Talk:English people

Because of their length, the previous discussions on this page have been archived. If further archiving is needed, see Wikipedia:How to archive a talk page.

Previous discussions:

• Archive 1 (20 Dec 2004 to 22 Oct 2005)
• Archive 2 (21 Oct 2005 to 10 Nov 2005)
• Archive 3 (12 Nov 2005 to 3 Apr 2006)
• Archive 4 (4 April 2005 to June 2006)
• Archive: Origins of the English and the British
• Archive: Most Britons and Western Europeans are of Iberian origin
• Archive: British pages
• Archive: Verifiability and Cornish language discussions
• Archive: Related ethnic grous discussion
• Archive: Suggestion regarding related ethnic groups
• Archive:Various discussions about Germans

religion

Hello, perhaps the religion section of this article could be touched up a bit. For example, Jewish English people are given quite a mention but not Hindu or Moslem. According to the demographics of England article..?

1. Muslim: 3.1%
2. Hindu: 1.1%
3. Sikh: 0.7%
4. Jewish: 0.5%

I have nothing against Jewish people, but why are they singled out above the other religions..? User:Dan Carkner 04:31, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps because there are people whose ethnicity is English or British and whose religion is Jewish, but very few whose religion is Muslim or Sikh? I think though that the number of indigenous British people whose religion, if they have one, is not Christian is so insignificant that any inclusion other than Christianity is irrelevant to the facts that are trying to be presented. Enzedbrit 21:49, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

• Having just read over the religion section again, why does it bother talking about Irish immigration or Jewish immigration? The article is meant to be about people who are of a particular ethnic group, not who live in a particular country. Enzedbrit 21:50, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

I agree, it's all kind of a fuzzy area. But you don't want to just say that all English are Christians and Atheists-- in the end it depends on how you define English. Dan Carkner 22:43, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

This whole article is about defining the English. The way it has gone, it has done so on an ethnic/racial basis. Black and Asian people living in Britain who aren't Christian can claim to be of English or British ethnicity if they have that blood, that is, an indigenous parent or grandparent or something less diluted, and if there is a sizeable proportion of these people in the UK who aren't Christian but Hindu or Muslim, then yes, there is a basis to include those religions as religions of people who are of the English ethnicity.Enzedbrit 01:00, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

Why is there a religious section and a need for a religious section? Surely the figures only reflect the people living in Rngland, not the English people? Secondly, I don't see how it's so relevant that it needs to be but in the fact box? (Stpaul 08:00, 5 June 2006 (UTC))

I don't know why there is a religious section. Maybe the infobox contains one by default. If you think it is a good idea to remove religion fromthe infobox then I would agree with you, but we need to see what the general feeling of other editors is. I don't think that religion is a big issue in England, most people are not religious, though would probably describe themselves as CofE. Alun 15:44, 24 June 2006 (UTC)

Don't historically Calvinist peoples (Huguenots and Presbyterians) have a greater ethnocultural relationship with the English (Puritans) than others? This would mean the areas which have had significant Calvinist movements: France, Scotland, Ireland and the Holy Roman Rhineland (Palatines). Incidentally, these very places were on the royal coat of arms as displayed by King William III of England. While most people see Orangist activities and politics to be controversial, they would not deny the basically close cultural relationships in the Calvinist web. This is not so for the Lutheran issue (am I right?) that developed as a result of the 1701 Act of Settlement, which alienated the common man in those times by introducing truer foreigners than William actually was. William's Orange-Nassau territories straddled the old Duchy of Burgundy; the English and Burgundians were allies and trading partners for a reasonably long time. Lord Loxley 20:10, 25 June 2006 (UTC)

Indigenous/Pre-Roman

Someone has changed indigenous to pre-Roman on the history page. I have reverted this but feel then that this should be discussed. The British people, including the English, as detailed in this article, are the indigenous people of Britain. We are so because we are the direct descendants of the first people to live in Britain. There has been cultural shift but not genetic/blood shift from our aboriginal ancestors. The term indigenous has been applied here to differentiate between the various groups of peoples that have contributed to the English people in genetic and cultural terms. The use of indigenous Brythonic people is used to show that before the Roman occupation, the culture of our ancestors (in what is now England) was Brythonic. I believe that indigenous is the correct word to use here; others might have a differing opinion. Enzedbrit 21:14, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

The term "Brythonic", which is what the link leads to, is primarily linguistic in meaning, and refers to a Celtic language. There is evidence that an earlier language was spoken in the British Isles prior to the introduction of Celtic, so the use of "indigenous" might give the false impression that Celtic was the first language spoken here. How about something like "prehistoric" instead? TharkunColl 22:25, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

I don't think prehistoric is appropriate as pre-Roman Britain wasn't prehistoric and we still know a relative lot about these people. You're right that Celtic languages weren't necessarily the first people, but the term indigenous is to my thinking still correct. Indigenous Brythonic speaking people perhaps? The same could be true today of the indigenous Germanic speaking people of Britain - we're still indigenous although we now speak a Germanic language. Enzedbrit 21:41, 19 June 2006 (UTC)

Yes, okay. At least that makes it more clear that the phrase Brythonic is primarily linguistic, rather than ethnic. TharkunColl 07:26, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

Not necessarily, some linguists and archaeologists now think that Indo-European may have been introduced into Great Britain as long ago as the early Neolithic, and Celtic languages developed in situ as it were. This view tends to be held by archaeologists who do not see any evidence of mass immigration to Great Britain after the Neolithic. Francis Pryor (Britain BC) and Barry Cunliffe have both written about the lack of archaeological evidence for mass immigration after the Neolithic, and Barry Cunliffe in Iron Age Britain states that many linguists now think of the origins of Brythonic Celtic as indigenous. It's a POV, but one that can be verified. Alun 12:11, 22 June 2006 (UTC)

I would be more than happy to accept that the Brythonic languages evolved in Britain. Enzedbrit 21:14, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

How quaint; TharkunColl only believes that prehistorical issues are relevant to modern ethnic character when it suits him and you, Enzedbrit. We can go over the suppressed Celtic languages and culture in talks of the English, but nobody dare mention Anglo-French relations on pain of ostracism and accusations of trolling or vandalism. English and French languages have things in common. Answer for your political POV! Lord Loxley 15:05, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

English Channel vs German Ocean?

Come on TharkunColl; which happens to encapsulate English ethnic identity more? Would German culture be something English are, while English culture is something English are not? Keep thinking ill of the Norman Conquest. Defame Emma of Normandy for all you really care. I have placed this here, because you wanted to have the last word on my (and our) talk pages. For those unaware of the dispute, his desertion of the argument is here: User_talk:Lord_Loxley#Third_.28and_final.29_reply_to_User:Lord_Loxley. Lord Loxley 15:01, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Pre-Anglo Britain (race)

"in York and Norfolk, here the Germanic male sex chromosome occurs in about 60% of men, with indigenous Y chromosomes comprising about 40%"

By "indegenous," does this mean Celtic, the indegenous race/people of Britain? --Rainsey 00:53, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

The Germanic genes which are mentioned are taken from people of the continent and are compared to people in Britain whereas the indigenous genes are taken from people in Ireland whose location is least likely to have succumbed to invasion over the past few thousand years. There is no Celtic race but a collective Celtic identity that was born in the 18th century based on a cultural and linguistic heritage and spread out to encompass entire national regions. The quote in question means that the people sampled in these areas had a heritage that is 40% encompassed of the people that have lived in Britain before the first invasion of any tribal group, whomever they were, which is regarded as the first to alter the native culture (by something that is regarded as alien). Often, Celtic culture is regarded as being indigenous or the culture of the indigenous people of Britian prior to the Roman occupation which, classed as the native people. So, if the people in that part of Ireland are the same make-up of those in Britain prior to the Roman occupation, then those in the English samples today have a heritage which is 40% pre-Roman (Celtic, as you have put it) and 60% Germanic or other.

A lot of people would have it that the English aren't indigenous but the Welsh and Scottish are. This is based on an assumption that all English people are of one genetic composite and all Scots and Welsh of two others. This might sound nice, but isn't right. To compare these English samples to other indigenous peoples around the world, for example New Zealand, the indigenous people on average are far less than 40% indigenous blood. Whether people wish to regard the English, Scots and Welsh as separate peoples or not, the fact remains that they are all descended from the same people, are genetically similar and in same cases more similar to people elsewhere in Britain than others within those same home nations, and are distinct from the continent, and all have just as much claim to be indigenous. What will be seen more of in the future as Britons become an increasing minority in Great Britain will be an awareness of this ancient link to their island as has been seen in other countries colonised by non-native peoples. Being European doesn't make one any less an aboriginal. Enzedbrit 10:28, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

Indigenous genetic markers are usually compared to those of people from the Basque Country. This is based on the assumption that people in the Basque Country are genetically more representative of the paleolithic human population of Europe. The assumption is that there has been very little movement of people into the Basque Country after the paleolithic. These are usually refered to as a putative paleolithic genetic markers, because there is no hard evidence that this is true, but all science is based on certain assumptions that are made, and this is the assumption for most genetic studies of this type (Basque Country markers are ubiquitously used as a reference in this sort of study). The study found that on the whole people in the British Isles have a larger putative paleolithic component than Germanic component (Germanic components were identified from samples taken from Denmark, Northern Germany and Norway, and some samples taken from Friesland in a previous study were also used. The areas in England with the highest incidence of Germanic markers were York and Norfolk, but even here a substantial component of the material was of indigenous (ie paleolithic) origin, some 40% of Y chromosome markers from these areas were indigenous. The east of England is known to have been settled by Danes in the 9th century, they formed the Danelaw, and it has proved impossible to distinguish between Anglo-Saxon and Danish-Viking genetic markers, so we really do not know if we are measuring an Angle contribution or a Danish-Viking contribution, or the cumalitive effect of both. It should be noted however that the Germanic component of areas believed to have been settled by Saxons (rather than the Angles of the North-East) is rather less than those observed in the areas known to have been settled by Danes in the 9th century. Given that Y chromosomes are only carried by men, and are inherited exclusively from their fathers, it may be the case that the Germanic component of the entire population of these areas could be significantly less because we do not know the contribution of Danish-Viking/Anglo-Saxon women to the population. If the settlement of women was significantly smaller than that of men, then the total Germanic contribution to the gene pool of these areas might be rather less than the stated 60%, or if you like the modern population is descended from 60% Germanic men and 40% indigenous men, but we don't know these ratios for their female ancestors. So the simple answer to your question is that indigenous means the very earliest human inhabitants to occupy Europe after the end of the last major glaciation, ie some 12,000 years ago. Alun 12:08, 3 July 2006 (UTC)

This is first time I have used wikipedia and find it a fascinating place. However I doubt whether this subject can ever be brought to a conculsion given the apparently vast amount of published works that in their turn give some form of creedance to any POV.

Cited works on wikipedia need to be published, but they also need to be reliable sources, and only majority and significant minority points of view should be mentioned, the points of view of tiny minorities should not be mentioned. Saying that neutrality is achieved by including all significant minority points of view. Alun 17:25, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

"So the simple answer to your question is that indigenous means the very earliest human inhabitants to occupy Europe after the end of the last major glaciation" -- I thought the "indigenous" peoples referred to in the study were Celtic peoples... Unless you're assuming the Britons are a descendant of those migrators to Europe.-Rainsey 21:50, 5 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't know what you mean by Celtic peoples. The study refered to, which is cited (A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles) uses these criteria for determining what is indigenous. That is indigenous genetic markers are those similar or the same as Basque genetic markers, these are assumed to be very close to those of the earliest paleolithic people to have repopulated Europe after the last glaciation. It is almost certainly true that if the current population of the British and Irish Isles is largely descended from the paleolothic population of the British and Irish Isles (and current estimates are that about 80% of modern Britons are the descendants of paleolithic Britons), then the Celtic speaking peoples of the Iron age were also descended from the paleolithic population of the British and Irish Isles. Is this not common sense? Celtic speaking people were descended from the paleolithic population, and we are descended from the Celtic speaking population. Simple. Alun 12:31, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

For my part I had just negated the use of 'Celtic' as an ethnic term and the last part of your sentence, I am sorry, implies you have read neither what I nor Alun has written, not that we are authorities on the subject but you've not given us the courtesy of reading us before responding. Enzedbrit 03:58, 7 July 2006 (UTC)

Citation for Cornish ethnicity

I have removed it because:

1) There's a Cornish people page were all this has been thrashed out.

This is not relevant, please provide verification, there is non on the Cornish people page that I can find. Alun 13:00, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

What do you mean its not relevent the whole Cornish people page clearly points to the fact that many Cornish people think of themsleves as Cornish and not English; i am one of them.

Bretagne 44 15:36, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

The Cornish people article is not a verifiable source and neither are you. Alun 22:04, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

2) 37,000 people claimed to be Cornish on in the last UK census.

The link to the census on the Cornish people references section has no such information on it. Alun 13:00, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

By Cornwall County Council: http://www.cornwall.gov.uk/index.cfm?articleid=11425&articleaction=print

From the ONS: http://www.statistics.gov.uk/about/consultations/downloads/2011Census_assessment_eilr.pdf#search='Cornish%20ethnicity%20results'

Bretagne 44 15:36, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Maybe I missed it, I'll have a look again, but on a quick viewing these data are not present in either of these links. If they are why don't you add them to the article yourself? Alun 22:04, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

3) The citation was probably put there by an English nationalist in the first place.Bretagne 44 15:14, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

I don't understand this reason. Is it meant to be some sort of insult? It certainly is not a valid reason for not providing a cite, and seems to be deliberately inflamatory. It was probably me who requested verification, but I do this a lot, even for things I know to be true, when I have no material to hand for verification. I even do it to my own edits if I do not have a proper source when I make the edit (for example when I am not at home). Anyway it is the responsibility of the editor who makes the claim to provide verification. All wikipedians have the right to demand verification, in fact without proper verification the edit can be removed at any time. Asking for verification does not imply that the person making the request disputes the claim, it is merely a note indicating that the claim needs to be supported with a reliable source. I have had a look at the Cornish people article and there are citations that clearly do not support the claim being made. Alun 13:00, 14 July 2006 (UTC)

You do this a lot do you, perhaps you should spend more time looking for information than adding pointless citation marks. I have clearly proved that there is a phenomena of Cornish national identity and therefore have removed the citation, again!

