National Geographic facial reconstructions

slowburner

These reconstructions are based on single examples in Britain and may not be an accurate representation of Irish prehistoric populations.
Interesting nonetheless.



https://www.nationalgeographic.com/culture/2019/01/facial-reconstruction-history-england-uk/?fbclid=IwAR0VBll5P-M2VRD82658xix-ogb6N6ubUgziYfSkCKKbWGUanuLM5uc96a8

tac foley

Given the paucity of complete Irish skeletal remains from pre-Christian times it is hardly surprising that no effort has been made to make similar reconstructions.

dubhthach

tac foley wrote: »

Given the paucity of complete Irish skeletal remains from pre-Christian times it is hardly surprising that no effort has been made to make similar reconstructions.

There ye go Tac, Ballynahatty woman



Genetically closest to modern Sardinians and Southern Spanish

tac foley

I didn't say there were none, I said that there not many. So where are all the others?

cfuserkildare

How far back does that gene sample go?

Remembering that the Norman invasion, Celtic invasions etc would have displaced a lot of native peoples?

tac foley

Add the Scandinavian incursions/invasions and occupations of the eastern side of the island and you have a real people soup gene pool, although that is from much later on.

We have often discussed the proto-Iberian genesis of much of the occupants of early Ireland, bearing in mind that the island was separated from the British landmass a goodly time before the rest of what is now classed as an archipelago around 8000 BCE. The Storegga Landslip simply hastened the separation caused by the rising ocean levels.

There is a lot of mileage to account for the so-called 'black Irish' physical appearance of a lot of the population. I have two half-brothers - one is tall and fair-haired like me and the ould da - obvious candidates for our Scandinavian roots, but the other one takes after his grandfather, and is black-haired and sallow.

dubhthach

cfuserkildare wrote: »

How far back does that gene sample go?

Remembering that the Norman invasion, Celtic invasions etc would have displaced a lot of native peoples?

That's a full genome they got from both Ballynahatty woman and the three Rathlin Island men. As a result you can do population level analysis comparing her with known extent populations.

What should be remember is when you get the full genome you also get a great insight into the wider population. So for example you can tell how closely related her parents were, what the effective genetic population size was etc.

In case of Ballynahatty she's a Neolithic sample, her genetic profile matches what we see of all Neolithic samples so far sampled in western Eurasia. It's evident there was mass population turnover in most of Northern Europe with onset of copper/bronze ages.

dubhthach

tac foley wrote: »

I didn't say there were none, I said that there not many. So where are all the others?

Hiding in the National museum? I imagine they don't exist given the chronic under funding of both archaeology and Heritage in general in this country. One only has to look at poor state that many historical monuments are left in.

I reckon we only have reconstruction of Ballynahatty as research on her was done out of Queens in Belfast.

dubhthach

tac foley wrote: »

Add the Scandinavian incursions/invasions and occupations of the eastern side of the island and you have a real people soup gene pool, although that is from much later on.

We have often discussed the proto-Iberian genesis of much of the occupants of early Ireland, bearing in mind that the island was separated from the British landmass a goodly time before the rest of what is now classed as an archipelago around 8000 BCE. The Storegga Landslip simply hastened the separation caused by the rising ocean levels.

There is a lot of mileage to account for the so-called 'black Irish' physical appearance of a lot of the population. I have two half-brothers - one is tall and fair-haired like me and the ould da - obvious candidates for our Scandinavian roots, but the other one takes after his grandfather, and is black-haired and sallow.

The 'Irish DNA Atlas' theorized using modern population sampleset that there was Norse admixture in Modern Irish. However without a sample from Iron age/Early Christian period to use as a comparison I wouldn't be so sure on their figures.

