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From:
Subject: Re: [R-M222] Origin of M222
Date: Sat, 10 Jan 2009 22:28:12 EST


In a message dated 1/10/2009 2:32:24 A.M. Central Standard Time,
writes:

That's my feeling too. In fact I'd go a step further than that. I think
Argyll and NE Ireland were the same 'place' for quite a while. I get the
strong impression from the BBC program that Scotland only came into
existence as what we now call a 'country' some time later. So I think we may
be wrong in trying to reason in terms of different countries when thinking
about M222 origins.

You might want to read Campbell's "Were the Scots Irish." He takes a
radical view of Scottish history at odds with most of his contemporaries (he's an
archeologist).

He doesn't believe there ever was a migration from NE Ireland the Scottish
Dal Riata. Instead he believes it was basically one people settled in both
places. According to Campbell, the legend of the sons of Erc of the Irish Dal
Riata moving to Scotland was simply a foundation origin myth designed to
provide the kings of Scotland with an appropriate pedigree. He also has a theory
that both areas were Q-Celtic as relative backwaters of the Celtic world.
In Scotland he makes a division between western Scotland and those parts of
Scotland across the "spinal ridge" of Britain, which he says were Pictish
areas.

I can post this to the list if anyone wants to read it; or post it on the
M222 site.

There might be some support for his theory about a foundation myth. The
earliest Irish genealogical compositions (Laud 610) had no material on the Scots
at all even though it concentrated on Ulster tribes. In Rawlinson B.502 (c.
1120) only a bare bones pedigree for the king of Scotland is included. It
was not expanded to include any of the septs who now claim to be Dal Riata.
The same thing is true for the Book of Leinster (c. 1170). The first
Scottish pedigree other than the kings of Scotland to appear in Irish MS. is a
pedigree of the McDonalds in the G2 MS (c. 1345), followed by pedigrees for
MacSweeney in Ballymore and Lecan (c. 1400). Most Irish authorities believe they
were included for the first time because they were major gallowglass families
settled in Ireland. And neither of these are given Dal Riata pedigrees. The
McDonalds were linked to Colla Uais and the Irish Airgialla; the MacSweeneys
to the O'Neills.
No pedigree exists linking any Scottish clan to the Dal Riata in Scotland
until about 1467 or the date of the famous Skene manuscript. The earlier
Shenchus Fer nAlban breaks off before the foundation of Scottish clans.

In terms of DNA there isn't much that can be done to check on this theory.
Antrim was heavily settled by Scots at an early date under the McDonalds.
Tons of Scottish surnames appear there prior to the Plantation of Ulster.
The old Irish clans in the vicinity were the Ulaidh, otherwise known as the Dal
Fiatach, of which the Irish Dal Riata were a branch. Another tribe was the
Dal nAraidhi to the south. But Antrim was so heavily settled in the
Plantation years by Scots looking for native Irish DNA probably is impossible. In
the census of 1659 at least 60% of the population of the county was listed as
English or Scottish settlers. And a lot of the "native Irish" had Scottish
surnames. Mark McDonald spent quite a bit of time trying to isolate Dal
Fiatach or Irish Dal Riata DNA in NE Ireland with no success. To this day we do
not have a single surname reliably said to descend in Ireland from the old
Irish Dal Riata. No one has come up with any Dal Fiatach surname either although
MacDonsleavy was the major chieftain in the 1200s. The Dal nAraidhi to the
south are represented today by the Maguiness and McCartan clan and both are
heavily I haplogroup.


John







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