Bretagne 44 15:36, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

Yes. I do it a lot. I also do spend my time looking for information, in fact most of the work I do for my wikipedia edits is spent searching for verifiable information, even information included by other editors. I have almost certainly attempted to find on line verifiability for this information myself and failed, which is why the cite request is still there. Citation marks are not pointless, if you don't think that verifiability is important, just what are you here for? I get the impression (and please correct me if I am wrong) that you are not really interested in building a verified encyclopedia at all. Rather you are more interested in promoting your own personal nationalist agenda. It is perfectly acceptable to request a citation, in fact it is expected that wikipedia editors provide their own citations when they make an edit. I am not requesting you to do anything other than conform to what should be the norms of wikipedia behaviour. Here's my recent edit list so you can see that I do in fact spend a lot of time requesting and providing verifiability for edits and discussing content issues on talk pages.[1] I will insert the citation request tag one more time, if you remove it or a citation is not forthcoming within a week or so I will remove the comment altogether. Please familiarise yourself with the verifiability policy and read the fact and reference check and common knowledge guidelines, if you do so you will understand my position better, rather than assuming that I am acting in bad faith.Alun 22:06, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

• I have clearly proved that there is a phenomena (sic) of Cornish national identity. You have proved nothing of the sort, I seek verification. Remember verifiability not truth. No one disputes what you are saying, but if you make these sorts of claims then you need to provide a verifiable source. As far as I am aware wikipedia does not recognise such a thing as proof, only verifiability, no original research and neutrality and their accompanying guidelines. Why don't you just provide cite to the Mebyon Kernow website or something? Alun 22:04, 21 July 2006 (UTC)
  • Ok, I have found a reference that I think properly verifies that there is some opinion that Cornish people are not English, in fact in the article an Historian claims that Cornish people are no more English than Welsh people.[2] I modified the text of the article a little so that it is properly supported by the cite, but the general meaning has remained the same. Alun 17:51, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

But Alun, being Cornish or English isn't about blood! It's about self-awareness and subjective identity. Cornwall is in England so the Cornish are English. That's how it works. It's the only way it CAN work. Enzedbrit 20:45, 23 July 2006 (UTC)

While I agree with you, it doesn't matter to the article or citation. The article says that some Historians claim, which is true as there is a source supporting it. It is quite right to argue that Cornwall is part of England from one POV, but the fact that the other POV exists needs to be mentioned, as per the neutrality policy. The cited article doesn't limit itself to the biology of Cornish people, after all indigenous British people are all descended from the earliest paleolothic inhabitants of the island, the article mentions both cultural, linguistic and political reasons why some Cornish people do not consider themselves English. I'm a bit confused by your post, you say that being Cornish or English isn't about blood! It's about self-awareness and subjective identity. I would agree with that analysis, but you go on to say Cornwall is in England so the Cornish are English, which is the exact opposite argument, as it implies that it doesn't matter how they feel (ie self awareness or subjective identity) they are politically part of England and are therefor English. I would argue that Cornish people can be Cornish and British and English, but that if some do not feel English then we can cite it and accept it, but we certainly cannot deny it. Alun 05:30, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

The same is true for any group of English people though Enzedbrit 01:03, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

The same is not true of any group of English people. We are not dealing with truth, we are dealing with different points of view. What is true is that some Cornish people believe that they are not English, and we can verify this, we do not argue that all Cornish people are not English, as this is not true and is a breach of neutrality. If we can find a source that claims that another group of people living in England do not identify as English, then we can include this in the article, but we need to express it in a way that doesn't make it a fact, but a point of view. I'm not aware of any other part of England where it is claimed by some of the population that they are not English, but I'm no expert. There's a group calling for Mercian independence, but then presumably Mercians would not claim not to be ethnically English.[3] Alun 04:56, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

• I'm afraid Alun that you're just plain wrong here as I know first hand that there are many people who are in my eyes English because of origin/history/etc. but who do not regard themselves to be such, and I am referring out of hand here to people who regard themselves not as English but Northumbrian. I'm certain that if many people knew how we are debating ethnicity here on this article that they would indeed claim to be something other than English. People are saying that they are Cornish and not English and the arguments they are putting forward are by no means unique to Cornwall although there is definite political motivation behind such feelings, and with the climate and propoganda of today their numbers can only but swell. And yes, in time I'm certain you'll see the same for Mercians. Enzedbrit 09:05, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

What part of my above comment is wrong? I'm not disputing anything you are saying, I'm pointing out that we have a verifiable source for Cornish people who do not consider themselves English, this doesn't apply to all Cornish people, or even a majority, but it's a POV that is from a published source. If we can find a published source, for example for Cumbrians, that shows that some Cumbrians don't consider themselves English then we can include this POV as well. My point about Mercians is that Mercia was an Anglo-Saxon Kingdom, and therefore would be what we call today ethnically English (or Ethnically Anglo-Saxon if you prefer), the same claim cannot be made for Cornish (and possibly Cumbrian) people. The only thing we are lacking for other groups of people who live in what is now England, but who don't consider themselves ethnically English is a citable source. With a citable source we can, and should, include any and all of the indigenous people of England that don't consider themselves English, but we do need a verifiable source from a reliable source. Alun 10:51, 25 July 2006 (UTC)

I think there's an issue among all this that is too easily forgotten. Englishness, Northumbrian-ness and Cornishness are not tangible, provable concepts and in fact aren't a lot more than a personal preference. None of them can be proven, if we accept that birthplace does not denote "nationality". Cornwall is rammed with people born in England with no Cornish blood, who "feel they are Cornish" or are "spiritually Cornish". You can't prove it, or prove otherwise. That's why the arguments about this sort of thing are just so much hot air. I can declare that I'm Scottish (I've only been there once) and no-one can prove otherwise. Britishness is the only thing that can be proven, with a passport or suchlike. Personally I consider myself Cornish and British, and that England is not a proper country - that's my point of view. Points of view are everywhere and almost infinite, so do they all need to be proven and documented? Isn't there a certain amount of futility that comes with this kind of territory? Or are we only documenting points of view held by a certain number of people? Where does that begin and end?

That's the legacy of the Union between the various regions that make up the UK. Everyone wants it all ways, so they can be British and Scottish, British and English, British and Northumbrian etc. Officially, and in terms of what's verifiable, we're all just British and anything else is in our heads. Bretonbanquet 19:49, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

• None of them can be proven, if we accept that birthplace does not denote "nationality". Cornwall is rammed with people born in England with no Cornish blood, who "feel they are Cornish" or are "spiritually Cornish".

You are quite right, which is why ethnicity is about the group one identifies with. All indiginous British people are descended from the very first inhabitants of the island, but we don't identify socially or culturally as paleolithic people (when was the last time we did a bit of hunter gathering?). Ethnicity isn't just about blood, or more accurately descent, it's as much to do with language/culture/society and even politics, so it's about identity. Many people in the UK have multiple identities, English and Scottish or Welsh and British, there are no hard and fast rules, it's not citizenship and it's not birth, no one has any right to dictate to anyone else what group to identify with. There is a name for people who try impose their discredited ideas of ethnic identity or ethnic purity on other people, they are called racists. Please note I am agreeing with you here.

• Englishness, Northumbrian-ness and Cornishness are not tangible, provable concepts and in fact aren't a lot more than a personal preference.

We don't need proof, this is an encyclopedia, we require verifiability, if we can show that some people identify (or in your parlance, personally prefer to be identified as) as being Cornish not English using a reliable source then it can go in the article. We are interested in what people believe (as long as we can verify it), not in some concept of provable truth. Remember verifiability not truth. Alun 05:59, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

OK, that's pretty much what I wanted to hear :o) Given then that Wikipedia is not out to prove any concept of Englishness, more to just verify that there are various modes of Englishness and non-Englishness that people identify with, I am confused by some of the categories I see on various articles. I see categories for musicians, such as "English singers" and "English guitarists", which are surely problematic when it comes to actually deciding who goes in and who doesn't. I would not be popular if I tried to have a huge debate on them, since most people seem to think that if a singer was born in Middlesbrough, he's in the "English singers" category. That drives me nuts, and you saying that "no one has any right to dictate to anyone else what group to identify with" makes me feel a lot better. By categorising people as English or Scottish without having any clue whether they identify with those concepts, are we not being very un-wiki?

Does anyone know of any Wiki project designed to address this kind of thing? Bretonbanquet 17:03, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

We're getting off on a tangent here, but I believe there are projects for Category sorting and Categorizing. However, I think that, in the categories such as "English singers", it is referring to nationality, not ethnicity. Take for example Category:American singers, as there is no such thing as an "American ethnicity", it can only mean "singers from America (the US)". Perhaps they would be better named "Singers from Scotland", "Guitarists from England", etc.

Origins

There is a report of what sounds like an interesting paper concering Anglo-Saxon immigration and the genetic composition of the modern English population at [4]. Perhaps somebody could have a look at the paper itself, since media reports of this type of study are not always reliable. Rhion 06:12, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I have had a look for the paper online but cannot find it. The BBC are a bit crap, they don't cite the paper at all, or even give it's title, just the name of the publication. It may not be published yet, but there is at least one mistake in the BBC article Genetic research has revealed the country's gene pool contains between 50 and 100% Germanic Y-chromosomes.[5] This work is not definitive and may be wrong.[6] I may be able to access the paper when I go back to work as we have access to most of the major molecular biology journals there, but I don't have access at home. Thanks for the info. Alun 06:38, 19 July 2006 (UTC)

I had a look at the abstract fot this paper and it's a bit sensationalist and doesn't seem to really provide evidence, It's based on a computer model of what ifs, so all it's really saying is if there was a small Anglo-Saxon population, it could have become biologically dominant if our computer model is accurate.[7] For one thing it is assuming that there is a 50-100% Anglo-Saxon Y chromosome occurence in England, there are two problems with this proposition, firstly they cannot differentiate between Anglo-Saxon and Danish-Viking Y chromosomes, so is it Anglo-Saxon or Viking Y chromosomes they are measuring? The second is that the 50-100% only seems to apply to York and Norfolk, and not to other areas of England. Journalists get this sort of thing wrong all the time and a proper reading of the original paper is required for a definitive cite, journalists are not interested in being neutral or properly verifying their articles, they are only interested in a good story and I have seen several examples of journalists overstating or even deliberately distorting scientific results in order to get good copy. I should be able to get hold of a copy of the paper from work when I go back on Monday, we have access to most molecular biology journals online there. Alun 12:31, 21 July 2006 (UTC)

---

I am going to just comment on this: "a population of largely Germanic genetic origin, speaking a principally German language."

If this "Doctor" confuses language and genetics he is not even worth the efforf of reading him.

I tend to agree with you. I get the impression that this group of researchers are out to sensationalise their findings, presumably in the hope of getting greater funding in the future. The original paper (Y Chromosome Evidence Anglo-Saxon Mass Migration) recieved a great deal of media coverage, much of which was a distortion of the actual findings. But the results of their original paper were limited to say the least, taking as they did samples from a simple cross section of Britain from East Anglia in the east to North Wales in the west. They found a large proportion of genetic markers on Y chromosomes in the east of England that were similar to samples of Frisian origin, the so called Germanic genes, with little evidence of these markers on the Y chromosomes of Welsh men (which were more similar to markers on the Y chromosomes of Basque men). This lead to all sorts of claims in the media that Welsh people are genetically different to English people, and ignored the fact that there was also a hight prevelance of indigenous genetic markers in the English samples as well, and even claims that somehow Welsh and Basque people are closely related.[8][9] A far more reliable study done by UCL, A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles showed that there does seem to be a greater genetic contribution to the York and Norfolk areas by people coming from North Germany, Denmark and possibly Friesland, but that this does not apply to the whole of England, even in the south of England which was supposedly settled by Saxons. The paper also states that it is not possible to distinguish between Danish-Viking and Anglo-Saxon genetic markers, so are they measuring Anglo-Saxon or Anglo-Danish genes? No one knows even now. This paper didn't get anywhere near the exposure of the original paper because it's results didn't support the sort of racial differences that seem to be considered sensational by journalists. Now they are claiming that even with a small migration it could still imply a large Anglo-Saxon population relative to the indigenous one. Both the first paper and the last are reliant on a great deal of supposition, and upon computer modelling, the first model was to try to simulate the effect of a mass migration on an indigenous population, the second to try to simulate a small population out competing a larger one on the basis that the smaller population had a selective advantage. It's all very well, but it only seems to apply to central England (a point made in the New Scientist article [10]) but generally ignored by others, and it is also highly contingent upon the accuracy of their numerous assumptions. The reliability of any science decreases the greater the number of assumptions made, and in the New Scientist article this point is made well by another scientist commenting on the work. It seems to me that this work must be interpreted in light of what assumptions have been made, and how good their computer models are. What they are probably claiming (and I haven't actually had a chance to read the paper yet) is that this is possible rather than this occured. Alun 17:30, 22 July 2006 (UTC)

And here it is, a terrible piece of journalism purporting to be an article about science, but full of mistakes, misunderstandings and sensationalist rubbish.[11] Even the first sentence is wrong Anglo Saxons were the first apartheid racists, who said they were the first? And racists, all societies were what we would call racist at that time. Alun 03:26, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

Clumsy sentence

"Some people concentrated in several English counties, generally further from the south and west, notably the Cornish and the Cumbriaans claim to have a noticeably stronger connection, culturally, linguistically and politically, to the ancient Britons; As a result of this some historians claim that Cornish people can be considered distinct form English people.[18]"

I have trouble parsing this sentence. Maybe "notably the Cornish and the Cumbriaans" should be in parentheses. Also, forget the semicolon and start a new sentence.

Sorry if I'm violating convention in any way with this comment, as I'm new here. --BLHersey 02:58, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

It is quite bad. And what's the generally further from the south and west, Cornwall is the most south-west part of Great Britain, so how can it be further from the south west. How about

In some areas, notably Cornwall (and to a lesser extent Cumbria), some people claim a stronger ethnic connection to the ancient Britons, consequently some historians claim that Cornish people are distinct from English people. Alun 05:07, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Ah, much better! Thanks! --BLHersey 12:21, 8 August 2006 (UTC)

Even though if British history was actually tought, then everyone who is indigenous would feel this connection to the Britons, from whom we're all descended. I like Alun's point - whence did we come? Mars? Enzedbrit 11:31, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Neutrality disputed?

Why exactly is the neutrality of the article disputed? That tag seems to have been there since June, but I cannot find the problem on the talkpage and there doesn't seem to be any active discussion over the article's neutrality at the moment. Does anyone mind if I remove the tag? --Rudjek 20:41, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I think there has been some debate about the closeness of the ethnic bond between English people and certain peoples from continental Europe. In particular is has been claimed repeatedly on this talk page that somehow English people are more closely related to German people and French people than they are to Welsh, Scots and Irish people. There has been no evidence presented to support this except for an apparent confussion between linguistic groups and ethnic groups (ie this sort of logic, speaking a Germanic language=ethnically German). There has also been an attempt to imply that the Norman conquest made English (and British) culture more French, so the French are a related ethnic group. I think this is why the disputed neutrality tag is still there. Most debate about these issues seems to have stopped, I'll remove the disputed neutrality tag and we'll see if anyone wants to replace it. Alun 05:01, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I correct you. There is and has been evidence presented by other editors on WIkipedia. There is no definitive proof yet whether there was such a thing as Anglo-Saxon mass migration to the British Isles..however there is indeed some evidence for the theory. Also the ENglish culture was founded by tribes (or members of tribes) from the continent and so the Frisians, Danes, Germans...etc..are a related people to the English through cultural bonds if nothing else. Just because you do not like the idea that the English are a Germanic (or related to a Germanic) culture does not mean that the evidence that they are indeed a Germanic culture, is false. Sigurd Dragon Slayer

There is and has been evidence presented by other editors on WIkipedia.

I have seem no evidence presented, maybe we have a different idea as to what evidence is. You do not appear to have read my post. There has been no evidence presented that somehow English people are more closely related to German people and French people than they are to Welsh, Scots and Irish people. Indeed there has been no verification for the inclusion of any ethnic group as related to the English. It remains simply a matter of opinion. I am of the opinion that we should remove this from the infobox untill such time as someone produces evidence for English ethnic relatedness to any other group. Alun 07:09, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

There is no definitive proof yet whether there was such a thing as Anglo-Saxon mass migration to the British Isles..however there is indeed some evidence for the theory.

I don't think anyone disputes that Germanic tribes came to what is now England in antiquity, indeed there is plenty of evidence that they came as mercenaries of Romans, it is the extent of migration that is disputed. Most archaeologists these days are sceptical of mass migration to England at this time. It's acceptable to state that both theories are valid. The paper you link to is well known to me, it has several flaws that have been well documented on this talk page.Alun 07:09, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Also the ENglish culture was founded by tribes (or members of tribes) from the continent and so the Frisians, Danes, Germans...etc

This is not a fact, it is a theory. I would suggest that English culture can equally be said to have derived from the indigenous Romano-British culture. Read Francis Pryor's Britain AD and you will see that there is more than one perspective on this.Alun 07:09, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

are a related people to the English through cultural bonds if nothing else.

See below for a detailed discussion of this. I would dearly like to know what these apparently mythical cultural bonds are. I see no cultural practices that the English have that they share with Frisians or Danes but don't also share with Welsh or Scots.

