Ireland's Population Was in Serious Decline Before the Vikings

[Grace O'Malley]

Have you noticed how huge of an area the Irish samples alone cover with G25? Bigger than England or Scotland. Some supposed "Irish" plot on top of a mixed frog like me while others overlap with Sweden. I'm curious if some of them are self reporting Irish Americans with mixed heritage or if the Irish genome truly covers a large area on PCAs.

No they are all Irish in those samples but it is a relatively large sample of 64 which dwarfs a lot of other population numbers so it encompasses the diversity better than smaller samples. I used to get Iceland as my no 1 population on the G25 when the Irish sample was smaller but when the numbers were increased I now get Ireland as my No 1. The other populations just have smaller samples so they won't be as broad as the Irish sample.

Sample size will make a difference. Norway has only 7, English 19, Scottish 28 (a bit better), Welsh sample is now 20 which is much better than when there was only 3, the Swedish sample is reasonable at 22 but 19 for the English is not enough when you consider the size of the population.

[Grace O'Malley]

The Orcadian G25 sample is more southern than the standard Scottish one.

In what way? They are closest to Scotland, Ireland etc which would be expected.

Distance to: Orcadian
0.00583300 Scottish
0.00929077 Irish
0.00997250 English
0.01109619 Welsh
0.01267535 English_Cornwall
0.01380250 Dutch
0.01575301 Icelandic
0.01652101 Shetlandic
0.01674995 French_Brittany
0.01812782 Danish
0.01914219 Norwegian
0.02370322 German
0.02398250 Swedish
0.02538661 Afrikaner
0.02951555 Belgian
0.03307976 French_Seine-Maritime
0.03344966 French_Nord
0.03350168 French_Pas-de-Calais
0.03592241 German_East
0.03705858 French_Alsace
0.03773349 French_Paris
0.03868596 Austrian
0.04024746 Swiss_German
0.04310146 Czech
0.04641059 Hungarian

[Grace O'Malley]

Thats because they mixed with the Neolithic Picts, they are a balance between Northern Paleolithic and Neolithic. They are also theorized to have spoken a separate more ancient language before the merger. Scotland and Orkney specifically have about 40-50% Hg on average, the highest in Britain. The HG population resisted farming and moved North.

Picts were just the same as the Gaels i.e. a Bell Beaker derived population. Picts also most likely spoke a Brythonic Celtic language similar to the rest of Britain. They weren't some Neolithic holdout.

[Grace O'Malley]

Anyway getting back to my original post I really don't think anyone can say the Vikings boosted Ireland's population. What I really would like to know now is the amount of Celtic input into the Irish. I hope that sort of thing will be answered in the future. Also Celtic input into other countries.

I'm also hoping the Cassidy thesis will be released tomorrow so I hope it being a weekend doesn't delay this.

[RyoHazuki]

In what way? They are closest to Scotland, Ireland etc which would be expected.

Distance to: Orcadian
0.00583300 Scottish
0.00929077 Irish
0.00997250 English
0.01109619 Welsh
0.01267535 English_Cornwall
0.01380250 Dutch
0.01575301 Icelandic
0.01652101 Shetlandic
0.01674995 French_Brittany
0.01812782 Danish
0.01914219 Norwegian
0.02370322 German
0.02398250 Swedish
0.02538661 Afrikaner
0.02951555 Belgian
0.03307976 French_Seine-Maritime
0.03344966 French_Nord
0.03350168 French_Pas-de-Calais
0.03592241 German_East
0.03705858 French_Alsace
0.03773349 French_Paris
0.03868596 Austrian
0.04024746 Swiss_German
0.04310146 Czech
0.04641059 Hungarian

On closer inspection it looks like my mistake; with a Swedish, Irish, and Spanish model the Orcadian looks to have tiny bit higher Spain percentage to account for the higher Norse compared to the Scottish avg.

[Grace O'Malley]

On closer inspection it looks like my mistake; with a Swedish, Irish, and Spanish model the Orcadian looks to have tiny bit higher Spain percentage to account for the higher Norse compared to the Scottish avg.

OK. So it's because of a model that gave them higher Spanish? No Orcadians usually cluster north of Britain so they aren't southern shifted. I guess like anything with admixture models it can give some false results. This also happens with the commercial dna companies and people obsess over small amount of Iberian or Scandinavian or whatever else. But I guess it takes a while to understand this stuff.

