The name of the book is something like Saxon, Celtic, Viking Ancestry. I skimmed through it at the bookstore and some of the findings seemed counter-intuitive to me. His findings that struck me as unexpected were:
The patrilinear base of the British population was overwhelmingly Celtic, of course 90% plus in Ireland but also the majority overall in England. He could not sort out Viking from Norman from Saxon DNA because of the close relationship but it was much less than I would have expected.
He treats the concept of the Saxon as the basis of British population as a political myth.
The matrilinear line was more diverse and a different majority group predominated. His explanation was that the wives had to travel further for marriage. I would think the men, marching, crusading, ravishing, etc. traveled consistently further.
I may not be treating his ideas fairly because I just skimmed the surface. Perhaps someone who has read the book or has insight into DNA testing will comment.
Book by head of oxfordancestors.com
Moderator: MOD_nyhetsgrupper
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Doug McDonald
Re: Book by head of oxfordancestors.com
Richard Bradley wrote:
I have not read the book, but have seen comments by very knowledgeable DNA people.
Basically, Sykes is using data on Y chromosomes that is so bad, with
so little data for each person, that he really can't be expected to
be able to tell much of anything. Vastly more about the history
of Y-DNA has been learned since he got his data, and so we know
that his story is oversimplified beyond any hope of being correct.
Bottom like: the book is useless garbage.
I would say that SOME Viking can be sorted from SOME non-Viking.
I.e. me ... I'm R1a1* and YCA-IIb = 21, which is perfectly clearly
Viking. In fact, I'm quite close to the prototype McDonald/Viking Scot.
Doug McDonald
The name of the book is something like Saxon, Celtic, Viking Ancestry. I skimmed through it at
the bookstore and some of the findings seemed counter-intuitive to me. His findings that struck
me as unexpected were:
The patrilinear base of the British population was overwhelmingly Celtic, of course 90% plus in
Ireland but also the majority overall in England. He could not sort out Viking from Norman from
Saxon DNA because of the close relationship but it was much less than I would have expected.
He treats the concept of the Saxon as the basis of British population as a political myth.
The matrilinear line was more diverse and a different majority group predominated. His
explanation was that the wives had to travel further for marriage. I would think the men,
marching, crusading, ravishing, etc. traveled consistently further.
I may not be treating his ideas fairly because I just skimmed the surface. Perhaps someone who
has read the book or has insight into DNA testing will comment.
I have not read the book, but have seen comments by very knowledgeable DNA people.
Basically, Sykes is using data on Y chromosomes that is so bad, with
so little data for each person, that he really can't be expected to
be able to tell much of anything. Vastly more about the history
of Y-DNA has been learned since he got his data, and so we know
that his story is oversimplified beyond any hope of being correct.
Bottom like: the book is useless garbage.
I would say that SOME Viking can be sorted from SOME non-Viking.
I.e. me ... I'm R1a1* and YCA-IIb = 21, which is perfectly clearly
Viking. In fact, I'm quite close to the prototype McDonald/Viking Scot.
Doug McDonald
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taf
Re: Book by head of oxfordancestors.com
On Jun 25, 9:32 am, "Richard Bradley" <rbraba...@msn.com> wrote:
As to the Y-DNA pattern he claims, there is nothing novel there
(although when he announced it in a press conference, it was reported
as an astounding reinterpretation of history). Studies of bone
structure had concluded much the same thing - that the Saxons were an
upper class that managed to impose itself on a largely Celtic
population (and this is well known of the Normans, while work in
Iceland already had showed that viking women were largely of Celtic
haplotypes).
As to the mtDNA, I cannot speak to the actual result, but the
conclusion is at odds with the vast majority of populations - the
males are more mobile than the females, and introduced populations are
more highly represented in the Y-DNA, while local populations will be
more highly represented in the mtDNA pool. In a patrilineal society,
women move to their husband's home, but with the exception of the
nobility, we are still talking about movements of a handful of miles.
I seriously doubt this would compensate for the wandering of landless
younger sons, let alone the marching of armies, and in the context of
an island such small movements would in no way account for an
increased diversity. For this argument to stand, a mechanism must be
identified that would specifically favor large-scale movement of women
but not men, and only two come to mind - slave raiding and soldiers
returning with foreign wives, but these seem unlikely to account for
the "higher diversity" of the male migration itself. I wonder if,
instead, the diversity reflects a diverse ancient population (deriving
from Iberia after rounds of advance and retreat at the face of the ice
sheet, presumably with a good bit of mixing). This could be
distinguished from the data, which would have to be examined in
detail.
taf
The name of the book is something like Saxon, Celtic, Viking Ancestry. I skimmed through it at the bookstore and some of the findings seemed counter-intuitive to me. His findings that struck me as unexpected were:
The patrilinear base of the British population was overwhelmingly Celtic, of course 90% plus in Ireland but also the majority overall in England. He could not sort out Viking from Norman from Saxon DNA because of the close relationship but it was much less than I would have expected.
He treats the concept of the Saxon as the basis of British population as a political myth.
The matrilinear line was more diverse and a different majority group predominated. His explanation was that the wives had to travel further for marriage. I would think the men, marching, crusading, ravishing, etc. traveled consistently further.
I may not be treating his ideas fairly because I just skimmed the surface. Perhaps someone who has read the book or has insight into DNA testing will comment.
As to the Y-DNA pattern he claims, there is nothing novel there
(although when he announced it in a press conference, it was reported
as an astounding reinterpretation of history). Studies of bone
structure had concluded much the same thing - that the Saxons were an
upper class that managed to impose itself on a largely Celtic
population (and this is well known of the Normans, while work in
Iceland already had showed that viking women were largely of Celtic
haplotypes).
As to the mtDNA, I cannot speak to the actual result, but the
conclusion is at odds with the vast majority of populations - the
males are more mobile than the females, and introduced populations are
more highly represented in the Y-DNA, while local populations will be
more highly represented in the mtDNA pool. In a patrilineal society,
women move to their husband's home, but with the exception of the
nobility, we are still talking about movements of a handful of miles.
I seriously doubt this would compensate for the wandering of landless
younger sons, let alone the marching of armies, and in the context of
an island such small movements would in no way account for an
increased diversity. For this argument to stand, a mechanism must be
identified that would specifically favor large-scale movement of women
but not men, and only two come to mind - slave raiding and soldiers
returning with foreign wives, but these seem unlikely to account for
the "higher diversity" of the male migration itself. I wonder if,
instead, the diversity reflects a diverse ancient population (deriving
from Iberia after rounds of advance and retreat at the face of the ice
sheet, presumably with a good bit of mixing). This could be
distinguished from the data, which would have to be examined in
detail.
taf