Just because you do not like the idea that the English are a Germanic (or related to a Germanic) culture does not mean that the evidence that they are indeed a Germanic culture, is false.

Germanic is a linguistic term. English people speak a Germanic language. I do not understand what Germanic culture is. Modern English people are not Anglo-Saxons, their society and culture would be alien to us, just as the society and culture of Vikings would be alien to a modern Dane. If these cultures were related a millenium and a half ago, then there is no reason to assume that there has been continuity on either part. These cultures have been separated over such a long time that divergence has made them extremely different. On the other hand England has been part of the same country as Scotland and Wales for several centuries, they have culturally and linguistically converged. You cannot pretend the last 1500 years has not happened. What we need know is how English people identify themselves today, who do modern English people think are the closest to them. This is not a history article, it is about a modern people, and it is not just about descent it is about identity. Please read the detailed discussions below about how modern English people identify. Alun 07:09, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Related ethnic groups

I have included only UK and Irish peoples as ethnically related. My reasoning is thus:

1. We are interested in English people as they are today. It is true that a millenium and a half ago (or thereabouts) some people migrated to what is now England from the continent, bringing a germanic language with them. Modern English people are the descendants of those people and the original inhabitants of the areas settled. We don't know the actual scale of their contribution to the English gene pool, it appears large in some areas (though never to the complete exclusion of native genetic markers), but much smaller in other areas.
2. I don't think the simplistic arguments that basically go related language=same race or ethnicity=same race/descent hold water, ethnicity is, as much as anything about how people/s self identify, and how they identify other groups as related or not to the group to which they belong, this identity is based on common society/culture/language/politics/country etc. So the peoples living on the British and Irish Isles have much more in common with each other than they do with any continental people.
3. The dominant language on these islands is English, tiny proportions of people speak other languages as native languages in addition to English, but we all speak English to a native level, I do not think it is true that the Frisian language is the most closely related language to modern English (as someone claimed), I think the Scots language is.
4. People living on these islands have a shared history and ancestory that goes back millenia, even in the case of the descendants of Norman people it is very nearly a thousand years, assuming a generational span of 25 years that means 4x10 generations (four generations per century, with ten centuries), this is a whopping 2⁴⁰ ancestors, or to express it numerically 1,099,511,627,776 (or a British Billion (American Trillion)) this is far larger than the human population of the Earth today. We are almost all certainly quite closely related to each other, this amount of reproduction must have led to quite a bit of mixing of any incoming genetic material with indiginous material. It is also obvious that we are much more likely to find our reproductive partners close to where we live (rather than in continental Europe). Due to the industrial revolution and the subsequent mixing of people for a smaller but significant 8-10 generations (256-1024 ancestors), and the fact that most modern English people live in cities or industrial regions, where mixing must have been at it's greatest, it strikes me as just plain daft to try to claim that English people are somehow biologically more closely related to continental peoples than they are to other peoples on the British and Irish Isles.
5. Culture, there has been some debate that English culture is closer to that of Germanic speaking peoples than it is to non-English peoples of the British and Irish Isles, I have seen no evidence to back this claim up presented on this talk page. Indeed as a Welshman I do not think it is true, or provable, it just seems to be the opinion of certain nationalist people with an axe to grind. Culture has changed dramatically over the millenia, we are culturally very different from our ancestors of just a century or so ago and we have very few recognisable cultural ties with peoples from a thousand years ago. Modern culture revolves around popular culture, television, music, newspapers etc. in these regards we share a very homogeneous culture, most of these media are broadcast/printed on a UK wide basis (think of EastEnders, Coronation Street, the Nine O'Clock News (or even Not the Nine O'Clock News), The Sun, The Guardian etc). I could walk in to any workplace anywhere in the UK or even Ireland and have a conversation about the telly we all watched the night before, and the BBC is the epitome of this. Even in non-popular culture we all study Shakespeare at school, there are numerous Irish, Welsh and Scots playwrights, novelists and poets who have contributed to the rich English language literature of the British and Irish Isles (James Joyce, Dylan Thomas, Robbie Burns to name just three of the top of my head). To claim that English people have a closer cultural identity to continental people than they do to the other peoples of the islands they share is just nonsense.
6. Given all of these considerations, and bearing in mind that we are not talking about how people from a millenium and a half ago might have been related to continental people, I think it is fair to claim that the very closest ethnic groups to English people are those that share the same local geographic space (the same islands), the same language, the same history, have the most similar cultural references and who are most related by descent. It seems a nonsense to me to try to claim that Frisians and Danes have a similar level of ethnic relatedness to the English as the Welsh, Irish, Scots, Manx and Cornish peoples. So let's stick to closely related ethnic groups, or otherwise we might as well just call it an European ethnic group and have done with it. Alun 12:28, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• it is debated whether Scots is a language in its own right or merely a dialect of English.69.157.126.241 01:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• The English people trace a great deal of their culture and ancestry to the Anglo-Saxons and to deny such is just simply unfounded and unsupported. The Frisians speak the closest modern language to English and share other cultural traits as well as a great deal of their ancestry with most English peoples (i.e. to the the Anglo-Saxons). English people trace their ancestry to "Ancient Britons", Anglo-Saxons and Danish Vikings, so I don't see how you can not include continental groups. The main component of English culture is also Germanic, derived from the Anglo-Saxons, Vikings and even to the the Normans. What little left of it is "Celtic" is debated and insignificant compared to the Germanic elements which created the foundations for "English" identity. 69.157.126.241 18:40, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• The English people trace a great deal of their culture and ancestry to the Anglo-Saxons and to deny such is just simply unfounded and unsupported.

Where is the evidence of culture being traced to the Anglo-Saxons? Please provide evidence that modern English culture is significantly more similar to Danish, Dutch or Frisian culture than it is to modern Welsh or Scots culture. As for ancestry, so what, we are talking about ethnic identity, many modern Scots are also descended from Germanic speaking peoples, or where do you suppose the Scots language comes from? You need to show why you think that modern English people would identify themslves ethnically as equally related to Danish or Frisian people than Welsh or Scots people. Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Please provide evidence against such great amounts of English identity and culture from being traced back to the Anglo-Saxons and Danish-Vikings. I am not arguing that modern English culture is more similar to continental groups that to Welsh or Scots culture, but I am saying that there is still many shared elements in common which is worth mentioning. IT should be noted there is a great deal which the Welsh or (especially) Scots don't share with English culture. You need to show how English people wouldn't identify having an shared ethnic elements with Frisians, Danes , etc. The English have alot in common with their insular neighbours, but they also share a great deal with certain continental groups. 69.157.126.241 21:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• so I don't see how you can not include continental groups.

I gave my reasons, we are not talking about what ancient Anglo-Saxons might have identified with, we are talking about modern English people, I can find no evidence that modern English people identify ethnically as anything other than English and British, just as many Welsh and Scots people also identify as British. Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

What evidence do you have that the peoples identify their ethnically as British ? Exactly. Where do you think modern English trace their culture, language and ancestry from ? ANglo-Saxons, ancient Britons and Danish-Vikings. Those ties still exist between those modern groups, especially in terms of language, culture and genealogy. 69.157.126.241 21:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I have provided evidence for this below. Alun 08:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• The main component of English culture is also Germanic, derived from the Anglo-Saxons, Vikings and even to the the Normans.

Where is your evidence? This is a sweeping statement which only reflects your opinion, what is especially Germanic about English culture? and could you please be more specific about what the main component is? I might suggest that the main components of English culture are writers like Chaucer and Shakespeare. Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Where is the evidence that it is not Germanic ? Please do tell me what from English culture does not have its origin in Germnic culture or language ? I konw there are various elements, butthe majority derives from the people who founded English identity and language, the Anglo-Saxons. I might suggest that Shakespeare wrote in a Germanic language, Middle English. 69.157.126.241 21:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

You are avoiding a direct question by asking a question. I have made no claims as to the origins of English culture, you have. I simply asked you to elucidate the what it is in modern English culture that is so Germanic that it is similar to modern Frisian culture, but different ot modern Welsh or Scots culture. I get the impression you can't do this. Alun 08:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• What little left of it is Celtic.

I do not recognise such a thing as a homogeneous ancient Celtic culture.[12] It is an invention. Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I never said that Celtic culture was homogenous, but that doesn't refute the fact that very little Celtic (Brythonic) cultural elements remain in English identity and culture. 69.157.126.241 21:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

And what Anglo-Saxon ones do? We are not culturally the same as our ancestors, it is true that little Brythonic culture remains, it's also true that little Anglo-Saxon culture remains as well. Alun 08:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

The terms "Celtic" and "Germanic" are linguistic. Therefore, the vast majority of the entire population of the British Isles are Germanic, because they speak English. If genetic ancestry is deemed important, then the vast majority of the population of the British Isles is descended from indigenous stock. TharkunColl 17:57, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• What exactly is meant by "indigenous stock" ? It is known from archaeological evidence that the British Isles were hardly isolated from Paleolithic, Neolthic, Bronze Age, etc. migrations, which begs most people to question whether the Ancient Britons were one unified people. Besides this point, the population is also derived from other groups, including Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavian Vikings. In terms of genetic ancestry, it is currently highly debated just how much the peoples of the isles are descended from various groups, including "ancient Britons" (whatever this term means). In any case, from various evidence (genetics, culture, literature, history, archaeology, surnames/family history, etc.) it is known that the English do trace some portion of their ancestry from Anglo-Saxons and Danish Vikings. Just because they share "indigenous" or "ancient Briton" genetic elements or other cultural elements with the other insular peoples, doesn't warrant continentel groups from being omitted. 69.157.126.241 18:40, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
• It is known from archaeological evidence that the British Isles were hardly isolated from Paleolithic, Neolthic, Bronze Age, etc. migrations

Most British people are descended from the original paleolithic inhabitants of Europe.[13][14] Most archaeologists do not now support large scale migration theories. (see Francis Pryor, Britain BC and Britain AD) Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

No, SOME academics do not support large migration theories, and even many of them do not reject the idea completely, they only insist it isnt as straightforward as previously thought. That is only ONE genetic study which only shows that many British men may have Y-chromosome dating back primarily from "Paleolithic" times. It is in fact widely accepted, especially in archaeological circles, that there has been various migrations to the British Isles. This is easily seen by Paleolithic, Neolithic, Bronze Age, Iron Age (arguably), etc. artifacts and structures in Britain.

Every man has a Y chromosome dating to paleolithic times, they must have got them from someone living at that time!!! There are many genetic studies that support the fact that most British people have European paleolithic Y chromosomes (geneally with the R1b locus). I have only provided one. I could give you a lot more, I do have a degree in Genetics after all :) Large scale migrations to Great Britain are generally discredited. You seem to be unaware of recent developements in archaeology. Alun 17:08, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• begs most people to question whether the Ancient Britons were one unified people.

Is anyone here claiming that they were? I certainly would not claim that this is the case.[15] Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

You consistently claim they are the same people derived from Paleolithic times. 69.157.126.241 21:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I consistently claim that the population of the British and Irish Isles are mainly descended from the earliest paleolithic inhabitants that colonised Europe after the end of the last major glaciation. I don't think anyone would dispute this, where do you think they came from? This occured about 12,000 years ago, I have never claimed that culture and language have remained static over the course of the ten or so millenia (about 400 generations) following this event. This would quite obviously be an absurd claim. Alun 08:05, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• the population is also derived from other groups, including Anglo-Saxons and Scandinavian Vikings.

So what? These people did not live in splendid isolation, we are not our ancestors and we do not have the same cultural/social/ethnic identities as them. We may be derived from several culturally and ethnically distinct peoples, but we are not necessarily culturally/socially/ethnically similar to other descendants of those people with whom we have been separated for over 40 generations. Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I am not claiming such things and yes I do acknowledge that the Anglo-Saxons and Danish Vikings intermixed with the native Britons. But the fact is the language, identity and much of the culture of England traces from those peoples and therefore they share similar cultural traits with other peoples directly descended from them (Frisians, etc.) as well as shared ancestral/genetic traits. 69.157.126.241 21:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I wish you would stop refering to your opinions as facts, at best these are theories, we don't know what happened in the period imediately after the Romans left, and to claim some sort of perfect understanding about it seems to fly in the face of academic history and archaeology. Academics have postulated theories and ideas, no one but you claims these are facts. Alun 08:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• Just because they share "indigenous" or "ancient Briton" genetic elements or other cultural elements with the other insular peoples, doesn't warrant continentel groups from being omitted.

You are quite right, but this is not the reason I have given. Modern English people identify as British and English,[16]] not Germanic, you cannot superimpose some thousand year old deffinition of Anglo-Saxon ethnicity on modern English-British people. If you want to talk about the ethnic identity of Anglo Saxons do it on the Sub-Roman Britain or Anglo-Saxons articles, because it is not relevant to the modern world. Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

That is your own POV and most English people will acknowledge they speak a Germanic language and have numerous elements of their culture, history and identity deriving from Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and Danish Vikings. You are not only incorrect on how Anglo-Saxons and Danish-Vikings influences are not "relevant to the modern world", you are ignorant of history. Modern English culture traces much of its origins to Anglo-Saxons and Danish-Vikings and therefore it is VERY relevant to the people today. The name of the people and the language aren amed after them for goodness sake. 69.157.126.241 21:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Please provide evidence for this most English people will acknowledge they speak a Germanic language and have numerous elements of their culture, history and identity deriving from Germanic peoples such as the Anglo-Saxons and Danish Vikings. or is it just what you think most English people would do? When you say most in this way it is little more than a form of weasel words unless yo can show a study supporting it, if it is your opinion then you should state that I think most English people....etc. Alun 17:08, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Please sign your comments. Since the population of the British Isles have been freely mixing for 1500 years, any Anglo-Saxon element in English ancestry is also shared by the Scots, Irish, and Welsh. TharkunColl 18:18, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• What exactly do you mean by freely mixing ? Whatever Anglo-Saxon ancestry of the English, especially in the east, would not be equally shared by the Welsh and especially not by the Irish. I can see this argument for the Scots of the south-east and borders area, but they would also have Pictish and Gaelic(Irish) ancestry. 69.157.126.241 18:40, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

English migration to the Welsh coal mines was large and well documented in the 19th century, most south Welsh people are probably descended from English people, even if they don't know it. There was a lot of mixing in the industrial revolution. Whatever the truth about biology, the people of the islands share a common language, culture, history, politics and geography that none of them share with our continental neighbours. To try to impose a historical and disputed identity on these people (that English people are ethnically or racially Germanic and Welsh, Irish and Scots are ethnically and racially Celtic) is a nonsense. Live in the world as it is today, not how you think it should have been 1500 years ago. Alun 19:26, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, live in the world today, based on what these people believe and on historical, cultural and genealogical facts, not your own biased, British Supra-nationalist opinion. Yes, I agree there was English migration to the coal mines of south Wales and I'm sure many people there do have different amounts of English heritage. What levels of "mixing" was there though during the industrial revolution and what are you drawing this from ? Yes the people of the islands do share a common language, the English language (notice it is called "English", not "British") but they also have their own distinct languages which they do not share. They do share culture, history and politics with each other but they also share similar things with continental peoples. The peoples of Britain share many elements but also have differences. In terms of the English, they share current similarities in culture, language, history and genealogy with other Germanic-speaking and continental groups, especially the Frisians, so how can you omit them ? I am not trying to impose the identity of these peoples as "Celtic" or "Germanic" (although in a linguisitic sense, the English are Germanic since they speak a Germanic tongue), but it seems you are trying to impose an equally non-sensical idea that there is one British Isles people. 69.157.126.241 20:10, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Please do not make personal attacks, you can be banned from editing if you do, there is no reason for you to call me names just because I disagree with you. Please do not think that you can make assumptions about my beliefs based on a few comments here. If you knew anything about me you would percieve that it is ludicrous to call me any sort of nationalist. In fact it must be apparent to you that your position is more nationalistic than mine as I am taking a pan-nationalist view. I have provided quite a lot of evidence for my point of view. You keep making the same statements over and over again, but I can find no real evidence for your claims. Please read my comments above about your previous statements and respond to them with evidence for your stated position (I have comprehensively replied to your previous two posts, it would only be courteous of you to reply to my queries). You have failed to address any of the salient points I have made regarding your position. The fact that Welsh people, Irish people and Scottish people are different from English people is not in dispute here. We are talking about related ethnic groups not the same ethnic group. You have provided no evidence that:

English (people) share current similarities in culture, language, history and genealogy with other Germanic-speaking and continental groups

that they do not also share with Welsh or Scots people. Please be specific about what it is that English people do that is so similar to Danish or Frisian or Dutch people that Welsh or Scots people do not do, I would be thrilled to find out. I am Welsh and lived in England for four years from 1995-1999 and I could find precious little to differentiate them from Welsh people. I would dearly love to know what secret German things they do that they keep secret from us non-English Brits. Alun 08:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

That is your own unfoudned opinon and just becasue you have no background in the subject or are unaware of such cultural differences doesnt mean they don't exist. Reading your page, I find that you are of English ancestry fort the most part anyway so you already don't have the same upbringing as many native or ethnic Welsh who are of Welsh descent. I told you already that the English people share aspects of langauge, genealogy, history and culture with especially Frisians, but also Danish people, Dutch people, etc. Read the infomration on their respective articles, read up on English history here on Wikipedia, English language, the Vikings, the Anglo-Saxons, etc. and all articles threading from such topics for a start. Describing the Germanic roots of many elements of English culture will take time to explain. You must also remember that the cultures of Scotland, Wales and Ireland have equally important non-Germanic elements not seen in England. Those nations therefore have a mix of Brythonic and Gaelic cultures along with Germanic. In terms of genealogy and etymology, you alrady know how the English are related to Frisians, Danes, etc. 69.157.126.241 21:49, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Listen mate I am Welsh, I had the same upbringing as the children I went to school with (a Welsh language school). Both my parents were born in Wales. You do not have the right to decide what I do and do not understand. You know a little bit about me, this does not make you an authority on my life. You do not seem to be able to state what Germanic things English people do. This is because it is nonsense. They don't exist. You are trying to imply that modern English people have the same cultural practices as Frisians from the 5th century. This is quite evidently not true. If the so called Germanic culture of the English was so apparent that they were obviously ethnically related to the Frisians then you should at least be able to state what it is. But you can't. As far as I can see the most Germanic thing English people do is to drink beer (which Germanic tribes invented). Given that the Scots language is a Germanic language, maybe you should go to the Scottish people page and claim they are a related ethnic group to Frisians as well. I have read extensively around Wikipedia, the pages you are refering to are not about culture, they are about history. You seem to have got into a situation where you have made a claim you cannot support, but you keep making it over and over. please state explicitly what cultural things English people do that they learned off their Frisian ancestors 1500 years ago that modern Frisians also do today that sets them appart from Welsh and Scots people. As far as I can see you don't know. Alun 22:54, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

No, that is not it at all Wobble and in fact you simply are too stubborn to accept any other opinon than yours because of your own personal issuess on the subject area. I will provide you with what s Germanic about English culture but it takes times since its difficult to establish what is English and what is Germanic or what from characteristically English culture traces its origin to the Anglo-Saxons. These elements DO exist since it is Anglol-Saxon culture which formed the basis of English identitiy and made the culture distinctively "English". With that in mind, there were also other subsequent Germanic cultural and lingusitic influences from the Vikings and Normans. You must remember that I am speaking of GERMANIC not GERMAN cultural elements. It is difficult to examine exactly what is what in cultures. For example it is hard to detect what is Gallic, Germanic and Latin in French culture but that is what their culture is labelled as. Clearly the Latin elements are more idetifiable than the "Gallic" since that is what their langauge is based on. In England, the same can be said about the Germanic elements since that is the base of its language and whatever Brythonic/pre-Brythonic elements left over are very hard to detect, if at all. As for your own personal ethnic identification, you did not have the same upbringing as others since they are descended from different families, obviously. You consider yourself Welsh, but I and many, if not most others, would classify you as Welsh-English since you are of both English and Welsh descent.

"A man can be born in a stable, and yet not be an animal." - Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington. 69.157.126.241 23:17, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• you simply are too stubborn to accept any other opinon than yours

There is no point in getting personal. I am entitled to disagree with you and to argue my point. I fail to understand how I am being any more stuborn than you.Alun 14:59, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• I will provide you with what s Germanic about English culture but it takes times since its difficult to establish what is English and what is Germanic.....These elements DO exist since it is Anglol-Saxon culture which formed the basis of English identitiy and made the culture distinctively "English".

You amaze me. You keep stating that English culture is Germanic, but you now need to go and find out why it is, because you apparently don't know. So I get the impression that you have decided it's Germanic first without any basis for making this claim and now you need to go and try to find a source to support what you have said. Alun 14:59, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

As I told you before, it is hard to distinguish what is the origins of English customs, as to whether it is Bythonic, Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian, etc. however, much of what is English obviously developed from the base original culture and language of English people and England which was that of the Anglo-Saxons. Need I say any more ? 69.157.126.241 21:22, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't get it. How can it be obvious that English culture is different form Welsh and Scots cultur, but at the same time hard to distinguish. I would suggest that these two concepts are mutually exclusive. By deffinition what is ovious cannot also be hard to distinguish. You are tying yourself up in linguistic knots because of your inability to actually produce any evidence for this. What is obvious to me is that you have decided that English people share a culture with Frisian people that they do not share with Welsh or Scots people. Because you have decided this it must be true, but now this obvious thing is hard to distinguish. Your arguments seem to be a) English people speak a Germanic language, therefore they must be an ethnically Germanic people (but there is no such think as Germanic ethnicity, and Welsh and Scots people speak Germanic languages, in Scotland they even have the Scots language, does this make Scottish people a Germanic people?) and b) English people are descended form Anglo-Saxons who were Germanic, so they muct be racially Germanic (but English people are equally, or possibly mainly descended from Brythonic people as well). This also seems to ignore the 1500 years of history since these times. I have stated before that I do not think that exclusively racial or linguistic arguments are sophisticated enough to describe the complex relationships between British peoples. They certainly cannot be used to define the modern relationships between the peoples because they rely on interpretations of what people think might have happened 60 odd generations ago. Alun 06:13, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• In England, the same can be said about the Germanic elements since that is the base of its language and whatever Brythonic/pre-Brythonic elements left over are very hard to detect

No this is not what is required. You need to find out what is specifically English that is Germanic, you may find that much so called Germanic cultural elements (and I don't believe such things exist) that occur in England also occur in Wales and Scotland. They have to be exclusive to English and Frisian people, or they do not suport your claim. Alun 14:59, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• You consider yourself Welsh, but I and many, if not most others, would classify you as Welsh-English

Neither you or anyone else has the right to dictate to people what ethnic group they belong to. A mere coincidence of biology does not define the socio-cultural conditioning one undergoes as a child or adolescent. There is a word for people who want to classify others into racial straight-jackets. I am angry and offended by your remark. I don't give a flying fuck what you think, you have no right to racially classify me, you know fuck all about me. Don't try to demean my opinion by impugning my motives. I have no issues with anything, I am interested in producing a neutral article, looking at your recent edits you have introduced a great deal of POV into articles that were more neutral before you edited them. If anyone has an agenda here it seems to be you. Alun 14:59, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually, ones cultural and ethnic identity is not down to just his own personal views or opinions on oneself, it is also based on those in the persons surrounding society and culture and how that person is treated by others. "A mere coincidence of biology" ? C'mon pal. Your genetic familial heritage is a large part of who you are and where you come from, but in any case, your familial heritage is also how you develop socially since it is them who you interact with most when your young and in development and this in turn affects how you interact with others in your society. Actually, I have introduced more factual views into some articles and made them more neutral since they were leaning towards one persons or one groups own POV. I am not "racially" classifying you as I am not speaking about race, which is a taboo area that deals with the classifcation of humans into biological sub-groups. I am talking about cultural and ethnic identification here which in part is based on ones ancestry. Do you really have to swear ? Wow. 69.157.126.241 21:22, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

it is also based on those in the persons surrounding society and culture and how that person is treated by others.

As I say you don't know anything about how people in the surrounding society think, you appear to understand nothing about Welsh culture or society. Welsh culture is generally assimilative. Many (at least tens of thousands) people have moved to south Wales from England over the last century or so, if you were to go into a pub in Cardiff and start telling the descendants of these people that they are all English you would either be laughed out of the place or get the shit beaten out of you. You clearly know nothing of Wales or Welsh society. Alun 05:32, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• but they also have their own distinct languages which they do not share

All people who live in the UK and Ireland speak English as a first language. The fact that other languages exist does not alter the fact that we have a common language that none of us shares with any continental peoples. Isn't this obviously important when it comes to related ethnic identities?

English has become a worldwide langauge and it is the native language of millions and millions of people around the world. Im sorry to inform you, but it is something you DO share with continental and other peoples around the globe. It is ignorant to to claim "All people who live in the UK speak English as a first language" since there are many people in Wales and in Scotland who speak Welsh and Scots Gaelic as their first language. Yes, almost all the peoples in the British Isles can speak English (there are very few Irish monoglots left in the West of Ireland), but only the English have exclusively English as their only native and traditional tongue. The Scots, Welsh, and Irish all have languages they do not share with anyone else. In any case, English shares much in common with Frisian and they are the only members of the Anglo-Frisian classifcation under West Germanic languages. 69.157.126.241 21:49, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

All people in the UK do speak English as a first language, that does not also preclude them from speaking another language as a first language. My sons speak both English and Finnish as first languages, I spoke Welsh as a first language untill I left school, one doesn't have to choose you know. Alun 22:54, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Your first langauge means yourn ative tongue, i.e. the one you learned first and which is spoken at home. There are many people who learned Welsh or Scots Gaelic first in the UK and there are people, albeit very very few, who are Welsh monoglots.69.157.126.241 23:17, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

A first language is one where the speaker can speak fluently and without a foreign accent. People can have more than one first language, please see First language. Most languages learned before puberty can be learned to a native level. The terms first, native, and mother can be misleading. It is quite possible that the first language learned is no longer a speaker's dominant language, and therefore no longer the first language. Young immigrant children, whose families have moved to a new linguistic environment may lose, in part or in totality, the language they first acquired. I do not believe that there are Welsh monoglots any more, there may have been some left twenty or thirty years ago, but any left alive today would be very old indeed, Welsh people do go to school you know, and in north Wales where most Welsh is spoken at home there are very few Welsh language schools because there is no call for them, parents of children there want their children to be able to speak English. Alun 04:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• you are trying to impose an equally non-sensical idea that they are one British Isles people.

This is related ethnic group, not the same ethnic group. I am merely pointing out that English people are much more closely ethnically related to Welsh, Irish and Scots people than to any other ethnic groups. To claim that English people are more closely related to Germans or Dutch or Danes than to Welsh or Scots is to pretend that the last 1500 years has not happened, no acts of Union, no intermarriage etc. No one has claimed they are a single British people (though a large majority of people in Great Britain identify as English and British, Welsh and British or Scotish and British, I have provided a link (in one of my responses to you above) to a survey conducted in 2003 which shows that 69% of Scots, 79% of Welsh and 83% of English identify at least somewhat as British), you cannot win an argument by claiming I said something I did not say.

• I urge you to read my comments about your previous posts and respond to them, especially about the specific things that English people do that are the same as Germanic people but different to other peoples of the British and Irish Isles. Alun 20:42, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• Your link from one survey claiming that people identify as British is dealing with nationality and not ethnicity, ethnic identity or ethnic origin. Even so, the vast majority of the respondents all claim their own "nationality AND British" with a slight majority claiming their "nationality exclusively" and "their nationality first and then British". I am NOT arguing against the view that English are more related to other insular groups than to other continental peoples, but I am arguing that the English are also significantly related to certain continental groups (eg. the Frisians) more so than other peoples. Just because they may be "more closely related" to other insular groups, does not mean that their important ties to continental peoples should be omitted. 69.157.126.241 21:49, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

slight majority claiming their "nationality exclusively" and "their nationality first and then British".

This comment seems a bit confused. I get the impression you are trying to distort these data to support your opinion when they quite clearly do not. You cannot claim a group that has positively identified as British for the anti-British group. This is Misuse of statistics. Alun 17:08, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually the survey does not state what the question asked to the people who responded was. In the case of Great Britain (not Northern Ireland) it is safe to assume that nationality and ethnicity are the same (see Nation and Ethnic group and you will see they are very similar concepts). My argument is that it does indeed mean they should be omitted. Otherwise you should include French and any other number of peoples (Italians for example, Britain was a province of the Roman Empire after all. Keep it simple is what I am saying, include those that are obvious and closest. Alun 22:54, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

The Romans left very little impact on the people of Britain and what few settled here were easily absorbed into the population. They had nowhere near the demographic or cultural impact of the Anglo-Saxons. In the case of Britain and this survey, it is not safe to assume nation means ethnic group or ethnic origins since many of the people may be only referring to where they were born or their citizenship. Nationality and ethnicity can be both related and different concepts. In the case of this survery, we really don't know for sure. 69.157.126.241 23:17, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

The Romans left very little impact on the people of Britain

What's this? Don't you think Christianity was a large impact? Alun 10:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It is clear from the survey that many people identify as British, you just don't want to acknowledge it because it doesn't support your opinion. In complex cases like the indigenous people of Great Britain, nationality and ethnicity are often conflated. Indeed I would claim that in respect to the indigenous people of Great Britain, nationality and ethnicity are the same thing. This is because, whereas it is apparent that a person from an ethnic minority, an English-Pakistani for example, may identify ethnically as Pakistani and nationally as English, for someone who is both ethnically English and nationally English, the distinction is not really apparent, and probably doesn't exist, the same applies to Welsh and Scots people. For example the Office for National Statistics recognises White or White-British, White-Irish and Other-White ethnic groups, with a more detailed inclusive level of ethnic classification including Welsh, Irish and Scots. So in this classification English, Welsh and Scots ethnic groups are included within the White or White-British ethnic group. It is clear here that Irish people living in the UK can identify as White or White-British and then as a sub group of Irish within this group, or they can identify simply as British-Irish.[17] People in the survey above cannot be refering to citizenship as there is no such thing as Welsh or Scottish citizenship. People in the survey were asked which groups they identify with, if they identify to the country they were born in, that is their prerogative. These data clearly show that you have at best a perfunctory understanding of the complexity of the people living on the British and Irish Isles. Alun 08:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• Don't be so sensitive Wobble, I am not making a "personal attack". I am refuting your own biased POV. More to follow later... 69.157.126.241 20:46, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

You are making a personal attack by calling me names. A refutation does not require that you are personally offensive. In fact you have not even made a refutation because you have provided no evidence. You claim that my POV is biased, but I have at least provided evidence and sources for my replies to your comments above. You do not appear to have had the courtesy to even read what I have written before you fly off the handle. I am happy to accept anything you might want to include if you verify it properly. I have searched extensively on the net for verification about related ethnic groups for the English and can find nothing at all. Personally I would be happier to remove this section from the infobox alltogether as I don't really believe in the idea of related ethnic groups. As it is I am prepared to accept that the ethnic groups of the British and Irish Isles are related because of their long histories living on the same group of islands, their use of the same language and their similar cultural practices (drinking Tea for example). Alun 20:55, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Well then you must acknowledge the simlar cultural practices between the English and continental groups. Also, there are other elemnets to culture and ethnicity besides cuisine (i.e. tea; also, many people in the Isles are not fond of drinking tea, especially in Ireland). Justb ecause you havent found anything on the net specifically titled "related ethnic groups" doesn't merit omisson of the topic. Obviously groups of peoples have closer links than others as you admit such by including insular peoples to the section. If you include insular peoples, then you must include continental peoples, especially the Frisians, who share aspects of history, language, culture and genealogy with the English. The closer geographic proximity of the other insular peoples obviously does not merit the exclusion of other groups. The English share more in common with Frisians, Danes, etc. than many other continental groups and even peoples in the Isles themselves. For example, it could be argued that an Englishman from York shares as much or more in culture, language and ancestry than a native Irish speaker from the Aran Islands, or a native Scots-Gaelic speaker from the Hebrides. Finally, I am not making personal attacks by calling you names and I have no idea where you are getting this from. If we are to continue this discussion, I ask you to not be so easily offended since I have no idea what exactly is offending you. 69.157.126.241 21:49, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