Of course we are awaiting on embargo to be lifted on following thesis. I imagine there should be a couple acdemic papers published before then though:

A Genomic Compendium of an Island: Documenting Continuity and Change across Irish Human Prehistory

Abstract:
This thesis provides an initial demographic scaffold for Irish prehistory based on the palaeogenomic analysis of 93 ancient individuals from all major periods of the island's human occupation, sequenced to a median of 1X coverage. ADMIXTURE and principal component analysis identify three ancestrally distinct Irish populations, whose inhabitation of the island corresponds closely to the Mesolithic, Neolithic and Chalcolithic/Early Bronze Age eras, with large scale migration to the island implied during the transitionary periods. Haplotypic-based sharing methods and Y chromosome analysis demonstrate strong continuity between the Early Bronze Age and modern Irish populations, suggesting no substantial population replacement has occurred on the island since this point in time. The Mesolithic population shares high genetic drift with contemporaries from France and Luxembourg and shows evidence of a severe inbreeding bottleneck, apparent through runs of homozygosity (ROH). Substantial contributions from both Mediterranean farming groups and northwestern hunter-gatherers are evident in the Neolithic Irish population. Moreover, evidence for local Mesolithic survival and introgression in southwestern Ireland, long after the commencement of the Neolithic, is also implied in haplotypic-analysis. Societal complexity during the Neolithic is suggested in patterns of Y chromosome and autosomal structure, while the identification of a highly inbred individual through ROH analysis, retrieved from an elite burial context, strongly suggests the elaboration and expansion of megalithic monuments over the course of the Neolithic was accompanied in some regions by dynastic hierarchies. Haplotypic affinities and distributions of steppe-related introgression among samples suggest a potentially bimodal introduction of Beaker culture to the island from both Atlantic and Northern European sources, with southwestern individuals showing inflated levels of Neolithic ancestry relative to individualised burials from the north and east. Signals of genetic continuity and change after this initial establishment of the Irish population are also explored, with haplotypic diversification evident between both the Bronze Age and Iron Age, and the Iron Age and present day. Across these intervals selection pressures related to nutrition appear to have acted, with variants involved in lactase persistence and skin depigmentation showing steady increases in frequency through time.

http://www.tara.tcd.ie/handle/2262/82960

I'm not sure when you talk about 'Proto-Iberian' origin, I'm assuming you are talking about the outdated notion that Irish male paternal lineages been mostly under Haplogroup R1b reflect mesolithic continuity? In reality it would seem is that R1b underwent rapid expansion/diversification into Western Eurasia from the onset of Copper age onwards.

Likewise there was mass population turnover reflecting input from Eurasian Steppe into Northern Europe, that is reflective of wider genetic change from Ireland in West to Southern Siberia in the east.

tac foley

dubhthach wrote: »

I reckon we only have reconstruction of Ballynahatty as research on her was done out of Queens in Belfast.

I hope you'll note that I diplomatically refrained from pointing that out.

I'd like to see what kind of a job the Dutch twins would have made of her, given the unpopularity of their 'All-black' Cheddar Man reconstruction.

dubhthach

tac foley wrote: »

I hope you'll note that I diplomatically refrained from pointing that out.

I'd like to see what kind of a job the Dutch twins would have made of her, given the unpopularity of their 'All-black' Cheddar Man reconstruction.

Cheddar Man is Mesolithic in comparison, Cheddar man fits the pattern as seen with other Mesolithic remains such as La Brana from Northern Spain:



Dark pigementation + Blue eyes. The two of them are also Haplogroup C when it comes to their Y-Chromsome which is very rare in modern European men.

As a comparison Haplogroup C is recorded at levels of up to nearly 50% in Aboriginal Australians as well as been found in various Asian and Native American populations.

Neolithic population saw an expansion of a mediterranean like population across Western Europe, over time there was gradual admixture back in of surviving hunter gatherers (eg. genomes from Late Neolithic have higher percentages of Mesolithic input then genomes from Early Neolithic)

Ipso

Isn’t there a C clade that is found in South Western eurasia? I remember reading that it pops up in some Scottish border surnames.
When is Dr Cassidy’s paper on ancient genomes out?

tac foley

Ipso wrote: »

Isn’t there a C clade that is found in South Western eurasia? I remember reading that it pops up in some Scottish border surnames.
When is Dr Cassidy’s paper on ancient genomes out?

