The Genghis Khan Effect in Ireland and Scotland: Niall of the Nine Hostages and Somerled

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In the early 2000s, researchers from Oxford University found a Y-chromosome with a particular fingerprint that was widespread across Asia, an unusual finding given that Y-chromosomes are generally localized. The explanation for this is that researchers had stumbled across the Y-chromosome from the great khan of the Mongol Empire, Genghis Khan, who ruled during the 13th century.

On further inspection, it was found that around 8 per cent of men in Mongolia had inherited the Genghis Khan Y-chromosome, and around 16 million throughout Asia. This is hardly surprising given that after conquering a territory, the Mongols would usually kill all men and bring the attractive women to Genghis Khan.

This reproduction dominance was dubbed the Genghis Khan Effect. But what has any of this got to do with Ireland and Scotland? In Bryan Sykes, the late professor of HG at Oxford, book …, the Genghis Khan Effect could be at work (albeit to a lesser extent) in Ireland and Scotland stemming from two key individuals: Niall of the Nine Hostages and Somerled of the Isles.

Niall of the Nine Hostages was a semi-mythical High King of Ireland who lived around the 4th and 5th centuries AD, famous for potentially bringing the man that would become St Partrick to Ireland initially as a captive. Y-chromosome tests from Ireland have shown that Niall’s genetic fingerprint is present in large numbers of men with Ui Neill clan surnames – such as Gallagher, Boyle, Doherty, O’Connor, Bradley as well as O’Neill. In the north-west of Ireland, around a quarter or a fifth of the male population has this Y-chromosome signature.

An equivalent is found in Scotland in the form of Somerled, a Norse-Gaelic lord of the 12th century who established the Kingdom of Argyll and the Isles and who is credited with an expelling the Vikings from western Scotland.

Sources:

Irish High King Niall Of The Nine Hostages (Niall Noígíallach) - DNA research -    • Irish High King Niall Of The Nine Hos...  

Bryan Sykes (2007) Saxons, Vikings and Celts: The Genetic Roots of Britain and Ireland (W.W Norton and Company: New York).

The Irish Times - The genetic imprint of Niall of the Nine Hostages https://www.irishtimes.com/news/scien...

#genghiskhan #history #mongolempire