London - Red hair may be the genetic legacy of Neanderthals...

Planet Save.com ^ | 1/14/05 | Planet Save.com

[TASMANIANRED]

Yes , but I don't do hospitals any more.

[Canticle_of_Deborah]

Neither do I!

[SunkenCiv]

Prehistoric Ireland
http://www.ncf.carleton.ca/~cd200/mac34.html

The Neanderthals (Homo Sapiens Neanderthalensis):

As the ice cap receded across Europe, the high pressure and motion of the ice left behind a layer of powdered stone. This formed an extremely fertile soil, which soon became a vast and fertile grassland. There was an explosion of animal life into this vacuum, which was soon covered with thundering herds of Mammoths, Giant Deer, Bison, and other ungulates. Cave dwelling Neanderthal Man, the heavy set "cave men" of cartoons and comics, was quickly replaced by modern man, and seems to vanish from the record about 34,000 B.C.

We have had such sport lampooning Neanderthal Man, that we tend to forget he was the first known Homo Sapiens. We acknowledge that he is more powerfully built than modern man, but it has recently been shown that he may have been more fleet of foot. For example, he is far better equiped to run sideways than are we - something which may have been very useful during a hunt. We now suspect, from examining tombs, that he was a spiritual being, and more embarrassingly, he had a larger brain than we do.

We may owe more to Neanderthal man and to his Mousterian culture than previously realized. When a Mousterian flute was discovered in the Divje Babe I cave in northwestern Slovenia, a musicologist (Bob Fink) in Saskatchawan, Canada published a study based on spacing of the holes in the bone instrument. Fink maintains that it was tuned to the Diatonic scale, and that our present day ideas of what is musical, may be handed down from our cave dwelling cousins.

There are many theories about the disappearance of Homo Sapiens Neanderthalensis , but it is unknown whether he interbred and disappeared, or was killed off by his modern cousins. It is also unknown why he did not adapt to the changing climate, and come to dominate the grasslands.

[Dr.Zoidberg]

THE WITCH'S DAUGHTERS

Have no truck with the

daughters of Lilith.

Pay no mind the

red-headed creatures.

Man, be warned by their

sharp, white teeth;

Consider their skulls, and their

other queer features.


They're not of our tribe, with their

flame-colored hair;

They're no sib to us, with their

pale, white skins;

There's no soul behind those

wild green eyes.

Man, when you meet one

walk widdershins!


When they die, they pop,

like burst soap-bubble

(Eight hundred years

is their usual span).

Loving such beings

leads only to trouble.

By Heaven, be warned,

you rash young man!


Robert A. Heinlein

August 1946

[Chani]

ping for later

[tgslTakoma]

!

[stands2reason]

Naaahhh....

[stands2reason]

(Pssst - she's a natural blonde.)

[stands2reason]

The Celts originally were settled in Spain and France. And there are redheads there. But most of the mainland Celts were conquered and now the main remnant of the tribe are settled in the Northern Islands.

[stands2reason]

So Celtics are dark-haired?

[stands2reason]

Ewan McGregor, Scottish actor

Mark Steyn, genius columnist

David Mustaine, singer and guitarist

[Eskura]

>>Only thing is the REAL Irish aren't red-headed and freckled. Ireland gets that from the viking invaders. Turns out the real Irish are the Black Irish: Dark featured, but still rather pale skin and rather short.

You'd make a great fiction writer, but do us a favour and don't give up the day job just yet! The fact is, 99% of men with Gaelic surnames in the province of Connacht and 96% of men in Munster carry a genetic marker called Haplogroup R1B, which originated in Iberia 30,000 years ago, and is therefore associated with the first inhabitants of Europe - the Stonage Europeans. This genetic marker is also found in "Viking countries" but it is in the minority. If the Vikings had an impact on the genes of Ireland, then non R1B genes would be present in higher numbers there. 8% of Irish people have red hair, 10% of Scottish, the highest percentages in the world. As a whole, Ireland is about 80% R1B, as are Scotland, Wales and Cornwall. The Basque country is about 90% R1B, and England is 50%.

Y-Chromosome Variation and Irish Origin -
http://www2.smumn.edu/uasal/DNAWWW/pdfs/Yirish.pdf

Iceland was colonised by the Gaels and as a result, Iceland has a higher percentage of the R1B gene than the rest of Scandinavia (around 50%) -

Estimating Scandinavian and Gaelic Ancestry in the Male Settlers of Iceland - http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/AJHG/journal/issues/v67n3/001900/001900.html

The following children are very Scottish / Irish looking. -





http://www.timesonline.co.uk/newspaper/0,,2765-1247765,00.html-

"The geneticists produced a map of Europe with contours linking places that were genetically similar. One contour goes around the edge of the Atlantic, around Wales, Scotland, Ireland and includes Galicia in Spain and the Basque region."