As I say I will acknowledge these similar cultural practices when you actually tell me what they are. Constantly refering to these practices, but never actually being able to articulate what they are just makes me think that they just don't exist, you don't have any evidence for this and you have singularly failed to produce one example of a Germanic cultural practice that the English do that is not also done by Welsh and Scots people (beer drinking for example). Drinking tea was just an example of a British thing that continental people don't do. It's odd that you mention Ireland as not a great nation of tea drinkers because a few years ago I came accross a tea website that showed that Irish people have the highest per capita tea consumption in the world, followed by the UK obviously. I really wish you'd stop repeating yourself, you provide no evidence or verification, I do not accept your opinion as fact. I have produced quite a lot of evidence for my position. Alun 22:54, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

If the Insular peoples are going to be listed on the "related ethnic groups" section, then they need to have references as well as to what they have in common, unless we are listing all the groups based from common knowledge. Also, it is important to remember that the Frisians speak a language and have a culture more similar to English than the original Brythonic and Gaelic cultures of Scotland, Wales, and Ireland. The Anglicisation of Wales, Ireland and Scotland is due to English historical policies and actions and is a form of cultural genocide to some people (as is peoples attempts at trying to push some unified British people based on English culture and language). In any case, much of their respective cultures and language remain, especially in Ireland which is as much Gaelic (Celtic) as it is English (Germanic-based). English culture is having the same affect on world cultures (first from the British empire and now from Anglo-American culture) as people around the world now share many aspects in common with English culture and speak English. I have also produced evidence for my opinion and drawn from alot of the same sources as you. You have provided mainly POV and "common knowledge" yourself, so maybe you should stop repeating yourself. Its funny you say Irish people have the highest tea consumption in the world because I have never seen such non-sense, although I have seen studies that say the Irish have the second highest consumption of beer per-capita in the world. In any case, many peoples and countries around the world drink tea, including many continental Europeans, and the beverage itself is not characteristically British (it was spread everywhere by the British from India). 69.157.126.241 00:49, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

If the Insular peoples are going to be listed on the "related ethnic groups" section, then they need to have references as well

Are you now suggesting that we remove the insular ethnic groups? I think that all groups that have not been verified should be removed untill such time as someone finds some verification (including insular ones).Alun 04:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

The Anglicisation of Wales, Ireland and Scotland is due to English historical policies and actions and is a form of cultural genocide

Not according to John Davies the Welsh historian (see A History of Wales), Welsh people gave up speaking Welsh because it was in their interests. It's almost impossibly to coerce someone in to giving up their language. Stalin failed in Estonia and I think you might just find he was a little more persuasive than the English. Fundementally no government can dictate what language a family speaks at home, only the family members can do that. The fact is that Welsh people started speaking English because it put them in a better position economically, they could get better jobs elsewhere in the UK, also with the advent of mass media in the twenties it must have been easier to learn English, when people started to listen to the radio etc. Alun 04:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

it is important to remember that the Frisians.....have a culture more similar to English than the original Brythonic and Gaelic cultures of Scotland

I don't think anyone can claim that the original language of Scotland is Gaelic, in fact Gaelic is thought to have been introduced to Scotland at about the same time as English is to England, presumably by the same sorts of methods as the Anglo-Saxons used, (cultural genocide I think you called it, where is Pictish these days?). I don't know what you are talking about when speak of original Brythonic and Gaelic cultures, there must have been considerable cultural heterogenicity within the Celtic speaking tribes of Great Britain. To claim a common culture is absurd and I'm sure these peoples would not necessarily have identified as Celtic, or have recognised each other as than anything other than foreigners, they spent enough time fighting each other. You have provided no evidence that English people have a closer culture to Frisian people. I don't know why you keep stating this when you can't support it with a citation, I'm not asking for much, if it's that well established it should be easy.

Here's a nice quote from Simon James's website (it's about Celtic culture (how closely modern and ancient cultures are really related)) but I think equally applies to ancient Anglo-Saxon and Frisian cultures and how they might relate to modern English people. If we are Celts, and they were Celts, then it is all too easy to think that they must have fitted with our ideas of what Celts are, or recently were. They must fit into the Celtic 'cultural package'; yet that package is largely a modern construct, cobbled together from fragments from different times and places..... the Ancient Britons, Irish, and indeed Gauls, may have been very different from us and, if we could meet them, they would actually seem far more alien than we have imagined.[18]. It's worth having a look at Simon James's Ancient Celts Page with some well reasoned arguments as I wrote my own first book on the Celts I became increasingly aware that the differences between the ancient peoples-now-called-Celts was at least as deep and important as their common 'Celtic' culture. What is widely thought of as the Ancient Celtic 'cultural package' -- warriors, Druids, abstract curving-line art, etc. etc. -- may be largely a modern concoction, drawn from sources very widely scattered in time and space. So I don't subscribe to the we are Celts and the English are not point of view, though I accept it as a valid point of view it is not the only one and there is plenty of evidence of diverse cultural practices in Great Britain and Ireland in the Pre-Roman period. Barry Cunliffe's Iron Age Britain is a good source. Alun 07:17, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• I have also produced evidence for my opinion

So where have you hidden it? because I can see no references or links in support of your claims in your posts here. Alun 04:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• You have provided mainly POV and "common knowledge" yourself

I have provided a lot of sources to support my position, you have not, how can you claim you have when a simple glimpse at your posts shows no links to supporting external verification. There is no such thing as common knowledge on wikipedia. My statement about common knowledge was in support of removing the related ethnic groups section all together, because it's only based on common knowledge and not supported by any verification. Alun 04:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• Irish people have the highest tea consumption in the world because I have never seen such non-sense,

Another example of me being able to support what I say with a verifiable source, while you cannot. Please take a look at this website and understand that your opinion is not fact, other people can find reliable information that can contradict your opinion, you need to accept that sometimes you are wrong.[19] There are also cultural references to the presence of tea in Irish culture, think of Mrs Doyle in Father Ted, she is only funny with her obsession with tea because it has some basis in reality, like all humour. Alun 04:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Being able to support with a dubious and unreliable source, yes. That is one survey which I find ridiculous. Tea is drank by lots of people everywhere and is more popular in India and China probably more than anywhere else. Do you ever listen to any others opinon but your own ? I think you have some messed up views on this subject that arent as widely supported as you claim in the academic world (this issue is hotly debated, there is no current consensus), but whatever. 69.157.126.241 21:11, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

On what grounds do you refer to this source as dubious and unreliable? Your attitude seems to be that any information that does not conform to your pre-conceived ideas is automatically false. In fact this is an absurd possition to take, you are in effect stating that your unsupported opinion carries more weight than any other material irrespective of it's origin. Your comments have largely been those of personal opinion, sometimes you claim that your opinions are shared by most peole, but I have no idea who these most people are. To me most people would represent a majority in a survey or opinion poll that could be cited. Claiming that most people hold the same views as you, without being able to support such a position is just a form of weasel words. You attitude here is the same as that for the survey of British people above. Evidence that you don't like you choose to disregard. This cherry picking of information speaks volumes about your attitude towards neutrality. I have provided much evidence for the position I have taken with regard to ethnic identity in Great Britain, you have provided little except your opinion and that most people agree with you. Your continual regection of verifiable and reliable sources combined with your inability to provide sources of your own lead me to think that what you really want to do is make the article reflect your personal opinion. Let's remember this is an encyclopedia. Please see WP:NPOV, WP:V, WP:NOR, WP:RS and WP:CITE Alun 05:32, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• Offence caused earlier. You seem to have been quite supprised by my reaction earlier to your comment about British nationalism. I will give you the benefit of the doubt and explain why it is offensive. In the UK a British nationalist is a member of the British National Party which is a neo-fascist racist party. By calling me a British nationalist you were effectively calling me a nazi. Now do you see why it is offensive? Alun 05:35, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I do see now and it was not my intention. When I say British Nationalist, I didnt mean to associate you with that political party.I was referring to your ridiculous view of "One British Isles People". 69.157.126.241 21:11, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

You may not like it because it doesn't fit into your nationalistic and as far as I can see largely unfounded perceptions, but the citation I gave earlier does show, quite categorically that a large majority of people in Great Britain identify to a certain extent as British.[20] This is a fact and is supported. If you are not prepared to accept this then it says more about how little you actually know about the peoples of Great Britain. You cannot just dismiss a properly conducted survey of how the peoples of Great Britain identify themselves just because it contradicts your opinion, this is disingeneous to say the least, and strongly implies that you are not really interested in producing a neutral article, as you want to cherry pick the data you use. Identity in Great Britain is complex, often how people identify very much depends on context. Whether a British nation or British ethnic group exists or not seems to be a matter of opinion. Some people would argue strongly that it does, others that it doesn't. I do not think it is particularly important how it is classified one way or another, but I do think that it is just incorrect to claim that there is no such thing as a cultural and social bond between the peoples that live on the island. This bond is strong and, whatever you may think bears most of the hallmarks of ethnicity. It is also important to remember that people are very sophisticated in how they percieve themselves, to most people identifying as British does not mean that they are any less Scots or Welsh or English, and why should it? In the survey mentioned 64% of Welsh people identify as both Welsh and British, 60% of Scots identify as Scottish and British and 63% of English identify as English and British, these figures are remarkably similar, and show clear majorities in all of the countries. With regard to Ireland the situation is far more complex and I think one could argue that the only ethnic group in Ireland that strongly identifies as British is the Ulster Scots group in the North. I have tended to avoid mention of Ireland, I think Ireland is a very different case, it's a different island and at least part of it is a different state, I think it would be accurate to claim that in the case of Ireland the connection is much less strong, though I think generally we do have an affinity for Irish people, and British citizens have certain rights there, I think (though I'm not sure, my memory is not what it was!!!!) British citizens can vote in Irish elections and are eligible for Irish citizenship (and vice versa). Alun 05:32, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

You state above As I told you before, it is hard to distinguish what is the origins of English customs, as to whether it is Bythonic, Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian, etc. however, much of what is English obviously developed from the base original culture and language of English people and England which was that of the Anglo-Saxons. So you are saying that something that is obvious is also hard to distinguish. How can this be so? These concepts are mutually exclusive, it is either obvious or it is opaque, it cannot be both. Alun 06:24, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• To the unidentified user, having read this, I must say that I concur with Alun. It does appear that you place too much emphasis on differences between the English and the rest of the British which, in all honesty, do not exist. Aside from an identity that one is English, for example, there is no difference in culture, life or genetic make-up between them and the rest of the British. As for Frisians, the English language is closest to Frisian but the Frisians are continental and life is just so different there. Let's try to discuss things on here first, before changing the article, even though I doubt there are many more people than us that actually read it. Hwyl fawr! Enzedbrit 11:29, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

RfC

Request for Comment: Peoples related to the English

I have been keeping an eye on this article for a couple of months. As it is obvious that the conflict is not going to go away, I have taken the liberty to place this request for comments. The origin of the dispute is about whether Bretons, Danes, Dutch and Frisians should be added to the list of related people to the English. E Asterion ^{u talking to me?} 20:34, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Statements by editors previously involved in dispute

1. I am under the impression that one of the main policies of wikipedia is the verifiability policy. It has long been a problem with related ethnic groups that they are difficult to verify (at least online). I cannot even find any reference to a definition of related ethnic groups with a google search. I would like to see this section removed from the info box completely as I'm not convinced of it's merits. Be that as it may the definitions of what constitute ethnic groups have varied from the purely racial (only descent counts) to the purely linguistic (English people are ethnically German because they speak a Germanic language), neither of which are particularly accurate or reflect the realities of the situation. There has been a fair amount of nationalistic posturing, with English and non-English nationalists stating that there are greater differences between English people and Welsh, Scots and Irish peoples than really exist. These are largely based on events that may or may not have occured well over a thousand years ago and tend to ignore the more recent history of the various constituent parts of the UK. If there is to be a related ethnic groups section then I think it should reflect the realities of the present, which is that the peoples of Great Britain have a shared culture that goes back centuries that they just don't share with any peoples of continental Europe. If we are to include Danes, Frisians and Bretons, then we should also include French and Germans, in fact we should probably just include all Europeans and have done with it. Ultimately we are related to all these groups, it's the degree of relatedness that is disputed. I simply think that in that case we should include only the very closest of related groups, and that would be the other peoples of the islands of the archipelago. I am aware that we should not accept concepts such as common knowledge. Given that these are all unverified anyway (and I have placed unverified tags in the references section in the past but they have been removed at some point, I stopped editing this article for a while) and seem to be unverifiable I think it would be best just to remove them all and let people draw their own conclusions. Alun 21:25, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Comments