I'm confused by your comment.

What connection is there between a surname and a genetic proclivity?

My buddy A**** McGregor is pitch-black and from Bélize, where his ancestors were bound 'workers' for a sugar plantation owned by the McGregors - all his relatives have the same Scottish surname but have no connection genetically with any part of Europe.

Wibbs

tac foley wrote: »

I'm confused by your comment.

What connection is there between a surname and a genetic proclivity?

My buddy A**** McGregor is pitch-black and from Bze, where his ancestors were bound 'workers' for a sugar plantation owned by the McGregors - all his relatives have the same Scottish surname but have no connection genetically with any part of Europe.

Well your friend's case is obviously different to someone with a surname native to them. It would be like trying to link the genetics of an adopted person to their parents.

Surnames can most certainly show genetic links. In Ireland the Niall of the Nine Hostages genetic link is a good example. <- Link.

From the link: "The researchers looked at 17 STR markers on Irish Y chromosomes to determine the relatedness of samples they had obtained. They found that there was a strong association between the most common signature and surnames that were related to the most significant dynasty of early medieval Ireland – the Ul. Some of the surnames included (O’)Gallacher, Boyle, O Doherty, O’Connor, Cannon, Bradley, O’Reilly, Flynn, (Mc)Kee, Devlin, Donnelly, Egan, Gormley, Hynes, McCaul, McGovern, McLoughlin, McManus, McMenamin, Molloy, O’Kane, O’Rourke and Quinn. Of course there were no surnames at the time of the earliest Ul dynasty, but when the Irish took surnames around 1,000 A.D, many chose names that were associated with Ul dynasties".

Ipso

tac foley wrote: »

I'm confused by your comment.

What connection is there between a surname and a genetic proclivity?

My buddy A**** McGregor is pitch-black and from Bélize, where his ancestors were bound 'workers' for a sugar plantation owned by the McGregors - all his relatives have the same Scottish surname but have no connection genetically with any part of Europe.

My comment was more about whether C could have been a widespread haplogroup back in the day. I just threw in the surnames for reference.
Although exotic haplogroups in Britain could be due to the Romans.
Haplogroup A which is associated with Africa has been found in Yorkshire.
As Wibbs pointed out once a haplogroup survives to the period when surnames developed and as surnames are passed via the male line then you can see patterns develop (in Ireland this had to do with the clan based culture of the Gaelic lords and hereditary laws).

dubhthach

Haplogroup C does appear to be present among Western Hunter Gathers yes, for example both La Brana (NW Iberia) and Cheddar man (Southern Britain) are in Haplogorup C. C survives today at fairly lowlevels in Europe (on range of 1-2%).

I'm not aware of any specific Borders surnames where there might be increase prevalence of it.

As for McGregor, well form memory a fair number of men with surname fall into the 'Scots Modal' cluster eg. that's is positive for L1335. This reflects pattern seen with many Scottish surnames.

What's interesting is that L1335 was 'bifurcated' in last couple of years due to next generation testing, a sub-branch was discovered in men who lack the specific STR haplogroup seen in the 'Scots Modal' but who carried the L1335 mutation. These men appear to have origins in Wales. In comparison all the L1335+ Scots modal men fell under marker called L1065

https://www.ytree.net/DisplayTree.php?blockID=9

What this all hints at is that L1335 probably arose in Southern Britain and spilt/expanded with one branch ending up in Wales (the smaller branch) and the other in what is now Scotland. Where it underwent rapid expansion/diversification form about 2000-1500 years ago.

The two branches (L1065 and the Welsh one) both seperated from each other in Late Bronze Age/Early Iron age.

Given how tightly linked to Scottish surnames L1335+/L1065+ is when we tend to see it in Ireland it is often linked to individuals with surnames of recent Scottish origin (eg. from middle ages to Plantation period).

Ipso

Probably deserves its own thread, but what’s the take on this.

https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2019/04/09/1818037116

slowburner

Excuse the pun...the work certainly puts flesh on the bones of theories concerning the Atlantic megalithic tradition.