"Of the Celtic regions, by far the strongest correspondence is with Scotland,” said Bradley. “It corresponds exactly with language.” While that could be due to the Plantation of Ulster, Bradley said it was more likely due to something much older because the matches occur throughout the whole of Ireland and not just the north."

The following are two MEPS from the West of Ireland. -




These girls are Gaelic footballers from Galway, in the West of Ireland, and you don't need to be an anthropologist to notice that as a group they are homogonous in appearance.



Further examples of people from Ireland/Scotland/Wales/and the Basque Country -












Basque -





The vast majority of Scottish, Irish, Welsh, Manx and Cornish have hazel coloured hair. In fact this is true of most of North-Western Europe. Now ask yourself this. If there is such a thing as "Black Irish", then is there such a thing as "Black English" using the pictures below as a reference. It makes about as much sense to me. The first is the English National Team, the second is of a Gaelic Hurling Team from Munster in the South-West of Ireland.



Notes on Y-Chromosome Haplogroup R1b
http://home.comcast.net/~libpjr1/haplogroupI.htm


R1b (previously known as Hg1 and Eu18) is the most prolific haplogroup in Europe and its frequency changes in a cline from west (where it reaches a saturation point of almost 100% in areas of Western Ireland) to east (where it becomes uncommon in parts of Eastern Europe and virtually disappears beyond the Middle East). A R1b haplotype (a set of marker scores indicative of the haplogroup) is very difficult to interpret in that they are found at relatively high frequency in the areas where the Anglo - Saxon and Danish "invaders" originally called home (e.g., 55% in Friesland), and even up to 30% in Norway. Thus a R1b haplotype makes it very challenging to determine the origin of a family with this DNA signature.

During the Last Glacial Maximum, about 18,000 years ago, the people bearing the R1b haplogroup over wintered in Northern Spain (see map1). After the glacial retreat about 12,000 years before present, R1b began a migration to the north in large numbers (see map 2), and to the east in declining numbers.

R1b probably arrived in Spain from the east 30,000 years ago among the paleolithic or "old stone age" peoples considered to be aboriginal to Europe). It is believed that everyone who is R1b is a descendant in the male line from an individual known as "the patriarch" since his descendants account for over 40% of all the chromosomes of Europe. This haplogroup is characteristic of the Basques whose language is probably that of the first R1b, and who are genetically the closest to the original R1b population (which probably amounted to only a few thousand individuals). Source: Dr. David Faux http://www.davidkfaux.org/shetlandhaplogroupR1b

The members of R1b3 (or R-M269, formerly known as R1b) are believed to be the descendants of the first modern humans who entered Europe about 35,000-40,000 years ago ( Aurignacian culture). Those R1b3 forebearers were the people who painted the beautiful art in the caves in Spain and France. They were the modern humans who were the contemporaries - and perhaps exterminators - of the European Neanderthals. Source: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~d..._2003_R1b3.html

Hg R was the dominant lineage in Western Europe and then, pushed south by the descending Ice Age, to southwestern France and northwestern Spain to evolve into lineage Hg R1b. This area became a refuge for humans in Europe during the coldest millennia of the last Ice Age. As the climate warmed, the scattered clan Hg R1b followed the migration of game to the north and some of them reached what is now the British Isles about 15,000 years ago which at this time was connected to mainland Europe. It is believed they changed from hunter-gatherers to farmers in southeastern Europe about 8,000 years ago and in Britain about 4,000 years ago. As hunter-gathers became farmer’s permanent settlements ended this great migration period and over time Hg R1b settled predominately in what is known today as Spain, Portugal, France, Belgium, Denmark, England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland.

Haplogroup map of Europe -
http://baz.perlmonk.org/haplogroups.jpg

[dangus]

Entertaining. (Very nice photos -- you certainly did a lot of work!) But 100% irrelevant.

I didn't say that the modern inhabitants of Ireland were Scandinavians. The red hair gene is robust.

[Eskura]

>>Entertaining. (Very nice photos -- you certainly did a lot of work!) But 100% irrelevant.

Well I don't like people being misinformed on such an issue. It’s only 100% irrelevant because you can’t or couldn’t be bothered disproving it. The phrase “Black Irish” is an American one, and as an Irish person I find its use, when defining the origins of the Irish, odd to say the least.

Myth of the Black Irish -
http://www.darkfiber.com/blackirish/

>>”Generally speaking, western Ireland, less affected by fairer Celtic, Viking, and Anglo-Norman invaders, tends to have a higher concentration of "Black Irish" than eastern Ireland.”
>>“They can be dark and almost Latin looking like Colin Farrell or Moira Kelly”

Colin Farrell is from Dublin on the East coast of Ireland – one of the most non-indigenous parts of the whole island, inhabited by many of non-Gaelic extraction. Moira Kelly does not look almost Latin –



>>“Or blonde and almost Scandinavian looking like Peter O'Toole or Grace Kelly.”



