Eye and hair colour distribution among 458 Estonians (both sexes studied)

[The Blade]

Another survey of this kind I conducted.
My criteria once again
I've always had a pretty clear criterion of blondism (even when I didn't know anything about anthropology) which actually matches the Fischer-Saller scale. What I consider blond includes the nuances listed on it. Yellowish colour of one or another form is my idea of blondism (even wikipedia agrees with me):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blond
If a person has light hair lacking these tones I call that light brown, not blond.
Orange and similar reddish blond shades affect both blondism and rufosity rate.
Here is the scale I used. Colours A to O are what I count as blond.
The numbers V and VI reflect reddish blond hair and affect both blondism and rufosity values. Deeper orange shades I also include as reddish blond.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fische...93Saller_scale
Other hair colours in my view:
- light brown
- medium brown (including medium ash brown nuances)
- dark brown (again including some dark ash brown forms)
- black
- reddish brown
- pure red
To estimate the eye colours distribution I use the Martin-Schultz scale. Green eyes with brown spots when green dominates I count as light. Evenly mixed green-brown shades and such where brown dominates I consider hazel and don't count as light.
The Martin-Schultz scale includes:
1-2 : blue iris (1a, 1b, 1c, 2a : light blue iris - 2b : darker blue iris)
3 : blue-gray iris
4 : gray iris (4a, 4b)
5 : blue-gray iris with yellow/brown spots
6 : gray-green iris with yellow/brown spots
7 : green iris
8 : green iris with yellow/brown spots
9-10-11 : light-brown and hazel iris
12-13 : medium brown iris
14-15-16 : dark-brown and black iris
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin...3Schultz_scale
Colours 1-8 I consider light. 9 is where non-light eyes begin for me.

Above you see an image of the Martin-Schultz scale.
Everyone counted with natural shades. My ladies' results are based on film actresses, models, singers, footballers, tennis players, MEPs, mayors of places, government ministers and other politicians. Males include singers, TV actors, architects, politicians and basketballers. Last person who became part of my study was basketballer Bernhard Nooni (with this a sample of 229 people of each sex was achieved). A few people are partly Russian. People born in Estonia but of fully foreign ancestry (those were usually Russians or Germans) were excluded.
Links:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...film_actresses
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego..._female_models
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...female_singers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...7s_footballers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...tennis_players
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...en_in_politics
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...ers_of_Estonia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...ces_in_Estonia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...Ps_for_Estonia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...n_male_singers
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...evision_actors
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...ian_architects
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...an_politicians
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catego...etball_players
And now, the results.
Ladies first:
Hair colour distribution:
Blonde – 106 (46,29%)
Reddish blonde – 6 (2,62%)
Red – 2 (0,87%)
Reddish brown – 3 (1,31%)
Light brown – 28 (12,23%)
Medium brown – 26 (11,35%)
Medium ash brown – 28 (12,23%)
Dark brown – 15 (6,55%)
Dark ash brown – 12 (5,24%)
Black – 3 (1,31%)
Total blondism value: 48,91% (112 women)
Total rufosity share: 4,8% (11 individuals)
Brown hair total: 48,91% (112 people)
Medium brown hair shades (including ashy ones): 23,58% (54 women)
Dark brown shades (including ashy nuances): 11,79% (27 women)
Dark hair total (dark brown shades & black): 13,1% (30 individuals)

Eye colour distribution:
Blue – 84 (36,68%)
Blue-green – 6 (2,62%)
Blue-grey – 28 (12,23%)
Green-grey – 36 (15,72%)
Grey – 32 (13,98%)
Green – 20 (8,73%)
Hazel – 11 (4,8%)
Brown – 12 (5,24%)
Light eyes total: 89,96% (206 women)
Dark/dark-mixed eyes total: 10,04% (23 women)
Blue and blue-mixed light eyes value: 51,53% (118 people)
Grey and grey-mixed light eyes rate: 41,93% (96 women)

Males' data (There is one case of central heterochromia. As the light part didn't dominate, it falls into the dark-mixed category to me):
Hair colour distribution:
Blond – 61 (26,64%)
Reddish blond – 4 (1,75%)
Red – 0
Reddish brown – 2 (0,87%)
Light brown – 31 (13,54%)
Medium brown – 47 (20,52%)
Medium ash brown – 39 (17,03%)
Dark brown – 34 (14,85%)
Dark ash brown – 8 (3,49%)
Black – 3 (1,31%)
Total blondism share: 28,39% (65 men)
Rufosity total: 2,62% (6 men)
Brown hair total: 70,28% (161 men)
Medium brown hair shades (with ashy tones counted): 37,55% (86 people)
Dark brown shades (with ashy nuances included): 18,34% (42 individuals)
Dark hair total (dark brown shades + black): 19,65% (45 men)

