaya hypothesis. It supports displacement during the Early Bronze
Age, and that the present day, fairly homogeneous population of
Ireland, largely descends from Copper Age Eurasian Steppe
pastoralists.
Okay, so what if we apply that also to
the late prehistoric British populations? Scottish and West British
today appear to have a close genetic distance to the Irish. How
about the lowland SE British? It might be the case, that they had
fresh admixture, exchanged with the Continent, and particularly with
the expanding Germanic cultures. These events could have occurred
even during late prehistory.
Now People of the British Isles (POBI)
Study 2015:
http://www.peopleofthebritishisles.org/nl6.pdf
This genetic study looked at the
British Isles including Northern Ireland, but excluding the Republic
of Ireland. It tested a large sample group of present day British
with known local ancestry.
Key points.
-
Orkney had the most distinctive
population, with a known high percentage of Norse ancestry.
-
The Welsh were distinct from the
English. However, they were the most diverse group, with a clear
division between the North Welsh and South Welsh. Cornwall was also
distinctive from English.
-
Northern Ireland clusters with
Scottish.
-
There was no homogeneous shared
British “Celtic” population. The Scottish, North Welsh, South
Welsh, and Cornish being quite distinct from each other.
-
The South-East British (most of
the English) were surprisingly homogeneous, although the boundaries
of the old Anglo-Saxon kingdoms could still be distinguished.
-
The Continental Anglo-Saxon
contributiion to present day English people appeared to be circa 10%
to 40%. This contradicts Bede's claims of a genocide. The English
descend more from earlier British populations than they do from
Anglo-Saxon immigrants.
-
Although the Norwegian Viking
contribution to Orkney was distinctive, the Danish contribution to
Eastern England could not be detected. This may be because of the
close genetic distance between Danish Viking and some earlier Anglo
Saxon settlers makes it impossible to see.
-
Although there was no “Celtic
Fringe”, the Welsh appear to be closest to the late prehistoric
British population.
-
Any Iberian contribution appears
to be tiny and insignificant.
-
There appeared to be a
contribution in Southern Britain, particularly in Cornwall, from a
population shared today by the North French. This contribution
appears to have occurred during late prehistory and is historically
unknown.
Okay, so that is suggesting a diversity
across the British Isles that extends into Prehistory. A key finding
to this thread is that it found the English to be an admixed
population, with earlier British ancestry dominating Anglo Saxon
ancestry from the Continent.
Finally, I think it is worthwhile
bringing up another recent study:
Iron Age and Anglo Saxon Genomes from
Eastern England. Schiffels, Haak, etal. 2015.
This qualitative study focused on
ancient DNA from a number of Iron Age and Anglo Saxon cemeteries in
the Cambridge area of SE England, referenced against modern
populations.
Key points.
-
The East English derive 38% of
their ancestry from Anglo-Saxon immigrants
-
The closest genetic distances on
the Continent between the Anglo Saxon settlers and present day
Europeans was to the Dutch and Danish.
-
They found evidence of admixture
and intermarrying. Individuals with both Iron Age British, and
Anglo Saxon ancestry.
-
People of Iron Age British
ancestry were adopting and embracing Anglo-Saxon culture and grave
goods.
-
The richest graves were of local
Iron Age British ancestry (with Anglo Saxon cultural artifacts). The
poorest graves were recent Anglo-Saxon arrivals.
My conclusion:
-
We have to be careful about who we
regard as the Celts. A Celtic culture did exist, but it wasn’t
necessarily brought to the British Isles and Ireland by an Iron Age
people. It may have developed on the Western Atlantic Seaboard from
earlier Bronze Age peoples.
-
Those Bronze Age peoples,
predominantly descended, from Eurasian Steppe Pastoralists, that had
swept across Europe, bringing innovations. They are the oldest
peoples of Ireland and the British Isles, but they did not form a
homogeneous Celtic Fringe. There must be more to it.
-
The Anglo-Saxon event in SE
Britain was a major and significant migration. However, it was not
the genocide of Bede's claims. Hengist and Horsa were clearly
mythological origin characters akin to Romulus and Remus.
-
The modern day English are an
admixed population. They have a foot both in earlier British
ancestry, and in Anglo-Saxon / North Sea migration.
