Featured Academic Review
'Blood of the Isles: Exploring the Genetic Roots of our Tribal History' by Bryan Sykes © 2006 Bantam Press ISBN 0-593-05652- 3 288 Pages + Photographs + Appendix: Graphs and Charts + Index Hardback £17.99
This book came with a voucher for £50 off a DNA test, to be analysed by Oxford University, which is not only the most novel freebie, but sounds like an absolutely genius idea for funding further research. Bryan Sykes is a Professor of Human Genetics at that university. His background is in inherited conditions, before his skills were diverted into genetic archaeology.
I am not a scientist nor do I have anything but the most casual interest in genetics, therefore I am reviewing this not as a peer, but as a fascinated layperson. My interest was piqued in a television documentary about similar research, 'The Blood of the Vikings', undertaken by University College, London, which demonstrated clear Norwegian genes amongst isolated populations in England and Scotland. 'The Blood of the Isles' describes Oxford's more ambitious project, which sought to discover the genetic make-up of those in all areas of the British Isles.
Sykes and his team collected the DNA of literal thousands of people, in hundreds of locations, throughout Eire, Northern Ireland, Scotland, England, Wales and Kernow. Where possible, they also sought to establish where each person believed their ancestry lay. Early conclusions showed that many of their volunteers lived in the same area where all four grandparents had lived, therefore establishing them as settled in the area.
The extracted DNA was then interrogated for information from both the mitochrondrial strand (mother's input) and Y-chromosome (in men only, the father's input). Very quickly, patterns started to form which, when compared to known histories and the DNA from ancient remains, began to show a picture of how far the invasions and/or immigrations into Britain had affected its population.
This all sounds very dry and heavy going, but it isn't at all. Of necessity, there are some technical details, which only once caused me to re-read a couple of pages to keep up. The author writes these apologetically and soon lightens the narrative with a couple of entertaining anecdotes or, on one memorable occasion, interrupting a detailed exploration of Welsh DNA with a wistful remembrance of the wonderful ice-cream in Lampeter, complete with instructions on where to find the shop selling it.
Did the Saxons annihilate all the Celts in England? Did the Vikings over-run the Gaels in Scotland? Where are the Picts today? How completely were the Tuatha De Danaan wiped out in Eire? All of these questions are answered in a compelling and convincing way, supported throughout with evidence. Some of the conclusions truly rewrite the established view of British history, as well as having profound implications for national identities.
I know that it's traditional in an academic review to discuss those conclusions, but they are so astonishing that I would prefer that others take the journey towards them without knowing how it ends. If this makes it a book review instead, then please feel free to re-allocate it on the website.
For more information: www.bloodoftheisles.net
Reviewer: Jo Harrington