1. Wobble, you make some valid points in this paragraph that I agree with, but also you make alot of unfounded claims. Ethnicity itself is a touchy subject and its definition includes various elements. It does primarily consist of shared/common ancestry (kinship and descent) as well as cultural, behavioural, religious, familial, linguistic, phenotypic/genotypic traits which may or may not result of such descent. We are debating whether certain ethnic groups should be included under this subject based on their level of similarity or relation to English people. This is obviously a highly subjective subject area, even if relying solely on shared genealogy/kinship and descent. There is no need to argue for the inclusion of the other Insular peoples, but if they should be included, then why not other groups who are closely related to the English (even if not considered by some as being as similar). The French should not be included since they have only had limited influence on the English language with little similarity in terms of culture. The French have practically no significant relation with modern English in terms of shared ancestry (that is what can be traced in historical records). Some argue against this by citing the invasion and influence of the Normans. This however is flawed by the fact that 1) the Normans settled in very small numbers and were easily absorbed into the English population 2) the Normans themselves were primarily Norse or of Scandinavian descent 3) their culture was a hybrid of northern French and Scandinavian elements 4) their langauge was a Norse-influenced Oil language different from standard Parisian French 5) other than the language, what lasting influences and impacts on English culture they did have were not uniquely "French" and were common of most continental Kingdoms and nations of the Middle Ages. As for the Germans, it is questionable whether they should be included since they do not share a great deal with the English other than limited linguistic and cultural similarities as well as possible shared ancestry with especially northern Germans. Getting to the matter at hand: whether the Frisians, Bretons, Dutch and Danes should be included under "related ethnic groups". The Frisians should obviously be included if any such subject is to be in this article. They may not share as much in common with the English as the other Insular peoples but they do share a great deal in common in terms of 1) language: English and Frisian are the only members of the Anglo-Frisian branch of West Germanic languages and are closer to each other than any other langauges 2) shared ancestry: the Anglo-Saxon based surnames still form the majority of English surnames and most English can trace varying degrees of descent to the Anglo-Saxons. Even going by the one or two inconclusive y-chrom. analyses of some British populations ("A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles" (pdf) Y Chromosome Evidence for Anglo-Saxon Mass Migration), there is clearly a significant "Germanic" line of y-chrom. descent in such studies in the sample populations in England, especially in the east of the country. The "Germanic" samples taken to compare were from Friesland, Schleswig-Holstein and southern Denmark. The Anglo-Saxons who migrated to England included Frisians and the peoples were very closely related speaking the same language (Anglo-Frisian) and inhabiting the same geographic region (the German Bight) 3) Culture: the national identity and creation of England as a Kingdom traces back to Anglo-Saxon England as well as the origins of disinctively "English" culture and language. Although evolving over time and receiving other influences (Scandinavian, Norman, etc.) they persist to the modern day. Many of these cultural traits are shared with other Germanic based cultures and peoples, including the Frisians. The Danes should be included mainly because of their shared history with the English, influences on English culture and language (especially Northern English dialects) as well as their significant shared ancestry with the English (due to Danish Viking settlment), especially those from northern and eastern England. As for the Dutch, they do not have any more reason to be included than the Germans would (being speakers of a Germanic-language and possible shared ancestry), while the Bretons would only be able to make a case based on shared ancestry (like the English, also descending from Brythons) and arguably shared history during the reign of the Angevin Kings of England (see history of Brittany). I am not arguing really for their inclusion anyway as much as I am for Frisians and Danes and I strongly believe these two peoples should be included if you are going to maintain keeping the related ethnic groups section. 69.157.126.241 22:24, 19 August 2006 (UTC) 22:55, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
2. This type of argument, i.e. one that provokes a large amount of strong personal feeling and can subsequently develop into a heated row, is often blighted by a poor definition of the topic in hand. "Related ethnic groups" is such a horribly vague term that differences of opinion are practically guaranteed. All ethnic groups are related to the English, some more closely than others. Where is the line drawn? 1000 years ago, 5000 years ago, 10,000 years ago? What is guaranteed to prolong the argument is that very little of what some people are saying is verifiable to the satisfaction of Wikipedia. Arguing whether the English are more closely related to Frisians or to the Welsh is ultimately futile when nothing can realistically be proven either way. I have had many run-ins with people who like to remove all mention of Britain from articles and replace it with England, either believing that they are one and the same thing, or that anything with a vague connection to England is English and not British. The point is not that they are wrong, but they cannot prove they are right. Englishness, like Welshness, Scottishness and Cornishness, is not a provable concept but an attitude with which people identify, often for reasons other than descent, place of birth etc. Likewise, one's opinion of the relative closeness of other ethnic groups to the English depends on personal experience and POV, in the absence of clear facts. So, without the prospect of any verifiability for any measure of relativity between the English and any other ethnic group, the whole question of "related ethnic groups" should be abandoned. The alternative is an infinite extension of this current dispute. Bretonbanquet 23:02, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
3. This is all very much a matter of degree. Of course, the English are more closely related to Europeans than they are to others. But if this info box actually has any use at all (which I doubt), then it has to reflect what the people themselves think about their kinship. The truth is that the English feel almost infinitely more akin to the Scots, Irish, and Welsh than they do to any Continentals - and this fact still remains true even if the feeling is not reciprocated. TharkunColl 23:09, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
4. Here I must agree. This is, I believe, another firm argument in removing the section which is 'related ethnic groups'. To be honest, I had never known that there was so much argument amongt British peoples to be so detached from each other until I got involved in this forum and others like it. I, for one, am purely British first and foremost. It's my island, and although I'm happy to relate to regions within it, the island's identity has existed for so long, not the modern countries that have divided it. Enzedbrit 11:38, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
5. I think if you're going to call something related then you should either cite your sources, or define your criteria for a relationship. Of course you can't really do the latter without violating WP:OR - something I think one or more contributor has been doing in arguing for the inclusion of these groups. I am in agreement with those who say that virtually every group is related and this is all a matter of degree. I personally don't find the related groups infobox information useful at all. Perhaps it should be in the See also section where the nature of the ethnic relationship can be elaborated - possibly in a timeline or sprinkled throughout the article or something instead. TharkunColl makes the point that the related groups should be what the English people think - ie, which ethnic groups do the English think they are related to? This would be a fine approach, if there was a reliable reference. Otherwise, without a source which says which ethnic groups the English ethnic group are related to, I agree they should all be removed from the infobox. I think everyone involved in this discussion has said as much. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 12:57, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
6. Someone could argue that places like Goole, Crowle or if you want to push it Epworth and the Isle of Axholme do have some relation with the Dutch, but I really doubt local people really think this way anymore. Regards, E Asterion ^{u talking to me?} 23:28, 13 August 2006 (UTC)
7. I think we should have the section. I think it the related groups box, we should have those that share similar cultural traits on the continent such as the Germans, Dutch, Danes, Swedes...etc...As I think histroy is an important part of current culture an dlike it or not they have a shared history with us. Their days of the week are another case in hand, all derive from the same Goddesses that were shared with all the other Germanic Pagan peoples and in this sense I mean the early English. They also are related by language. The Frisian language is the closest language to English, unless you count Scots as a language rather than a branch of English, either way the language is very close. Our Yule celebrations (as well as the word Yule > Jul) are also very similar to the Scandinavian and other Germanic peoples. Our folklore again is similar and derives from the same source, a lot of the time. In areas such as Northumbria the folkloric creatures still in many cases retain their old Germanic names (such as Dvargar for Dwarves or Dwarfs). And can anyone here say that folklore and folk customs are not important to a nations cultural identity and self view? Like it or not we are related to the continental nations and the Northern European ones even more so. The same goes for the other inhabitants of the British Isles, they share customs, language and traditions and also share a country (United Kingdom) so they are related. I don't see the problem with any of these groups being added. Not that it matters, I doubt this would change anyones minds. I just feel if this section is not re-added Wikipedia would lose another once of integrity. I'll speak more on each of these points later, when I am less busy! Sigurd Dragon Slayer

some responses to above comments:
This is all very much a matter of degree. Of course, the English are more closely related to Europeans than they are to others. But if this info box actually has any use at all (which I doubt), then it has to reflect what the people themselves think about their kinship. The truth is that the English feel almost infinitely more akin to the Scots, Irish, and Welsh than they do to any Continentals - and this fact still remains true even if the feeling is not reciprocated. TharkunColl 23:09, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, I do not doubt they would feel more closely related to other Insular groups, but I also believe, from my experience with people who are English, that they obviously feel more related to especially Danes and Frisians but also Dutch (especially if from the east of England) then to say French or Italians. [[User:|User:]] 23:22, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

You obviously have a very limited experience of English people. Have you actually ever been to any of these places you claim to know so much about? Alun 05:37, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• Does that really matter ? Does one have to visit a certain place to know about English people ? English peopl and culture are spread around the globe and I have read much into this subject area. Do you in turn have expertise in this field of study ? Exactly. 69.157.126.241 21:05, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

You claimed to have personal experience of people specifically from the east of England. Now it seems that you have never been to England at all and have learnt all you know about the English from books. TharkunColl 22:45, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I've had personal exprience with English people from all over England, but not in the UK itself. I myself am of mainly German and Flemish descent, but I know many English people from the UK as well as those of English descent who live here in the USA. I've also learnt much from books and other media. Whats your point here "TharkunColl" ? 69.157.126.241 22:23, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Someone could argue that places like Goole, Crowle or if you want to push it Epworth and the Isle of Axholme do have some relation with the Dutch, but I really doubt local people really think this way anymore. Regards, E Asterion ^{u talking to me?} 23:28, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I think we should have the section. I think it the related groups box, we should have those that share similar cultural traits on the continent such as the Germans, Dutch, Danes, Swedes...etc...As I think histroy is an important part of current culture and like it or not they have a shared history with us. Their days of the week are another case in hand, all derive from the same Goddesses that were shared with all the other Germanic Pagan peoples and in this sense I mean the early English. They also are related by language. The Frisian language is the closest language to English, unless you count Scots as a language rather than a branch of English, either way the language is very close. Our Yule celebrations (as well as the word Yule > Jul) are also very similar to the Scandinavian and other Germanic peoples. Our folklore again is similar and derives from the same source, a lot of the time. In areas such as Northumbria the folkloric creatures still in many cases retain their old Germanic names (such as Dvargar for Dwarves or Dwarfs). And can anyone here say that folklore and folk customs are not important to a nations cultural identity and self view? Like it or not we are related to the continental nations and the Northern European ones even more so.The same goes for the other inhabitants of the British Isles, they share customs, language and traditions and also share a country (United Kingdom) so they are related. I don't see the problem with any of these groups being added. Not that it matters, I doubt this would change anyones minds. I just feel if this section is not re-added Wikipedia would lose another once of integrity. I'll speak more on each of these points later, when I am less busy! Sigurd Dragon Slayer

Whatever the history, the fact is that the modern English perceive all those Continentals as foreign and alien, in a way that the other peoples of the British Isles are not. Folklore is all very well, but it is massively less important that everyday life and language. TharkunColl 13:44, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Sigurd, I think you should pay attention to Zzuuzz and TharkunColl's comments above, they are relevant. We do need to define what is related and what is not. We can't include groups just because we are of the opinion that they are related. And as he says if we start to define what level of relatedness is acceptable, this would constiture original research. Alun 17:12, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I have paid attention, but have you to me? Only you can answer that. I do not believe this to be the case. As the unnamed user has said in the East and North of England many people do consider themselves related to the Dutch and Danes, sadly due to the wars it has become unpopular to consider yourself related to the Germans. But the fact still stands that most English people do consider us connected to various continental groups (that have been mentioned), as well as the other British peoples. I do think that we need to take into account culture, history and tradition to define who is a related group, and not just opinion's on who is foreign. I am not saying certain groups are related because it is my opinion, but it is both reading up on the subject and also first hand experience of people in the country, specifically the North, East and Centre of England (I do not visit the South much). Evidence for the fact that many in the UK consider themselves (at least culturally) related to the Danes and the European Continent, can be seen at York, where the inhabitants take great pride in their Viking (Danish) heritage. So we should have the related groups box, and not just a bias one with only the other British peoples, or for that matter continental peoples. Sigurd Dragon Slayer

Removing of the Related Ethnic Groups box

I think someone's behavior has been childish and uneccesary. There was no group in that box that were not mentioned as being connected to the English in the main article. The Scots and Welsh are connected obviously because they are from Great Britain and still share a large percentage of DNA with many in England. The Danes, Germans (in this case meaning North-Western Germans) and Frisians are mentioned as they are related to the Anglo-Saxons who are whether you like it or not the founders of the English nation and still are the largest percentage in the Gene Pool (that is Germanic Y Chromosome being strongest in Central, North and East England) and are thus genetically indistinguishable from these people. Their cultures are very connected due to shared history. So I shall put it back and nothing is unsourced and almost all the other Ethnic Groups have such a box! I will not let Wikipedia become a one opinion site! Sigurd Dragon Slayer

still are the largest percentage in the Gene Pool (that is Germanic Y Chromosome being strongest in Central, North and East England)

• This statement is based on a misunderstanding of the science, Y chromosomes only represent half of the population (men), Germanic Y chromosomes are only in a majority in certain parts of England (eastern-central england), and we do not know the contribution of Germanic women. Please check your sources. Also see A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles Alun 06:57, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

That sentence was not a misunderstanding. I should have said male, as you had probably guessed. Please do not be so pedantic. I know about this subject very well. I have even stated it's faults in another discussion...there are many!Sigurd Dragon Slayer

How can I possibly know your level of understanding? If you make a statement that is incorrect I will respond to that statement. You claim two things that are incorrect, firstly that Germanic Y chromosomes are the largest component in the (male) gene pool, this is not in fact correct. Y chromosome coverage in England is heterogeneous, with some areas of England having few if any representation of Germanic Y chromosomes. Germanic Y chromosomes only form a majority in certain areas, generally the areas settled by Guthrum the Old and his followers when the Danelaw was formed (so roughly East Anglia, up to and including Yorkshire). Most areas of England seem to have about a 50:50 split between indigenous and Germanic Y chromosome markers, with some areas having a very small representation (notably, and unsuprisingly Cornwall). See the Principal Components plot in this paper A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles Even in York, the place with the highest representation of Germanic Y chromosomes markers these represent only about 60%-70%, meaning a 30-40% indigenous male input, the indigenous female input into the gene pool may have been greater and may well mean that the total contribution of Germanic people to the local gene pool (in York) may have been substantially less than 50%. You also claim that because Germanic Y chromosomes represent greater than 50% of the Y chromosomes of England that this makes the English genetic makeup genetically indistinguishable from these people. This is clearly not true, there is about a 50% contribution to the English Y chromosome gene pool that is derived from indigenous people, it is therefore more accurate to state that the English gene pool is very much different from the Danish/North German gene pool. The English gene pool is derived from an admixture of these two groups (indigenous and Germanic) at best. I do not know of any study that claims that the English Y chromosome gene pool is exclusively of North German/Danish origin, or that it is indistinguishable from it (and the only way it could be indistinguishable from it is if it was entirely of Germanic origin). This is either a deliberate distortion of the data or another misunderstanding of the science involved. I also urge you to look at this paper Evidence for an apartheid-like social structure in early Anglo-Saxon England, which also claims about a 50:50 split for indigenous and Germanic Y chromosomes (they quote a median continental ingression into England of 24.4-72.5%, with a mean of 54.1%). Indeed the evidence as it stands indicates that English people are equally the descendants of indigenous people as they are the descendants of any possible invading peoples, just as the article currently states. Alun 12:04, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Ah, but there are those that do indeed say that the Y Chromosome is predominately of Frisian, Danish or North German stock. And there are many in the acedmic world who claim that the modern English are not equally descendants from both indigenous and settling peoples, such as those that suggest Offa's Dyke was a genetic barrier for instance. I personally believe that everyone in England has both British and Germanic blood, but that doesn't mean everyone would agree with me. It is the haplotype frequencies are indistinguishable. I urge you to read this one http://mbe.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/full/19/7/1008 which in my mind is the best even if it is small in scope. Also again I will say this so everyone understands it, testing the Y Chromosome only reveals one thing, it reveals what your father's Y Chromosome was, so it will say either Germanic or British...etc...when you are in fact mixed British/Germanic...etc...you have thousands of ancestors and only one is being tested. Sigurd Dragon Slayer

Ah, but there are those that do indeed say that the Y Chromosome is predominately of Frisian, Danish or North German stock. I don't understand what this is supposed to mean. There are assumed indigenous Y chromosomes (similar to Irish and Basque) and there are assumed Germanic Y chromosomes (similar to Frisian or Danish/North German, depending on the study). The most recent data seem to indicate that there is about a 50:50 split between indigenous and Germanic Y chromosomes in England as a whole, both A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles and Evidence for an apartheid-like social structure in early Anglo-Saxon England give similar figures. The paper that claims Offa's Dyke was a genetic barrier is in fact claiming that no Germanic Y chromosomes entered Wales, leaving the Welsh relatively free from any Germanic Y chromosomes. It makes no comment about the extent of indigenous Y chromosomes in England. The paper you link to, Y Chromosome Evidence for Anglo-Saxon Mass Migration (it is the same paper) is well known to me. It describes a computer model designed to simulate the extent of immigration necessary in a single event that would produce the level of Germanic Y chromosomes seen in their samples. Their samples are not representative of the whole of England, as the area they sampled from was East Anglia and Central England, an area subsequently shown to be unrepresentative of England and to have a greater than average proportion of Germanic Y chromosomes. the area is also a problem area because their data are contaminated by Danish-Viking Y chromosomes that are indistinguishable from Anglo-Saxon Y chromosomes, which they thought they were studying. If you actually read A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles you would know this. The paper Y Chromosome Evidence for Anglo-Saxon Mass Migration states that there was an immigration event affecting 50%–100% of the Central English male gene pool and also notes that our data do not allow us to distinguish an event that simply added to the indigenous Central English male gene pool from one where indigenous males were displaced elsewhere or one where indigenous males were reduced in number. This fits in well with the A Y Chromosome Census of the British Isles paper's estimate of about a 60% non-indigenous (ie Anglo-Saxon and Danish-Viking) contribution for York and Norfolk. Indeed this paper states that their results provide significant evidence that there has not been complete population replacement anywhere in the British Isles. You really don't seem to understand this work at all. I do not need to have the significance of Y chromosomes explained to me, I have a BSc in Genetics and am perfectly au fait with the concept of hereditary and how it relates to genetics. I fear it is you who are hopelessly confused by this work. Alun 13:24, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Anyway irrespective of what the Germanic contribution is to the moder English gene pool, this does not really have any bearing on relatedness to English ethnicity does it? We need to understand how English people identify rather than relying on what genetic research tells us, genetic evidence is not proof of how a population identify themselves and how their group is related to other groups. Here's a nice piece on English Civic Nationalism from the Campaign for an English Parliament that raises some good points about Englishness, though I'm not sure how relevant it is. Detail about genetic analysis and descent should be included in the body of the article where it can be commented on thoroghly Alun 05:26, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