Grace Kelly’s parents were from Mayo on the west coast of Ireland (she was a natural brunette as the picture above shows), Peter O’Toole was born in Galway. Both counties are in Connacht and both have Gaelic surnames. To reiterate, 99% of Connacht’s inhabitants with Gaelic surnames are R1B. Therefore both are of Stone Age European extraction. They look Irish. Sweden is about 20% R1B.

Source: Y-Chromosome Variation and Irish Origin -
http://www2.smumn.edu/uasal/DNAWWW/pdfs/Yirish.pdf

“When the DNA samples from Rush (Co. Dublin) were analysed it seemed there was virtually no genetic contribution from Norway here either.”
Source: BBC Viking Survey -
http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/programmes/bloodofthevikings/genetics_results_07.shtml

Wallace T. also remarked (while failing to provide a single solitary source to back up his notions) -

"residents of Asia Minor and other Mediterranean countries contributed another short, dark type via trade routes to Cornwall and other parts of the British Isles where tin, and to some extent, silver and gold were found. They inhabited Ireland and Britain before 500 BC and did not speak an Indo-European language like the Gaelic that was brought to Ireland from Galicia in Spain or the Low Countries. Generally speaking, western Ireland, less affected by fairer Celtic, Viking, and Anglo-Norman invaders, tends to have a higher concentration of "Black Irish" than eastern Ireland."

And you stated –

“Only thing is the REAL Irish aren't red-headed and freckled. Ireland gets that from the viking invaders. Turns out the real Irish are the Black Irish: Dark featured, but still rather pale skin and rather short. True, they get the balck hair from the Spanish invaders.”

These statements are completely false, and while my first post attempted to prove this conclusively, I obviously haven't gone far enough.

So, first of all, who are/were the Celts? The word Celt originates with the Greek word for Barbarian, and was applied by them to the people who lived in central Europe. Traditionally, it was believed that Ireland was invaded in 300BC or so, by people from central Europe (Celts), replacing the bulk of the native population and thereby introducing Indo-European culture to the island. This is no longer believed by anthropologists and there are a few reasons why. During the Ice Age, the Stone Age people of Europe migrated to Iberia. Anthropologists can identify this population and their descendants because they and only they belong to the genetic group Haplogroup R1B. After the Ice Age, this population began moving north along the Atlantic coastline, eventually arriving in Ireland 10,000 years ago. R1B is the largest haplogroup in Europe and most western European men carry this marker on their Y-chromosome. People in Western Ireland of Gaelic extraction are over 95% R1B and Ireland as a whole is 80% R1B. R1B is the largest haplogroup in most parts of Europe, including central Europe, but the key point is that Haplogroup I is also found there in large percentages. Therefore if the Irish population was replaced by Celts, then the Irish would have much higher percentages of Haplogroup I among their population. Ireland is about 15% Haplogroup I, thanks primarily to the arrival of Norman, Norse, English, and Huguenot, and this haplogoup is found in the areas of Ireland where these people settled.

But Gaelic is a Celtic language? Again, this was the traditional belief supported primarily by the fact that Gaelic (and the Britannic languages of Cornish, Welsh and Breton) have an Indo-European vocabulary. But the fact is, the structure of so called Celtic languages is synonymous with that of the Basque language. The Basque language was traditional viewed as the only surviving Stone Age language in Europe – and Basques are 90% R1B. These similarities include the fact that the Verb appears at the start of a sentence in Irish (or Welsh etc). Also, when a word in Gaelic incurs a grammatical change, this change can affect the start of the word. For example, “cara” (friend) becomes “mo chairde” (my friends), with the “ch” having a very different sound to “c”. This does not happen in Indo-European languages. Gaelic also incurs the absence of a present participle and the use instead of a verbal noun. There are other examples also. So how did all these Indo-European words arrive in Gaelic? Well, the same way as the word “e-mail”, “hover”, and “gerrymander” arrived in England and it didn’t require an America invasion, did it? Gaelic and British culture are ancient to the islands of Britain and Ireland, going back at least 10,000 years, and are therefore Stone Age European civilizations. Newgrange, the oldest building in European, was built in Ireland circa 3500 BC. This is 3000 years before the Celts were said to have arrived in Ireland, yet Newgrange has examples of art that most people would think of as being Celtic.



