Why do native Welsh people look very Mediterranean?

Question

I'm not talking about recent immigrants from the Middle East or southern Europe, but NATIVE Welsh people whose ancestors lived in Wales for many centuries. For example, Catherine Zeta-Jones and John Rhys-Davies. They look very Spanish, Italian, or Greek.

Answer 1

Even the Romans noted that the Welsh were 'dark like Spaniards' and deduced they must have distant ancestry from there. They seem to be correct. Most of the ancient geneflow into the British Isles and Ireland appears to come from Iberia and the Atlantic coast.The Welsh and western Irish (who also frequently are dark, even black haired) have the highest amount of this ancient dna (although it is high everywhere in Britain & Ireland.) There is also one part of Wales where there is an abnormally high amount of a type of y-dna usually more connected with places like the Middle East--it is not from a recent migration but also appears by its mutations to be prehistoric and to have arrived in the neolithic; the bearers would have appeared to have kept their community rather seperate from those around them, hence the spread of this fairly rare dna in a small area.

Answer 2

As one of the fairer type, I would not automatically agree but, when I think long and hard, you do have a point, to a degree, as I have seen some of the types of people, you mean, over the years, in NW Wales. Believe in the past there was a tendency to shorter and darker.



Speaking however as a member of the NON Welsh speaking, English speaking majority (some even call us "Englishmen with Welsh accents" !!), I would ask you not to labour the point too much. We are used to having our very Welshness, questioned by our own Welsh speaking countrymen, and do not need it from outsiders. Like most British people, we are pretty mixed. There ARE types ,but we are not all one type!!

Answer 3

It's true - many Welsh people have dark hair, dark eyes and almost olive skin.



There are many different colourings in the UK, the above description does describe a lot of the Welsh. My maternal great grandmother and grandmother looked just like that -thick dark brown hair and dark chocolate eyes. That's a very dominant gene, and although my grandmother married a red head with blue eyes, the brown eyes still come through - I've got dark eyes and all my children, particularly my son, have brown eyes.



There is some evidence that Welsh people originally came from the Basque region - mediterranean travellers who arrived in the UK around 500 BC. That may account for it!

Answer 4

All that coal dust has made them a bit grubby.

Answer 5

i dont think so