Posted on 09/12/2007 2:34:22 PM PDT by blam
John Hurt admits sadness at his faked Irish ancestry
By Tom Peterkin, Ireland Correspondent
Last Updated: 2:56am BST 12/09/2007
For years the actor John Hurt took great pride in his Irish aristocratic ancestry, believing that his great-grandmother was the illegitimate child of the Marquis of Sligo.
Actor John Hurt admitted that his lack of Irish blood was a great disappointment
Much to his disappointment, genealogists have discovered that his Irishness was nothing more than a family myth, perhaps created to give the family tree a spurious link to the upper class. Instead it appears that his family hails from Croydon, south London.
The research was done for the BBC's Who Do You Think You Are programme, which traces the roots of well-known figures and is to be broadcast tomorrow night.
The star of the Naked Civil Servant and The Elephant Man admitted that his lack of Irish blood was a great disappointment. He felt so close to the country that he even moved there for a spell. Now he can no longer be included in the roll call of great Irish actors.
"As far as I was concerned I was Irish," he said. "My disappointment was that they had managed to prove that the one thing I thought I did have was Irish blood and I haven't got any."
Hah! That must Hurt.
"Oh no, not again!!!"
On the other hand, Barry O’Bama’s as Irish as Paddy’s pig.
Meh. Who cares.
Poor guy.
You can still be a drunk .
His great-great grand da’ was Paddy O’Furniture.
I had a friend in high school with and Irish-sounding last name who got a tattoo with the Notre Dame mascot standing in front of a shamrock. His dad saw it and said “We’re not Irish you idiot”.
Black Irish, baby...
More importantly, I never met a member of my father's side of the family who cared and I don't either. I am much more interested in my descendants than my ancestors.
“John Hurt Admits Sadness At His Faked Irish Ancestry”
Cheer up Mr. Hurt.
You’re a helluvan actor.
Great in “I, Claudius” and lots of other roles.
Even good in “Hellboy”.
My husband had a friend growing up whose last name was Irish. He found out years later that the friend’s father had changed his name long ago. The real name was Albanian, but he had thought an Irish name would be more acceptable.
Better make that Paddy's lamb, pig is not halal
Wow, what a link. My mom was born in County Cork. Can I get my genes mapped, or is this something cost-prohibitive?
I have no contact/knowledge of grandparents, etc., except burial locations. So finding out generally where my family came from (even dating back centuries) is of interest to me.
bookmark for response.
LOL! The parody of that scene in Spaceballs was hilarious!
There's a noble name that goes along with the surname and that can be found all over the place as well.
Fortunately as of 700BC the name was found ONLY in Spain. By the 1400s it was also found in Brittany and France. By the end of the 1600s it could be discovered all over Europe as far from the King of France as was possible (because he was killing them off). By the end of the Napoleonic Wars (circa 1812) the name again concentrated in one place, New York (where American, Scandinavian and French branches coalesced), and then spread to Indiana and Florida. More recently almost everyone with the Spanish version of the surname/placename fled from Cuba to Florida and Mexico.
Even more recently a couple of them showed up in Southern Indiana as illegal aliens and got busted for drunk driving.
You just never know.
I got mine done here at : National Geographic Genographic Project for $107.50 each.
Y-chromosome DNA (male) and mtDNA (female).
I found out my dad was Irish (R1b) and my mother ('V') was a Skolt Sa'ami (Laplander).
I just read a book by Spencer Wells who is running the DNA project at National Geographic and he says with 160,000 (mostly European) samples completed, there have been on suprises, nothing unexpected (like maybe Neanderthal genes, etc) so far.
***LOL! The parody of that scene in Spaceballs was hilarious!***
Hello my honey hello my baby hello my rag-time-gal....
You mean Caligula is not Irish?
ancentry = ancestry. (It’s been a long day)
Oh, good grief. Who cares about some Hollyweirdo’s imaginary ancestry? Now, if it were a politician, that would be different. Like John F’n Kerry, who I believe is both Jewish AND Irish.
I’m a little miffed at the headline
Put a comma between ‘hurt’ and ‘admits’ and you have a story about John Kerry.
“Marquis of Sligo’
There’s a namesake North Carolina town of Sligo.
Even better is the neighboring ville of Moyock.
You're a yob!
Oh well, he’s not a real Roman either.
I love this show though, especially liked the one with David Tennant. It was interesting to see him so out of character.
No, Kerry is NOT Irish, hsalaw. He did, however, at times wish to create that impression.
“On the other hand, Barry O’Bama’s as Irish as Paddy’s pig.”
Smoked Irish, for sure.
John Hurt’s a fag, so he must be British.
He DNA pass the test.
Al Smith’s family on his father’s side was Italian. His name was changed when the customs officer couldn’t spell the Italian name.
Both my mother’s parents were born in Cork. My mother was their first generation born in the U.S.
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You have no idea.
Oh, good Lord.
A fake person discovers that he’s also a fake Irishman!!
What a coincidence!
Fakes just like to hang out together - that’s why so many of them live in Hollywood!
John Kerry Berg?
One day [Caligula] was on the Oration Platform in the Market Place dressed as Jove and making a speech. “I intend shortly,” he said, “to build a city for my occupation on top of the Alps. We Gods prefer mountain-tops to unhealthy river-valleys. From the Alps I shall have a wider view of my Empire—France, Italy, Switzerland, the Tyrol and Germany. If I see any treason hatching anywhere below me, I shall give a warning growl of thunder so! (He growled in his throat.) If the warning is disregarded I shall blast the traitor with this lightning of mine, so! (He hurled his piece of lightning at the crowd. It hit a statue and bounced off harmlessly.) A stranger in the crowd, a shoemaker from Marseilles on a sight-seeing visit to Rome, burst out laughing. Caligula had the fellow arrested and brought nearer the platform, then bending down he asked frowning: “Who do I seem to you to be?” “A big humbug,” said the shoemaker. Caligula was puzzled. “Humbug?” he repeated. “I, a humbug!” “Yes,” said the Frenchman, “I’m only a poor French shoemaker and this is my first visit to Rome. And I don’t know any better. If anyone at home did what you’re doing he’d be a big humbug.”Caligula began to laugh too. “You poor half-wit,” he said. “Of course he would be. That’s just the difference.”
— Robert Graves, I, Claudius.
Closest he ever got to one of those feline animals....
:)PaMom
That’s gotta....hurt. Oh well, if it ain’t Scottish it’s crap.
There was a man in our town whose last name was Jarvis. I had met some other family of the same name and asked his granddaughter if they were related. She laughed and said that her grandfather was Greek and when he joined the service they asked his name and the guy couldn’t spell his loooong Greek name they just put down Jarvis and told him that was his new name. He spent the rest of his life with that last name.
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