[JamesBond007]

Anyway getting back to my original post I really don't think anyone can say the Vikings boosted Ireland's population. What I really would like to know now is the amount of Celtic input into the Irish. I hope that sort of thing will be answered in the future. Also Celtic input into other countries.

I'm also hoping the Cassidy thesis will be released tomorrow so I hope it being a weekend doesn't delay this.

Hmmm, I think the average Irish person may have a small amount of viking blood but that Viking is obviously significantly stronger in certain parts of Scotland. The Irish and Welsh probably have the most Celtic blood while mainland Scots are probably intermediate between the native Irish/Welsh on the one hand and the English/Germanics on the other hand. Also, Celtic input is significant in Britanny France etc... in otherwords I bet it is stuff we basically already know.

Scots are really Celto-Germanic but we call ourselves 'Celts' to differentiate ourselves from the English but not me : I say "Celto-Germanic" !

[PaleoEuropean]

I expected for a Norse influenced people Orcadians would be more Northern than average

All calculators have their margin of error, even the more accurate mid-band calculators like K13 aren't 100% accurate. Unless the calculator tests populations individually and deduces what is missing instead of what is there it's a novelty. You would need a chipset that has a degree of intelligence rather than the basically spreadsheet style gedmatch calculators use.

[Grace O'Malley]

Hmmm, I think the average Irish person may have a small amount of viking blood but thatViking is obviously significantly stronger in certain parts of Scotland. Irish and Welsh probably have the most Celtic blood while mainland Scots are probably intermediate between the native Irish/Welsh on the one hand and the English/Germanics on the other hand. Also, Celtic input is significant in Britanny France etc... in otherwords I bet it s stuff we basically already know.

I don't doubt there is some Viking blood in Ireland. The parts of Scotland with Viking blood are the Orkneys/Shetlands/Hebrides. I think mainland Scotland doesn't have much. They had much larger bases in Ireland than the Scottish mainland.



What Scotland would have more of is Anglo-Saxon input but so would Wales. I'm not so sure about actual Celtic input in the Isles. There was some of course but I'm now actually thinking that France, Spain etc are in fact more Celtic genetically. I think that is quite possible. Irish, Scots, Welsh etc cluster too much with the English, Dutch, Scandinavians etc. This is due to similarity in the Bronze Age IMO. It will be interesting when some of these studies do come out. Ireland has some really good geneticists and Trinity has a really good Genetics Department which is why some good studies have come out of Ireland and will be coming out of Ireland in the future.

[JamesBond007]

I don't doubt there is some Viking blood in Ireland. The parts of Scotland with Viking blood are the Orkneys/Shetlands/Hebrides. I think mainland Scotland doesn't have much. They had much larger bases in Ireland than the Scottish mainland.



What Scotland would have more of is Anglo-Saxon input but so would Wales. I'm not so sure about actual Celtic input in the Isles. There was some of course but I'm now actually thinking that France, Spain etc are in fact more Celtic genetically. I think that is quite possible. Irish, Scots, Welsh etc cluster too much with the English, Dutch, Scandinavians etc. This is due to similarity in the Bronze Age IMO.

Agreed, some Gedmatch calculators give me Dutch and English and depending on what datasheet I use I my single closest population is the Dutch or Norwegians. I'm tired of these calculators. I just use common sense. My Father's name is Scottish Gordon and his mother was English and he might have some ancestors on the paternal side from Donegal which clusters with West Scotland closely and my mother is Celto-Germanic. Not only that but people in real life have told me "you're Scottish not English" and "You are Braveheart era Scottish". One Italian American called me a WASP but I'm obviously not English so it must be Scottish. Anyway, I'm trusting humans over these genetic calculators although some of them do tell me I'm Scottish. I had one genetic report done by LM Genetics by Lukasz and it nailed me as Scottish but my lowland Scottish Anglo-Saxon stuff was causing me to cluster with the Dutch as well. I'm sick of genetic tests !

[quote[It will be interesting when some of these studies do come out. Ireland has some really good geneticists and Trinity has a really good Genetics Department which is why some good studies have come out of Ireland and will be coming out of Ireland in the future.[/QUOTE]

Cool