CORNISH AND ENGLISH ARE ALL MIXED UP …
3 October 2014
… and so is nearly every European
Research by Harvard and Tubingen universities shows that nearly all presentday Europeans are descended from three admixed groups: west European hunter-gatherers, early farmers from the Near East, and, a later addition after the initial admixture, ancient northern Eurasians. You can read a report of the research, ‘New branch added to the European family tree,’ at Harvard Medical School report of 17 September 2014.
The original article about the research is ‘Ancient human genomes suggest three ancestral populations for present-day Europeans’, in Nature but only a summary is available for free.
I have deleted a link to an article on this in Past Horizons of 16 September 2014 as it seems to have been removed from the website.
Earlier posts
Our mother, 143 000 years ago 12 August 2014
Ranivorous Britons 16 October 2013
Cornish grass 25 May 2013
The origins of the Cornish 8 March 2013
Cornish and English bulging 6 January 2013
How we got to Britain 4 November 2012
Monkeys and me 24 October 2012
English and Cornish share a part neandertal ancestry 23 October 2012
A common source for the English and Cornish 14 May 2012
A walrus, a mouse, and a man went into a bar 18 July 2010
Puny boundaries 19 May 2010
To see oursels as ithers see us 17 May 2010
A wondrous mixture 8 May 2010
The Cornishman, the Englishman, and the frog 2 May 2010
The first Cornishman 1 May 2010
Cornwall 5460 years ago (The Balaresque study) 31 January 2010
Atomising people 12 September 2008
Blue-eyed Cornish and English are brothers 31 January 2008
English and Cornish are sisters under the skin 20 July 2007
English and Cornish have same milk gene 10 March 2007
|
|
OUR MOTHER, 143 000 YEARS AGO
12 August 2014
RIEUX Adrien et al ‘Improved calibration of the human mitochondrial clock using ancient genomes’ in Molecular biology and evolution August 2014. You can access a free pdf of the full text here.
This research shows that the most recent common female ancestor of homo sapiens dates from 143 000 years ago. We’re all related, as I have said many times on the blog. Where those claims of distinctiveness go wrong is that they stop too soon; despite claims of antiquity, they do not look far enough into the past to see our commonalities. This is not to say tribal differences have not been constructed since but they are comparatively recent and they are only layers on our commonality. I think we should primarily focus on our commonality rather than the constructs and phenotypic traits that separate us.
Of course, 143 000 years ago all homo sapiens were still in Africa. That means we Europeans are all – English, Cornish, and the rest – the descendants of colonists and settlers.
The nationalist ancestry and descendancy delusion
A telling rebuttal to nationalist ancestry and descendancy particularity is this from research into our commonality: “No matter the languages we speak or the color of our skin, we share ancestors who planted rice on the banks of the Yangtze, who first domesticated horses on the steppes of the Ukraine, who hunted giant sloths in the forests of North and South America, and who labored to build the Great Pyramid of Khufu” – Modelling the recent common ancestry of all living humans Douglas LT ROHDE et al Nature 431 pages 562-566, 30 September 2004. (Free summary but full item chargeable.)
Earlier posts
Ranivorous Britons 16 October 2013
The origins of the Cornish 8 March 2013
Cornish and English bulging 6 January 2013
Monkeys and me 24 October 2012
English and Cornish share a part neandertal ancestry 23 October 2012
A common source for the English and Cornish 14 May 2012
A walrus, a mouse, and a man went into a bar 18 July 2010
Puny boundaries 19 May 2010
To see oursels as ithers see us 17 May 2010
A wondrous mixture 8 May 2010
The Cornishman, the Englishman, and the frog 2 May 2010
The first Cornishman 1 May 2010
Cornwall 5460 years ago (The Balaresque study) 31 January 2010
Atomising people 12 September 2008
Blue-eyed Cornish and English are brothers 31 January 2008
English and Cornish are sisters under the skin 20 July 2007
English and Cornish have same milk gene 10 March 2007
|
|
RICE, WHEAT, AND CORNWALL
11 May 2014
Here are three items: bus, train, track. Your task is to pair up any two of them that you think go together.
Okay, have you done that? Now you can read on.
