Just had a thought. Why don't we count Neanderthals as Native
Europeans? The time period appears to be correct. Thus, not only
are East and West Europeans descendants of Neanderthals, so then are
the North and South Americans! This thought should cause Ian
Tattersall to shudder in his boots since he's trying to prove that
Neanderthals are a separate species (with the current exhibit at the
MNH).

Gerry

> If you don't want to count the Neanderthals (extinct), look at

Table

> 5 in http://www.stats.ox.ac.uk/~macaulay/papers/richards_2000.pdf ;
> it suggests that the Basques, Scandinavians, Balts, Finns and
> Russians are the most native, with the West Europeans (excluding

the

> Italians) the least native. By the lax American standards, all but
> recent or long-standing unintegrated immigrants count as 'Native
> Europeans'.
>
> The earliest *recorded* tribes in England are generally reckoned to
> be Celtic, and thus their linguistic heirs are the Welsh, but the
> English, high and low, now have a high proportion of British (i.e.
> pre-English) blood in them. 'England', of course, means the land

of

> the Angles, though the Romans and our Celtic neighbours called us
> Saxons. Torsten has, if I understand him correctly, proposed on
> Cybalist that the Anglo-Saxons themselves were largely of
> (continental) Celtic ancestry.
>
> Incidentally, I understand that the Cornish aren't convinced that
> Cornwall is part of England.
>
> The key point is that there isn't really a separate group

of 'native

> Europeans', and probably hasn't been since the Neolithic reached
> Scotland and Northern Scandinavia.
>
> Richard.