No, I agree with you. We are related to the Danes, Frisians, Swedes and also the other British ethnicities, through cultural ties, traditions, and our own views. Sigurd Dragon Slayer

So we need a citation that specifically states that Englis people generally see themselves as related to Danes and Frisians (I think the Swedes thing is just nonsense). Alun 13:24, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

The box was removed because there is no verification for the information contained therein. What we need is a citation that states specifically what ethnic groups are related to the English. As far as I can see it's really a matter of opinion and extent. Nevertheless without proper verification the information is subject to removal at any time. Being connectied to the English does not necessarily constitute being a related ethnic group. I urge you to read the talk page before you unilaterally make these changes. You will observe that the majority of people on this page do not support the inclusion of the related ethnic group box. Please start new discussions at the end of the current talk page. Alun 12:14, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

I think the majority of people on this discussion page only wish that the related ethnic group box be defined in what it entails, not permanently removed. 69.157.126.241 22:18, 19 August 2006 (UTC)

Nope, I disagree. Having been here for as long as I have, I think that the opposite is true. Enzedbrit 01:40, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

69.157.126.241, have you actually read the RfC above, your comment indicates that you have not. We cannot define it as this would entail original research, this is against policy. I am currently of the opinion that we should include all groups for which we can find a citation. Citations must be specifically about ethnicity, not about the editors interpretation of ethnicity. One cannot claim for example that just because there are linguistic similarities between two groups that this proves a related ethnicity, neither can one say this for biological relatedness. We need to find a reference that is specifically about how these groups identify their ethnically or nationally relative to other groups. I am becoming sceptical that English people can even be considered a single ethnic group rather than a nation, England is very diverse internally, and it certainly developed from several different related ethnic groups that were originally seperate nations. this work states of ethnic groups that, unlike nations "common myths and historical memories" may be much more plausible; since ethnic groups may be much smaller than modern nations, the often quite implausible myths of common descent that modern nations espouse (and that may have been created or radically adapted by modern propagandists) can have much more credible equivalents in the case of ethnic groups. For example all the talk of a Frisian relationship with English people may only apply to certain places in England in the east. I do not believe there is any evidence that the original kingdoms of the Heptarchy would have viewed themselves as a single ethnic group, possibly they would have percieved each other as related ethnic groups but not a single entity. The chapter from the book is very good and I will aquire a copy of the book from amazon [21] because I think it may well have some usefull information. Alun 04:51, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

If the English of the heptarchy did not consider themselves part of the same "ethnic group", then Bede would never have entitled his book A History of the English Church and People. TharkunColl 13:45, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

But wasn't that partly Bede's purpose? To promote the view that the peoples of England were one nation, didn't he even introduced creation myths for the various peoples of Great Britain in order to promote the idea of a kinship? Whatever the bonds between the various English peoples were in the Heptarchy, they had different names for themselves and each other, so one must assume they recognised each other as different in some way. All I'm saying is that I'm getting more sceptical, it's probably impossible to know just how these very early Angles, Saxons, Jutes et al. identified with each other, I'm certainly not trying to define them. It is also the case that England was not unified untill the Battle of Brunanburh in 937, and even subsequent to that there were ethnic groups in England that were not considered English. As late as 1003 Danish settlers were not considered English as this is when Aethelraed II ordered the St. Brice's Day massacre. A bit later it seems that the English were the English and the idea of being Anglo-Danish seems to disappear. Maybe this was something to do with the Danish Kings in the eleventh century, maybe it was to do with the oppression of the Normans who as foreign conquerors just saw the English as one nation to be oppressed. I don't know, but I don't think we can consider the English of the Anglo-Saxon period to be equivalent to the English of the world as it is today. But then I think you agree with me on this don't you TharkunColl? Alun 05:15, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

Areas of agreement

To try and build consensus let's start with the areas we all agree on. This is as I see it, if I misinterpret an editors opinion or position then I appologise, it is not my intention.

• English people are most closely related to insular people, with a less close relatedness to certain groups on the continent (Frisians, Danes etc.) and an even more dilute relatedness to other European groups (French-Norman and/or Franks etc). English people are also related to all western European groups, but this is close only in the sense that Europeans are all more closely related to each other than they are to peoples from other continents, for example. I'd put it like this:
• Insular (most related first)
  • Cornish
  • Welsh and Scots (including Ulster Scots)
  • Irish, Manx
• Continental (in no particular order)
  • Bretons
  • Danes
  • Frisians
  • North Germans?

This is just my perception, I am under no illusions that this is a definitive list, I may have left some groups out, and others may dispute the order, or what constitutes a group, I am open to this being refined/changed. Alun 06:57, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

• Should we include continental people?
  • Personally I am not strongly for or against. I have argued that because it is accepted by everyone that insular people are the most closely related people to English people, so their inclusion is a given (see below). Inclusion of continental groups is not so well accepted, some people are strongly in favour, some strongly against. Mostly this appears to be a question of degree of relatedness and opinion. Some argue that only the most closely related should be included, others that the closest continental groups should be included. These arguments are all based on the personal feelings of the individual editors. There are advantages and disadvantages in both sides of the dispute. The best argument as far as I can see is that we need to include how moder English people in the world today identify themselves. Theoretical origins and or linguistic evidence is not sufficient, it is the percieved identity of the nation/ethnic group as it stands today that is important. We can go into details about the various theories of descent/origins etc in the main body of the article, where thay can be properly refined and addressed, with the various POVs given in detail.Alun 06:57, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

• Verifiability
  • While I have argued for the inclusion of only the insular groups, I have felt uncomfortable doing this. I think that verifiability is essential, indeed the policy states this, otherwise wikipedia becomes little more than just a collection of personal opinions, no better than a chatroom or blog. I strongly disagree with the comment made by Sigurd if this section is not re-added Wikipedia would lose another once of integrity, indeed what detracts from the integrity of wikipedia is a lack of proper authority due to a lack of verifiability from reliable sources. So I propose that if we want to include any group in this related ethnic groups section, then we need to find a source that categorically states that this group is ethnically related to the English people. I don't think this is much to ask, it is wikipedia policy, plain and simple. I would point out that if such verifiability can be found then it is against wikipedia rules to remove a properly verified edit. Remember we need a source that is concerned with ethnicity, not one concerned with descent or percieved origin, but one that clearly indicates how English people consider their group relative to other groups. Alun 06:57, 20 August 2006 (UTC)

Religion

I thought this article was about the people of English people of England. The religion section does not make sense because it is including none English people like Pakistani/Indian who are Muslim, and Indian Sikhs and Hindus. Related ethnic groups look better than a religion section that includes people other than english.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.150.149.183 (talk)

I agree. This article is about the English ethnic group, rather than people who live in England. I'm rather surprised to see those religion figures there. Although they can be clearly referenced to the population of England, they cannot be related to those who identify as English. We hardly even know how many people identify as English, nevermind their religion. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 20:15, 23 August 2006 (UTC)

There are plenty of people of Pakistani/Indian/West Indian origin that identify as English. There are many people that identify as English that are Muslims, Sikhs, Hindus and Buddhists. The data were presented as proportions, not numbers of people and they can be verified. Why was the previous version any better, it was not based on any measure of ethnicity and religion? If you want to be finickety about it then we might as well remove the whole infobox. None of the figures in the infobax is anything but a guess. I could equally argue that the figures for English people in the USA and Australia are for people of English descent, and not for people that identify as belonging to the English ethnic group and so these figures are wrong. If your argument is that non-white English people cannot be ethnically English then I would suggest you depart forthwith from this page and don't come back, ever. Alun 02:55, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Charming. Whilst I completely agree that non-white people can be English, these figures relate specifically to the population of England. They include people (10%) who identify solely as belonging to another ethnic group. If this article is now about the population of England, rather than people of English ancestry or ethnicity, then let's be clear about that. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 09:22, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

The figures are proportions, not absolute figures, 10% for the entire population of England may identify as belonging to a different ethnic group, how do you know that the proportions for religious belief are different between those that identify as English and those that just live in England? Even the figures given for the population of English people living in the UK are wrong, as they only count white people as English (see the footnote). This even excludes people who are of indigenous English descent, who identify as English but who may also have descent from non white backgrounds, it also excludes people that identify as English that aren't descended from indigenous people, so effectively this measure is not ethnicity but race. The data given for religion are far from perfect, I grant, but are no less biased than any of the other data presented in the infobox, and at least their origin is clear. While it is difficult to determine the extent of English identity within immigrant groups and their descendants, I would guess (from personal experience) that the vast majority of the descendants of immigrants identify as English even if their parents/grandparents do not. I did not wish to cause offence, my comment was only aimed at those people who are conflating race with ethnicity, as you have stated that you don't, it was not directed at you, nonetheless I appologise if it offended you. Alun 10:24, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

I am questioning the statistics used here on religion since they are not really needed. They are only statistics on English people in the UK, and therefore ignoring millions of Englsh people around the globe, so they dont speak for all English people. More importantly, the numbers include many people in the UK who would not identify as being English. Epf 02:47, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Um, actually no numbers of people are given, so how can they include people who do not identify as English they do not include any people at all. Come on Epf, I thought you were a scientist, even 12 year olds know the difference between absolutes figures and ratios. If you are trying to imply that no English people are Jews, Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs or Buddhists then that is demonstrably nonsense. The figures given are proportions, if you dispute the ratios given then that's fair enough, the ratios given are based on those derived from the UK census, this is clear in the footnote. As long as it's clear what the figures relate to then I see no real problem, it's not like we're trying to hide their origin. Can you produce any other figures? There may be a higher proportion of Muslim and Hindu English people, as there is probably a significant number of English people outside of the UK that follow these religions, probably in India and Pakistan. The majority of English people are probably non-religious anyway. Maybe the best thing to do would be just to give the major religions practiced by English people leaving any figures out. I must admit I do not like the infobox at all, nearly all of the data there are somewhat suspect. All of the data relating to numbers of English people in various countries around the world are suspicious, mostly they refer to descent and not to ethnicity at all. Even the figures for the UK are rubbish. I think the most reliable figures are for Canada and New Zealand, because at least they refer specificallt to ethnicity in their census forms. Maybe we should rethink all of the data in the box, what do you think? Alun 05:07, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

• First of all, whether or not I am a scientist (Im currently a fourth-year student, doing one of my majors in anthropology) does not necessarily mean I have or have not any more knowledge on a certain subject than someone else (the whole concept of Wikipedia is that anyone can edit right? so just because one has a degree or a certain profession, does not necessarily mean one is "more correct" or knowledgable on certain subjects than others). From what I read previously, there were religious percentages which were based on UK citizens in the UK only (and including those in the UK who aren't English), so how can they speak for all English people (especially outside the UK) ? Also, the numbers from both Canada ("ethnic origin") and New Zealand do refer in part to culture as well as descent. What do you think the main criteria for ethnicity is Alun ? Descent is one of the main pillars in defining ethnicity along with the shared traits generally associated with such. Most of the numbers in the box are referenced so there isnt much you can argue against, except with the numbers of English people in England since its only referring to those who identified as "White British" (with only one choice) under ethnicity in the UK census and this obviously isnt very accurate since it includes many of "white people" (itself an ambiguous term) in the UK who are not English. Anyways, the format for religions now is fine since there arent any specific numbers, ratios, percentages, etc. As for the rest of the data in the infobox, maybe it does need a rethink, but I personally don't have the time right now. Once I'm back at school, I should be on here more. Ciao, Epf 19:25, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

The previous figures for religion were calculated based on people resident in England, far from perfect, whether they reflected similar proportions for English people is unknowable. It was probably an error of judgment on my part to include them. I think removing the figures but keeping the religions is a much better way of doing it. I never asserted you had more or less knowledge of any subject, I merely claimed that a ratio is not the same as an absolute number, so it makes no sense to claim that the ratios represented 10% of people who are not English, they represented proportions of people practicing certain religions in England, they never claimed to speak for all English people, and the footnote made this clear. In answer to your question I think there are many criteria for ethnic identity, one of these is descent, but it is not the only one and you know this very well, descent alone is only relevant to race. Indeed one may be able to show that people from the same ethnic group are generally more closely biologically related to each other than to people from other ethnic groups, but this biological relatedness is not the main criterion for defining an ethnic group, it ia a criterion, It is a consequence of a group of people seeing themselves as distinct from other groups over a period of time. Because individuals see others within their group as like and other groups as different, they are more likely to reproduce within their own group, over time leading to a certain biological homogeneity within the group, so it's an effect and not a cause. Be that as it may, defining oneself as of English descent is not the same as defining oneself as English, for example someone with a single English parent/grandparent/great-grandparent/great-great-grandparent (etc.), who has no concept of English society or culture and who may not even be able to speak the language, is still of English descent and would have the right to claim such on a census form, biology is not ethnicity, and descent does not necessarily imply close relatedness. From one point of view there is no problem with the data in the infobox, they are all verified, from another perspective the data are a heterogeneous mix, all derived using wildly differing sampling techniques, they are not really presenting like with like. I am wondering if one way to tackle this might be to think along the lines of jusst listing the countries with significant populations without actually trying to put a figure on the population, as we have done with religions. It's good to have you back Epf, hope you had a brilliant Summer. Alun 20:38, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks Alun and I did have quite a good summer. I'm glad we came to a consensus on religion but theres still a disagreeance on our views towards the importance of descent in ethnicity. The classical (and most commonly accepted) definition of an ethnic group would in fact include descent as one of the main prerequsities in defining an ethnic group. You also seem to misunderstand partially how descent is related to the ethnic identity and distinction. It is hardly seen as a "consequence" of a group seeing themselves distinct from others over time and descent isnt merely attributed to race or inherited biological characteristics since many other socio-cultural traits are associated with kinship and descent. In fact, it is highly debated right now as to the origins of the kinship and descent system and as to how it actually developed in terms of distinguishing ethnic identity. The geographic, biological and familial closeness of a group itself is known to lead to certain socio-cultural traits developing within a group and in turn further distinguishing it from others. I do admit however that many believe it could also be developed vice-versa in the sense that the cultural associations of a group in close geographic proximity in turn lead to common descent. It is difficult to say which is more responsible in the formation of groups, but we can say with the utmost conifdence that in either case, descent is an integral part of ethnic identification. Now, obviously someone with very limited English descent who has no ties to English culture would be quite rare in saying the person is "ethnically English", but you still must realize the importance of descent in ethnicity. I need to stress here that biological traits resultant of common descent are obviously part of ethnic identification, but they are not the only traits resulting from common descent. As I have explained earlier, the closeness and isolation of groups also allows for socio-cultural traits to develop and in turn these can also be passed down (socially "inherited") to varying degrees (i.e. depending ones geo-cultural location) ranging from behavioural/personality, cultural, lingustic, religious, and other familial traits and traditions. Obviously many of socio-cultural traits can also be learned from residing in a society without being of that cultures descent, but some (behavioural) can't or at least aren't leanred in such away that often. Therefore, a person living outside of English society with very little or no identified English descent could hardly be described as part of the English ethnic group, but in turn the same could be said about a person living in England who is of no English descent (and therefore has some degree of ethno-cultural traits not shared with ethnic English people). As for the information in the ethnic group box, I think we should leave the numbers and information as is since as you say they are referenced, albeit from different sampling techniques and sources. We could possibly do the same as we did with religion, but I would personally say to leave it as is right now since it is in line with figures for all the other ethnic group articles. Good to be discussing with you again Alun, but I wont be on here regularly for another two weeks or so. Ciao, Epf 17:05, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