Eye colour distribution:
Blue – 116 (50,65%)
Blue-green – 9 (3,93%)
Blue-grey – 22 (9,61%)
Green-grey – 15 (6,55%)
Grey – 22 (9,61%)
Green – 9 (3,93%)
Grey-brown – 1 (0,44%)
Hazel – 11 (4,8%)
Brown – 23 (10,04%)
Black – 1 (0,44%)
Light eyes total: 84,28% (193 people)
Dark/dark-mixed eyes rate: 15,72% (36 individuals)
Blue and blue-mixed light eyes rate: 64,19% (147 men)
Grey and grey-mixed light eyes value: 25,77% (59 men)

Average results based on both sexes:
Hair colour distribution:
Blond – 167 (36,46%)
Reddish blond – 10 (2,18%)
Red – 2 (0,44%)
Reddish brown – 5 (1,09%)
Light brown – 59 (12,88%)
Medium brown – 73 (15,94%)
Medium ash brown – 67 (14,63%)
Dark brown – 49 (10,7%)
Dark ash brown – 20 (4,37%)
Black – 6 (1,31%)
Total blondism rate: 38,64% (177 individuals)
Rufosity total: 3,71% (17 individuals)
Brown hair rate: 59,61% (273 people)
Medium brown hair shades (with ashy tones counted): 30,57% (140 individuals)
Dark brown shades (with ashy nuances counted): 15,07% (69 people)
Dark hair total (with black added): 16,38% (75 people)

Eye colour distribution:
Blue – 200 (43,67%)
Blue-green – 15 (3,27%)
Blue-grey – 50 (10,92%)
Green-grey – 51 (11,14%)
Grey – 54 (11,79%)
Green – 29 (6,33%)
Grey-brown – 1 (0,22%)
Hazel – 22 (4,8%)
Brown – 35 (7,64%)
Black – 1 (0,22%)
Light eyes total: 87,12% (399 individuals)
Dark/dark-mixed eyes share: 12,88% (59 individuals)
Blue and blue-mixed light eyes value: 57,86% (265 people)
Grey and grey-mixed light eyes value: 33,85% (155 people)

Phenotypical and pigmentation comment
The phenotypical mix of Estonians consists of Nordic (Corded mainly but also some Hallstatt ones) types, Upper Paleolithic survivors (Brunn, Faelid, East Cromagnid, Borreby), a certain amount of dinaromorphic features (Dinaric, Noric, Dinaro-CM, etc.), Baltids and a low amount of Alpines mainly. One basketballer had an unusual (for Estonia, not for Europe as a whole) appearance of a Pontic Mediterranean. As he had a completely Estonian name, I included him in my statistics.
Hair texture is mainly straight followed by wavy.
Estonia dethrones the previous blondism leader Sweden - 38,64% vs. 32,17% for Swedes.
The country also has the highest average light eyes result so far, its women almost hitting 90% (Swedish ladies scored as 85,97% light-eyed, with England and The Netherlands being close behind). Estonian males having 84,28% of light eyes, score second so far after their Dutch counterparts (84,75%), while Swedish men had a result of 83,29%. As you can see, Estonian men have a higher amount of pure blue eyes than their female compatriots but the latter clearly dominate when grey, green and light-mixed nuances are taken into account. Men and women in this survey have the same amount of hazel eyes but brown ones are clearly more common among males.

[XenophobicPrussian]

Nice work. Will be double checking the male hair colour results myself(and also your Swedish sample to compare, or atleast some of it because it has a really high N) because I'm very curious about Estonia vs Scandinavia, am doubtful Estonians will come out lighter but we shall see. Might take awhile as I'm pretty busy nowadays but will post when it's done.

[Tooting Carmen]

Nice work. Will be double checking the male hair colour results myself(and also your Swedish sample to compare, or atleast some of it because it has a really high N) because I'm very curious about Estonia vs Scandinavia, am doubtful Estonians will come out lighter but we shall see. Might take awhile as I'm pretty busy nowadays but will post when it's done.

Estonians are the blondest non-Scandinavians except maybe the Dutch.

[XenophobicPrussian]

Estonians are the blondest non-Scandinavians except maybe the Dutch.

Well yeah, that's what my own study found too(and they are blonder than the Dutch), but here I have a study saying otherwise and I'm genuinely curious what the truth is, not just going to say "nah he's wrong" and move on.

[Komintasavalta]

Estonians are the blondest non-Scandinavians except maybe the Dutch.

In Karin Mark's dataset, the combined frequency of light blonde, blonde, and dark blonde hair (1+2+3) was lower in Finland-Swedes than in Finns, Karelians, Izhorians, or Teryukhan Mordvins (https://www.etis.ee/Portal/Publicati...8-b9b3010eabad). Finland-Swedes are probably autosomally closer to Finns than to Swedes, so unmixed Swedes might have further been darker than Karatai Mordvins or Vepsians.

