Iron Age and Anglo-Saxon genomes from East England reveal British migration history [Nature Communications]
English DNA 'one-third' Anglo-Saxon [BBC News 19/1/2016]
Were one million or more Britons wiped out by the English in a Dark Ages holocaust?
The evidence has been gathered from three burial sites near Cambridge: Linton for the Late Iron /Early Romano-British period; Oakington for the Late Romano-British/Early Anglo-Saxon period; and Hinxton for the Middle Anglo-Saxon period.
The research contradicts linguistic evidence (and previous DNA research) that the Anglo-Saxons wiped out the indigenous Britons. Even in the east where the Anglo-Saxon influence could be expected to be at its strongest there is evidence of integration and intermarriage in the genetic record. Further west we would expect to see a much lower Anglo-Saxon contribution.
This suggests a band of immigrants emerging as a cultural, political and military élite and imposing themselves, their language and their way of life on the indigenous Britons. The result over several generations was a cultural and linguistic takeover with the Anglo-Saxons calling all the shots.
The burial sites reveal a genetically diverse but culturally integrated population.
So less of a holocaust , more of a shotgun wedding.
The People we call English/Anglo-Saxons today ,the descents of the of the Germanic Tribes from Northern Germany and Danish peninsula pushed the Britons westwards and call them Welas(Wales)Land of the Foreigner.
ReplyDeleteAs the British will push westwards the Amerindians to reservations in America.
Exactly right. And interestingly the 16 towns called Walton (e.g. Walton on Thames, Walton-on-the-Hill) derive from 'Wealatun', referring to a community of native Britons co-existing with Anglo-Saxon settlers. Wouldn't it be great to know how those dynamics worked. Was it like living in a free cultural enclave like a Chinatown, or a poor township like Soweto, or a hell-hole like the Jabalia regugee camp?
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