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Archiver > DNA-R1B1C7 > 2009-01 > 1231490030


From: "Sandy Paterson" <>
Subject: Re: [R-M222] Origin of M222
Date: Fri, 9 Jan 2009 08:33:50 -0000
References: <d51.3e51abab.3697fc23@aol.com>
In-Reply-To: <d51.3e51abab.3697fc23@aol.com>


Hi John and others

I feel a little uncomfortable addressing the note below since it comes from
someone who is not in the M222 forum, and he doesn't have the opportunity to
respond. So I'll try to be as tactful as possible.

I find the concept of trying to match the existence of M222 with known
historical movements quite intriguing, and I ask myself what that means. It
seems to me that the writer would be more comfortable if M222 in Ireland was
most highly concentrated in the NE rather than the NW. He would also prefer
it if Scottish M222 was more highly concentrated in the Hebrides and Argyll
than in the SW, border and central areas. And he would also like to see more
of it in Wales and Cornwall.

In the last paragraph he expresses the view that M222 is unlikely to have
originated in NW Ireland because to his mind the British distribution cannot
be easily explained by Irish settlement in Britain if you look at it in
detail. He then goes on to suggest separate age calculations for Irish,
Scottish and English M222.

Frankly, I don't find anything about the British distribution of M222 to be
inconsistent with a NE Irish origin at all. Migration itself is an act of
discontinuity and expecting it to result in a nice neat set of concentric
circles around some kind of epicentre is to my mind unrealistic in the
extreme.

Still, anyone who has separate groupings for Irish, Scottish and English
M222 is welcome to e-mail .csv files to me and I'll do the age calculations
with pleasure. Tim Janzen from what I call the Hades group and I have been
working on simulations/age estimation models and I'm sure he'll be happy to
verify my calcs.


Sandy Paterson













-----Original Message-----
From:
[mailto:] On Behalf Of
Sent: 09 January 2009 01:02
To:
Subject: [R-M222] Origin of M222

This is a post from the GEN-DNA list I thought those on this list might
find
interesting. The writer posts often on Irish subjects and has an
archeological background.

I have to say I am a little sceptical that the M222 mutation actually
happened in Ireland. Often when you look really closely at it the match
with known
historical movements is poor. For example M222 in Britain is a very poor
match for dark age Irish migration to Britain when you look at it closely.
I
understand (is there a good map?) that its concentrated in the wrong areas
of
Ireland (the NW rather than the NE where Irish Dalriada was located) and in

the wrong areas of Scotland (in the SW, Borders and central areas rather
than
Argyll and the Hebrides where Scottish Dalriada was located). I am also
unaware of concentrations in NW and SW Wales and Cornwall where other Irish

settlement is known. Indeed, should we even expect M222 to be associated
with
Irish settlements in Britain that originated in NE, SE and south coast
Ireland
anyway?. Probably not. Obviously M222 does partly overlap with the areas
of
Irish immigration but its
distribution is far wider than can be explained by the known historic
migrations and the hot spots are all wrong.

In my opinion M222's distribution must relate to prehistoric movements
(presumably late prehistoric judging by its relative youth) and from what I
know
the about prehistory of the isles, a British origin seems much more likely
in
pre-Roman late prehistory. In the pre-Roman Iron Age, the direction of
influence seems to have been very much Britain to Ireland rather than
Ireland to
Britain and this only seems to have reversed in the later Roman period.
Its
even possible that Niall or his immediate ancestors only arrived in Ireland
as
British refugees from the Roman invasions after the M222 mutation had
happened some centuries earlier in the pre-Roman Iron Age in western
Britain.

There is no question that M222 hit the reproductive jackpot in NW Ireland
but I doubt it originated there mainly on the grounds that the British
distribution cannot be explained easily by Irish settlement in Britain if
you look at
it in detail. Has anyone ever calculated an age of the British M222 on its
own using variance or other techniques. You could even separate it into
English and Scottish. My guess is it will prove to be significantly older
than
the early centuries AD date calculated for Irish M222.

Alan



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