What about the Picts? Well, the Picts also belonged exclusively to R1B and are therefore of European Stone Age extraction. The language they spoke is now believed to have had more in common with the language spoken by the Britons, than Gaelic did. This has been established by examining place names in northern Scotland. Old-Gaelic did not contain the letter “p”, and words in Welsh containing a “p” are generally spelt and pronounced with a “c” in Gaelic. Example – “Cean” is the Gaelic for head, while it is “Pen” is Welsh. This “p” sound is very common in Welsh, and was also common in place names of Pictish extraction. The same also applies for the letters “f” and “g” if I remember correctly. To summarize, the British, Gaelic, and Picttish civilizations are the three ancient civilizations of Britain and Ireland, and modern genetics fully supports this statement.

What about the English? Anglo-Saxon right? Well a haplogroup survey of East Anglia found them to be roughly 55% R1B, and 30% I. Germany on the other hand is about 40% R1B, 20% I and 35% R1a (other haplogroups were also found in both areas). So you can make your own judgements regarding how Germanic the English are based on those figures.

Source: Y-chromosomal diversity in Europe is clinal and influenced primarily by geography, rather than by language.
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?holding=npg&cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=11078479&dopt=Abstract

So this brings us to the "residents of Asia Minor and other Mediterranean countries”. R1B is not found with any degree of significance among the inhabitants of Asia Minor. Therefore if they “contributed another short, dark type” to Ireland “via trade routes to Cornwall”, then how come the genes common to the people of Asia Minor are not found in Ireland or Cornwall? The haplogroups found in the Mediterranean today are the same as those found in northern Europe but with the addition of haplogroups introduced from North Africa and the Middle East – via the Moors for example. Again, why are these genes not showing up in Ireland? The fact is, the "residents of Asia Minor and other Mediterranean countries” did not contribute to the Irish genetic makeup in any kind of non-trivial fashion.

“Turns out the real Irish are the Black Irish”

OK, so what you’re saying, I think, is that the Stone Age inhabitants of Ireland were the Black Irish. I am from Co. Galway in the West of Ireland, and all my grandparents have Gaelic surnames and are from my general locality, therefore genetically I am of Stone Age European extraction. So you’re referring to me and my extended family as “Black Irish” if I understand all this correctly. So I am “Dark featured, but still rather pale skin and rather short”? That’s strange because I have brownish red hair, I'm 6'1", and I have blue-green eyes. My sister and brother both have red hair, and my mother and father are brunettes like me.

What do you mean by “rather pale”? The use of the word “rather” suggests that there is a population somewhere else in Europe with paler skin than that found in Western Ireland. Where exactly?

>>”And rather short?”

“Indeed it was observed that, before the Famine the Irish were the tallest, strongest and "most comely" of the people of Europe.”
Source: http://www.irishheritage.net/prize.html
“The Irish people were the tallest, healthiest, most fertile people in Europe.”
Source: http://www.rootsweb.com/~irish/meetings/03may-1.htm

“in 1850 Americans were the tallest people in the world, with American men averaging 5'6". Almost 150 years later, American men now average 5'8", but we have fallen in the standings and are now only the third tallest people in the world. In first place are the Dutch. Back in 1850 they averaged only 5'4" -- the shortest men in Europe -- but today they are a towering 5'10".”
Source: http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1511/is_n2_v19/ai_20159533

>>“Generally speaking, western Ireland, less affected by fairer Celtic, Viking, and Anglo-Norman invaders, tends to have a higher concentration of "Black Irish" than eastern Ireland.”

I’ve lived in the west and the east of Ireland, and while I’d definitely agree that there are more blondes in eastern Ireland, I would not say there are more black haired people in the West. The dominant hair colour in the west of Ireland is, as I have said already, chestnut coloured just like McGregor in the previous post above.

[Incorrigible]

Well, now that you've brought Irish Hurling into the conversation....

And no redhead thread should go without a ping to RepubMommy.

[Eskura]

Woops! Heres Grace Kelly -



And heres Moira Kelly again. Notice that both are very similar in appearance -

[bert]

How about Orangutans? They also have red hair and a common ancestor could have provided the gene for both branches. You can't date a Neanderthal but I bet you could find a slobbery kissing orang to love you.

[bert]

....from the Spanish invaders....

For the record, in 1588 the Spanish fleet was roundly defeated and some escaped. while sailing around the northern coast of the British Isles they were shipwercked .....many on Ireland.

Thus they were stragglers or survivors but not quite invaders.

[SunkenCiv]

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

To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. Thanks.

Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on or off the
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[SunkenCiv]

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

To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. Thanks.

Please FREEPMAIL me if you want on or off the
"Gods, Graves, Glyphs" PING list or GGG weekly digest
-- Archaeology/Anthropology/Ancient Cultures/Artifacts/Antiquities, etc.
Gods, Graves, Glyphs (alpha order)