1+2+3  1    2    3     4     5     population
-------------------------------------------------------
34.5   2.2  4.4  27.9  51.5  14.0  Estonian
30.2   3.6  4.9  21.7  24.0  22.8  Finnish
26     1.7  3.1  21.2  55.7  18.3  Northeastern Finnish
25.7   .6   .6   24.5  54.2  20.1  Karelian
24.6   1.5  1.5  21.6  50.8  24.6  Izhorian
22.5   0    2.5  20.0  62.5  15.0  Ingrian Finnish
21.8   0    3.1  18.7  59.4  18.8  Teryukhan
21.3   .8   2.0  18.5  54.4  24.3  Finland-Swede
20.4   0    0    20.4  57.4  22.2  Karatai
20.2   3.9  1.9  14.4  42.3  37.5  Vepsian
19.9   .5   1.3  18.1  46.6  33.5  Erzya
18.5   1.2  1.2  16.1  51.7  29.8  Komi-Zyrian
16.7   .9   1.5  14.3  37.3  46.0  Udmurt
16     .2   1.7  14.1  47.3  36.7  Moksha
14.5   .7   2.6  11.2  46.8  38.7  Komi-Permyak
13.7   1.6  0    12.1  37.9  48.4  Bessermen
13.2   .2   1.1  11.9  47.5  39.3  Russian
10.3   0    .6   9.7   42.4  47.3  Saami
7.6    0    .2   7.4   38.7  53.7  Mari
7      0    0.6  6.4   54.9  38.1  Hungarian
4.7    0    0    4.7   31.2  64.1  Tatar
4.7    0    .4   4.3   30.1  65.2  Chuvash
2.7    0    0    2.7   27.4  69.9  Mansi
2.2    0    0    2.2   22.2  75.6  Khanty
0.6    0    .3   .3    16.7  82.7  Bashkir

Hair colour was recorded on the Fischer scale. During statistical processing of the data, the Fischer scale was reduced to a 5-point system: No. on the Fischer scale 4, 5 and 27 - 4 points (black); 6, 7, 8 - 3 points (brown); 9, 10, 11, 12 and 26 -2 points (dark blond); 13, 14, 15 and 25 - 1 point (blond); 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23 and 24 - 0 points (light blond). In addition, red hair was recorded separately (Nos 1, 2 and 3).

[...]

Among the peoples studied, Baltic Finns have the lightest hair. Generally, brown hair is predominant among them, but light hair is found more frequently than black. The average point is usually below 3.0. The distribution territory of particularly light hair (M<2.8) covers the greater part of Estonia, eastern and central part of Finland and extends to northern Finland. There are even groups with the frequency of blond hair over 40% and dark hair only up to 12% (M=2.4..2.5). Those are found in North Estonia (Rakvere and Kohtla-Järve) and in Savo province in Finland (Kiuruvesi). So strongly depigmented groups have not been found among the other peoples studied, not even among Finnish Swedes, who are usually similar to most Baltic Finns by their fair hair.
Finnish Swedes (excluding Åland Island, where the average point is 2.28) are most similar by hair colour to the relatively darker-haired groups of Baltic Finns (M=3.0..3.1). These include Finns in West Finland (Kokemäki, Kurikka), and, in the east, Vepsians, Karelians from the Lydic dialect territory (Girva) and Izhorians of Soikino. It could be added that, according to Juhan Aul, the Swedes who used to live in Estonia before World War II were also somewhat darker- coloured than Estonians [1, 2].

[1] Aul J. (1936) Anthropologische Forschungen in Eesti. Tartu Ülikooli Zooloogia-Instituudi ja -Muuseumi tööd. Nr. 19, Tartu
[2] Ауль Ю. (1964) Антропология эстонцев. TRÜ Toim., 158.[/indent]

Juhan Aul's book "Антропология эстонцев" can be downloaded here: http://dspace.ut.ee/handle/10062/41630.

[Lucas]

In Karin Mark's dataset, the combined frequency of light blonde, blonde, and dark blonde hair (1+2+3)

1+2+3  1    2    3     4     5     population
-------------------------------------------------------
34.5   2.2  4.4  27.9  51.5  14.0  Estonian

I've just wanted to post this too. Overall it is in agreement with Blade male data.

Mark all blonde shades = 34.5%
Blade = 28.39% but probably his light brown category (13.54%) was 1/2 dark blond for Mark standards so we have in such case 35.16% Astonishing

Mark brown shades = 51.5%
Blade = 48.68% (1/2 light brown + medium brown + medium ash brown + ash dark brown + reddish brown)

Mark dark brown and black shades = 14%
Blade = 16,16% (dark brown + black)

Mark red = 0.2% (not from this quoted table but from paper which I have)
Blade = 0

[XenophobicPrussian]

Blade, what did you do with old people, people with only black and white photos, and people with only 1-2 pictures available? Did you include them or skip so I know to do the same, as I'm seeing a lot of so far for example in Estonian male singers.

[Ülev]

average Estonians only on estonian sites:
https://www.delfi.ee/
https://www.err.ee/

[The Blade]

Blade, what did you do with old people, people with only black and white photos, and people with only 1-2 pictures available? Did you include them or skip so I know to do the same, as I'm seeing a lot of so far for example in Estonian male singers.

Even if there were 1 or 2 photos available I used them if they were clear.
Some of the old men I saw younger photos of.
Bad lighting photos or old and blurry I skipped if no other existed.
This is my normal work manner.