This was a triad test in a study that revealed differences between people from rice-farming south China and wheat-farming north China, roughly divided by the river Yangtze. Put briefly rice farming involves much cooperation between workers and over time that encourages collectivist attitudes; wheat farming conversely encourages individualist attitudes.
You can read a summary of the research in ‘Large-scale psychological differences within China explained by rice versus wheat agriculture’ in Science here but the full article requires a subscription. Googling the title of the article throws up several commentators on it.
What was your pairing? In very simple terms – too simple – if you paired train and bus you are an individualist, if you paired train and track a collectivist. The different modes of growing the crops involve cooperation for rice and more independence for wheat.
So, how did you do? Rice or wheat?
Read too this by Rachel Laudan for a questioning view. She reminds us that there is not a monolithic Chinese culture – I might add just as the places that nationalists call Cornwall and England are many Cornwalls and many Englands.
Note
TALHELM Thomas et al ‘Large-scale psychological differences within China explained by rice versus wheat agriculture’ in Science 9 May 2014 (Volume 344, pages 603-608)
RANIVOROUS BRITONS
16 October 2013
I have written several posts about the commonalities of people everywhere – and indeed what we have in common with other animals.
Now read this. The British, well, the inhabitants of what is now Wiltshire, were eating frogs’ legs around 9500 years ago.
Frogs have long vanished from the British diet but the article with cheery patriotism says we ate them before the French.
You see, we are not only related to the pipid frog, we ate frogs too.
CORNISH GRASS
25 May 2013
I have often drawn attention to our wide and varied family, explaining that you – and, yes, me – come from stardust and are related to the pipid frog and that the differences between the Cornish and English are trivial.
Now Brian Cox has reminded us that we are related to grass. He says we and grass “share the same common ancestor. You are all related. You were once the same”. More, “the fundamental similarities between all living things outweigh the differences” (Brian COX Wonders of life BBC 2013. Hat tip Maria Popova where you can read more).
Earlier posts on this theme
The origins of the Cornish 8 March 2013
Monkeys and me 24 October 2012
English and Cornish share a part neandertal ancestry 23 October 2012
A common source for the English and Cornish 14 May 2012
A walrus, a mouse, and a man went into a bar 18 July 2010
Puny boundaries 19 May 2010
To see oursels as ithers see us 17 May 2010
A wondrous mixture 8 May 2010
The Cornishman, the Englishman, and the frog 2 May 2010
The first Cornishman 1 May 2010
Cornwall 5460 years ago (The Balaresque study) 31 January 2010
Atomising people 12 September 2008
Blue-eyed Cornish and English are brothers 31 January 2008
English and Cornish are sisters under the skin 20 July 2007
English and Cornish have same milk gene 10 March 2007
CORNISH AND ENGLISH BULGING
6 January 2013
Cornish people have a bulge. So do English people. Come to that so do the French, Zimbabweans, and Chinese.
A study of the heads of anatomically modern humans – homo sapiens, that’s you and me – suggests that prefrontal bulging marks us out from extinct human species such as Neanderthals. We living humans have such a lot in common, such a lot, don’t we?
Note
Bruner E et al ‘Geometric variation of the frontal squama in the genus homo: Frontal bulging and the origin of modern human morphology’ American Journal of Physical Anthropology (online 4 January 2013). The full article is for payment but the abstract is free.
HOW WE GOT TO BRITAIN
4 November 2012
Steadily we are learning more about the origins of our homo sapiens species and our travels to populate the world. A readable account of some latest research is here (‘Scientists use genetics and climate reconstructions to track the global spread of modern humans out of Africa’ in University of Cambridge Research News 17 September 2012).
An abstract of the research is here (‘The great human expansion’ in PNAS 17 October 2012 Brenna M HENN and others). The full paper is available for payment.
Turning to this corner of the world, the work of the Ancient human occupation of Britain project, uncovering the first humans to live here, suggests that the date of the first human occupation of Britain is more than 800 000 years ago. The story is one of coming and going, settling and leaving, until around 12 000 years ago when the ancestors of most of us current occupants arrived: we presentday people have relatively shallow roots in Britain.
Our human occupying history thus began long before the arrival of Celtic-speaking migrants in Britain. It is unacceptable to arbitrarily put the starting point of our story where it suits Cornish nationalist or Anglo-Saxon nationalist myths and politics. We should acknowledge all the long years of Britain’s history.
Notes
This summary time chart of human occupation of Britain is informative.
This is about the Ancient human occupation of Britian project. There is a book: Homo britannicus (2006) Chris STRINGER Penguin
ENGLISH AND CORNISH SHARE A PART-NEANDERTAL ANCESTRY
23 October 2012
From time to time I have put up posts which discuss findings in the origins of humans and our ways. In the posts I argue that we all have much more in common than our differences, which are often constructed, and remind us of our journey from our undistinguished origins in primeval slime and our cousins on the road; and urge us to acknowledge the common experiences and common ancestry of people across Britain and the world; and indeed our common relationship to other creatures.
Yes, even constructed differences between groups are real, but I think that in the long story of humans contemporary differences are fundamentally shallow. Overblown claims of Cornish singular distinctiveness seem to be based on a foreshortened view of human history and a disregard of the vast commonalities.
In this post in April this year I noted Maria Pala’s comment about work in archeogenetics: “It helps us to revaluate the perception of our identity. We are highly focussed on identifying ourselves as Italians, British or whatever, but by analysing DNA we discover that originally, not such a long time ago, we came from a common source.”
Now, following on this post about interbreeding among homo sapiens sapiens and neanderthals, an article in PLOS Genetics reports research that suggests the interbreeding took place probably as recently as 35 000 years ago. People calling themselves Cornish and people calling themselves English have neanderthal genes and neanderthal avital grandmothers.
Read the report from PLOS Genetics 4 October 2012 ‘The date of interbreeding between neandertals and modern humans’ by Sriram Sankararaman and others.
Note this from the research: “the last gene flow from Neandertals (or their relatives) into Europeans likely occurred 37,000–86,000 years before the present (BP), and most likely 47,000–65,000 years ago”
Earlier posts
English and Cornish have same milk gene 10 March 2007
English and Cornish are sisters under the skin 20 July 2007
Blue-eyed Cornish and English are brothers 31 January 2008
Atomising people 12 September 2008
Cornwall 5460 years ago 31 January 2010
The first Cornishman 1 May 2010
The Cornishman, the Englishman, and the frog 2 May 2010
A wondrous mixture 8 May 2010
To see oursels as ithers see us 17 May 2010
Puny boundaries 19 May 2010
A walrus, a mouse, and a man went into a bar 18 July 2010
A common source for the English and Cornish 14 May 2012
A COMMON SOURCE FOR THE ENGLISH AND CORNISH
14 May 2012
During the last ice age our ancestors were thought to have huddled in two European refuges, one in what is now Basque country and the other in what is now the Ukraine, spreading out into Europe as the ice retreated. A recent study [American journal of human genetics 4 May 2012] led by Maria Pala suggests that the repopulating of Europe was boosted by an influx of people from the middle east. Indeed, they may be our predominant ancestral group.
Archeogenetics is a science that advances remarkably and challenges our previous views.
What struck me about this was a comment from Pala, as significant as the research. She said that archeogenetics had important lessons to teach us:
“It helps us to revaluate the perception of our identity. We are highly focussed on identifying ourselves as Italians, British or whatever, but by analysing DNA we discover that originally, not such a long time ago, we came from a common source.”
Indeed.
I have argued this point several times in the blog in answer to those who see not only constructed and changing cultural but also significant and inherent racial differences between people who call themselves different names. We have a common source.
This post may serve as a short introduction to some that I shall be putting up on identity.
Notes
The full study in the American journal of human genetics (linked above) is paid-access though there is a free abstract there. Accounts of the study are freely available here and here and here.
NEANDERTHALS AGAIN
11 February 2012
Ah, our Neanderthal relatives again. Here is a brief account of the oldest paintings yet discovered; and possibly made by Neanderthals and not our Homo sapiens sapiens ancestors. For comparison paleolithic cave art in the Cresswell Crags, and perhaps the Gower peninsula, the oldest in Britain, are dated around 12 000 BC.
mudhook 