From what I've been reading recently it seems to me that the importance of descent with regard to ethnic identity is largelly dependent on the group in question. For example in Germany it seems quite important to be able to show some sort of German pedigree to be accepted as German. Some German language dialects are mutually incomprehensibe and could be considered different languages, but because of the percieved ethnic closeness of the speakers they are considered the same language. On the other hand Serbs and Croats are biologically identical and have mutually comprehensble languages, but certainly view each other as different ethnic groups, as far as I can tell on the basis of religion. They deliberately try to exagerate the small differences (probably because they are small) by the use of the Latin alphabet in Croatia and the Cyrillic one in Serbia and by classifying Serbian and Croatian as seperate languages, though untill recently it was considered the same language Serbo-Croat. Sometimes it is not religion or descent but language that is the defining elememt in ethnic identity. I've ordered a couple of books from amazon (handy for me here in Finland to get stuff from amazon.co.uk) Language and Nationalism in Europe and The Origins of the English in the hope that they can provide some citable material, especially with regard to the related ethnic groups section. I'd like to be able to include some groups here and I think any groups that we can provide a citation for should go in. I may be well off the mark here, but it also seems to me that people living in the New World seem to identify descent closely with ethnicity, for example the famous Irish Americans who seem often to be third, fourth or even fifth generation Americans, but still identify strongly as Irish. I don't think this is so strong in Europe, it certainly isn't so strong in the UK where many people probably don't even know where their grandparents parents came from, I think we tend to identify with where we grow up. Whatever the truth I don't think there is an universal formula for ethnic identity, it seems quite nuanced and depends on different components within each group or community. Groups certainly can split away from a parental ethnicity to form a de Novo group, and ethnic groups can merge, up untill the 11th century Danes in the Danelaw certainly weren't considered English, but today I don't think anyone indigenous English person would identify as ethnically Danish (unless of course their descent is much more recent), so the Danes in England have adopted an English identity, as have other groups. Conversely the Danes in the Danelaw must have given up their Danish identity to become English. England's a complicated place, and the UK more so. Irrespective of our different point of view regarding this, I think we can certainly include both perspectives in the article and come to agreement. Alun 05:31, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

• As with regards to the New Zealand census (I just noticed your edit there), that is the opinion of their census bureau to consider ethnicity merely as "cultural affiliation" that allows for only one current possibility (I find this astounding, especially in a multi-cultural and multi-ethnic country like NZ). This is not only inaccurate, but the question for the 1991 and 2001 censuses were not much different from the 1996 census except that only certain selections were allowed (i.e. in 1991/2001, "New Zealand European" without further specific identifications compared to "other European" with further specifications in 1996) and you could only mark down your ethnicity once in contrast to the 1996 census as well as the ethnic origins and "ancestry" questions regulary used by the Australian, US and Canadian censuses which allow for multiple repsonses (usually 2-4 total). Epf 17:23, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes I see your point. My understanding is that even on the 1991 and 2001 censuses respondents could choose multiple ethnicities, but that in 1996 it was clearer that this was the case. I agree that this is a strange way to collect data, it is preferable to allow people to identify with all of the groups for which they have an affinity. On the other hand we should probably accept the data that the NZ state uses, like we do for other census data from other countries. Alun 05:38, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

Elizabeth Tudor

I wonder why we have Elizabeth Tudor in the picture. Surely her grandad was Henry Tudor, who was Welsh (descended from Owain Tudur). Tudur was a family name for a Welsh noble family. Shouldn't we have people who are more English, and monarchs aren't really representative of ethnically English people, unless we go to before 1066 (so Alfred the Great might be better?). Why not some contemporary English people? And why not representatives from sports? W. G. Grace or even David Beckham spring to mind. Why Newton and Darwin? Do we need two scientists? I'd go for Darwin, but I'm biased as I'm a biologist. There should probably be a Prime Minister there, even the Milk Snatcher would do, and she's very recognisable. Any takers? Alun 17:57, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Elizabeth's mother was English. Her father's mother was English. She was at best therefore only a quarter Welsh, and probably much less than that. She was born and brought up in England, and identified her own nationality as English - very strongly in fact: "I may have the body of a..." (etc.). She is also a crucial figure in English history, turning it from a bankrupt backwater into a European power. Her reign witnessed a cultural flowering of English literature. In short, she was one of the most important monarchs that England has ever had. TharkunColl 20:03, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Fair enough, but I wouldn't include any monarch, why not stick to English people of renown in their own right. No monarch can be considered representative of English people in general, they are only notable for their birth and not for their achievements. I admit this is my personal bias, I don't like monarchy at all and this page is not about them, it's supposed to be about normal people, the nation. Alun 05:11, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

I think Elizabeth I is definitely one of the most significant Englishwomen in history, and I think it's good to include at least one woman. Her achievements match those of any king: she helped save England from becomming a vassal state by repelling the Spanish Armada and implemented a religious settlement which is the basis for the modern Church of England. She is one of the most significant English people in history. I think her picture should stay--Johnbull 05:40, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

She was also a murderous dictator. What she did for the state does not correlate with what she did for the people. Her policy of stealing common land by enclosing it was hardly beneficial to the people, neither were her poor laws (needed largely as a result of her land enclosure). If we want a woman to be represented then it doesn't have to be a despot, though another despot springs to mind, Margaret Thatcher, I may have no time for the woman, but at least she was elected and got to be PM by her own achievements. I really don't think we need to have monarchs portrayed, they are not representative of the English nation. This is about the English people, it is not about monarchs or history. I would suggest William Shakespere, Charles Darwin, Margaret Thatcher and Nasser Hussain, that way we have a broad stretch of history, we include a woman and show the diversity of modern English people, we also have contemporary representation. In addition to these we also include a politician, a scientist, a writer and a sportsperson, and so have a varied representation of disciplines as well. I would be happy to include a footballer instead of a cricketer, and a different scientist, Isambard Kingdom Brunel or Isaac Newton for example. Alun 06:05, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Even if she was as bad as you say, she still deserves to go in, simply because of her fame. Does the box include people for their goodness, or just for their fame and influence? For the same reason the exclusion of Hitler from the German box is disingenuous at best, for he is surely the most famous German who has ever lived (yeah, I know he was born in Austria, blah, blah... actually, to be honest, I haven't even checked, but I'm willing to bet that he's not included in the German photo montage). In fact, though she was certainly responsible for some bad things, Elizabeth was very much a person of her time, and there is no way she can be portrayed in a wholly negative fashion - quite the opposite I think. Your suggestion that people be included only if they have achieved fame though their own efforts and not by a privileged birth does indeed have merit, but unfortunately we'd end up with a very limited selection, because the vast majority of famous people from history have been either aristocrats or those from wealthy backgrounds. Would Darwin have been so influential had he been born to a Yorkshire coal mining family? To single out monarchs as too privileged to count is to draw an arbitrary line. In fact, most monarchs of England have been neither English, nor in any way distinguished, and Elizabeth is one of the few who was both, and being a woman makes her an even better choice. TharkunColl 08:51, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually my point was more that they are not really representative of the English people. I don't think monarchs should be included because we always have one, their notability is mainly because they are so unrepresentative of the population. This article is not about them, or the aristocracy, it's about the people. The fact that she is a woman is irrelevant, there are many notable English women that could be included, from all sorts of backgrounds. There are a plethora of excellent English female novelists from the 19th century for a start. I do agree women should be represented, on relfection I think there should be two men and two women. Rosalind Franklin springs to mind, but then I've been doing a lot of work on her article so she would. Surely we can come up with better people than monarchs? Is the old class system and biased school history so firmly entrenched that we can can't see these people for what they were? Not representatives of English people, but repressors of English people. Alun 10:15, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

I should point out that this is my opinion, if the general feeling is that the present people are OK, then I'm happy to go with them. I was speculating that we could get better and more representative people there, that's all. Of the current crop, I don't like Elizabeth Tudor, the rest are fine, though I don't see why we have two scientists, maybe we could replace one of the scientists with a more contemporary woman, possibly a sportsperson like Kelly Holmes, she's an Olympic gold medalist and an English person? What do you think? Alun 10:45, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

Troubling

This entire article is troubling. Of the millions of people you designate as "English" in Canada and indeed, around the world, many, if not most, trace their origins to a mix of celtic and anglo/saxon roots. Few would classify themselves as "English" accept as a referent to the language they speak. Most Canadians who would trace their entire ancestral line to the UK would probably find celtic branches and few would find entirely "English" branches as you imply in this article. This article needs to be modified or deleted, because defining "English" as a cultural designation of people outside the UK who trace their ancestral lines back to the UK is not justified. Most of those people are, at the very least, anglosaxoncelts, and they trace their lines back to a mix of England, Scotland, Wales, and Ireland.— Preceding unsigned comment added by Ldjenks (talk • contribs)

In fact, most people ticked boxes on the census in their country indicating English ethnic origins or ancestry. The census organisations then reported the fact that these people described their ethnic origins or ancestry as English. We have reported those facts. You can check the references yourself. -- zzuuzz ^(talk) 17:34, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

In the article only people that have self identified as English are designated as such, ethnicity is about identity, it is not necessarily about descent, nowhere does it claim that all people descended from English people are themselves automatically ethnically English. It is also apparent that a person can identify as English and Welsh and Scots and Irish all at the same time, just because a person identifies as English it does not preclude them from identifying with other ethnic groups, ethnicity is not by necessity exclusive. The article nowhere claims that all people who can show descent from the UK are classified as English, you may want the article to state this because it supports your POV, but you are mistaken. I do not understand what you mean by a mixture of celtic and anglo/saxon roots, Celtic is a linguistic classification, the Anglo-Saxons formed a cohesive ethnic and political group that ceased to exist about a millenium ago when people started to think of themselves as English. Anglo-Saxons would not have included the Danes in England (mainly in the Danelaw), but the English did include these Danes. All indigenous English people and their descendants are also almost certainly descended from the pre-Anglo-Saxon Brythonic inhabitants of Great Britain as well as immigrating Anglo-Saxons, in that sense all of the peoples of Great Britain are descended from the pre-Roman Brythonic speaking populations of Great Britain (depending on how one classifies Pictish). The designation anglosaxoncelts doesn't make sense, what is it supposed to mean? Alun 17:50, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I have a whole lot of books in my home library that state very clearly that the "Celts" are indeed living and well all over the world. The books talk exclulsively about the "celtic" culture as it exists today. My son plays and composes 'celtic' music. You can buy 'celtic' table cloths, art work, etc. all over North America. "Celtic" rock bands are very popular in North America. And yet you say "Celtic iAlun 07:39, 4 September 2006 (UTC)s a linguistic classification". I beg to differ, because as an anglosaxoncelt, I only speak English. I'm afraid that English is more the linguistic definition, not "celt", and that is where this whole article is flawed. I am sorry for not signing. I don't know how to do that, but I certainly believe you should go over to google and google up anglosaxoncelt. It's seen increasingly on discussion boards such as BBC, and even more authoritative sources are starting to use it.Ldjenks 19:11, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

I just Googled "anglosaxoncelt" and there were fully four independent pages that mentioned it - all of which, moreover, were people's user names. This is not a term in widespread use, or indeed any sort of use at all. But, having said that, it's not actually a bad term to describe the genetic make-up of the English themselves - if we can allow ourselves to use the word "Celt" in a rather loose and inaccurate sense to refer to Celtic-speakers in general and those descended from them. If so, then "anglosaxoncelts" are precisely what the English are. TharkunColl 07:55, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

A more correct term is Anglo-Celtic, it is in far more widespread usage, though still only minority usage. See Anglo-Celtic.org.uk Alun 17:31, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Welcome to wikipedia, you will find that a lot of people will disagree with you on this and many other talk pages, mostly people are civil during these discussions, sometimes they are not, but there's a rule Don't bite the newbies, if you feel that you are being bullied then please point out that you are a newbie and that peple should make allowances for that. I hope you stay and make many contributions here. Here on wikipedia discussion boards are not considered reliable sources. We are trying to build an encyclopaedia so we need authoritative sources. We also need to verify our edits and we need to include all points of view, we cannot include original research. Your point of view regarding this anglo-saxon-celt thing can and should be included if you can cite an authoritative source, but be aware that the alternative point of view should also be included in the article, we are not in the buisiness of giving only one point of view or opinion. The idea of the Celts forming a homogeneous culture is a very modern one, your Celtic music and Celtic art would have been incomprehensible to the Brythonic/Goidelic speaking peoples of ancient times. There is Welsh, Scots and Irish folk music, to group these under a Celtic supra-group is somewhat artificial. There is a growing consensus in the archaeological community that the Celts are a relatively modern invention. The term Celt is defined by the OED as:

1. Applied to the ancient peoples of Western Europe, called by the Greeks κελτοι, and by the Romans Celtæ
2. A general name applied in modern times to peoples speaking languages akin to those of the ancient Galli, including the Bretons in France, the Cornish, Welsh, Irish, Manx, and Gaelic of the British Isles.

So in the modern world it is a linguistic classification, in the ancient world it was used by Greeks and Romans to refer to people in Europe that they considered as foreign barbarians, there is no evidence that these foreign barbarians had a homogeneous culture. You claim that it is artificial for people from North America to consider themselves English, how more artificial is it for them to construct and identify with a Celtic culture that has never existed. Modern Celtic identity does exist, but it is more like a way for minority European cultures to support each other both politically and culturally, that these Celtic cultures form some sort of homogeneous cultural group is disputed, there is much diversity amongst these groups, though they speak related languages. You seem to be under the impression that somehow ancient people identified is the same as modern people, well ancient people had no concept of what being a Celt was, and certainly wouldn't have identified as such. The idea of Irish and Welsh and Scots people all forming some sort of unified cultural group that is opposed to the English cultural group is just a form of modern nationalism, Scots and Welsh and Irish don't have more in common with each other culturally than they do say with the English. I urge you to read Simon James's excellent Ancient Celts Page where he dispells some of the ideas about a pan-European Celtic group. Alun 05:45, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

To quote Simon James himself "Nonetheless, this does not mean that the idea of modern Celtic identity is significantly more 'fraudulent' or unreal than any other - such as English, French, German, or indeed 'British' in the modern political sense. The latter is no older than modern 'Celtic' identity; both were creations of the 18th century." Rhion 07:25, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

No one is claiming modern Celtic identity is fraudelent, but it needs to be addressed it it's correct context, and not in the context of ancient civilisations. We recognise an affinity as much based on our minority status and (rightly or wrongly) percieved injustices to our respective languages and cultures as on anything else. It does confuse the issue when the term Celtic is used in different contexts to mean different things, but it's certainly not race and it's certainly not a homogeneous culture. Welsh culture is very different to Irish and Scottish culture and I do get the impression that sometimes there are attempts to shoehorn everything into a Celtic identity that just doesn't really exist, for the specific purpose of opposing it to English culture for anti-English or nationalistic purposes. Alun 07:54, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

None of the article is troubling, and you are pushing an anglophobic POV. You are suggesting that "celts" are a pure breed, and English people are "mongrels" and are not legitimate which is obviously totally flawed. Actually, you are suggesting English people don't even exist. Just to point out though, that is is disputed how many, if any "celts" made in to Britain. Vinneyt6 21:30, 30 August 2006 (UTC)

Ok, as I said under the deletion discussion board, both anglo/saxon and celtic, exist in modern Websters to denote cultural groups. Remember, Websters is used extensively in North America, which likely has millions more descendents from the UK and Ireland than what currently inhabit the UK and Ireland. I am concerned that most of the discussion here is central to Europe.....Hello....the rest of the world is out there too. In any event, as I stated on another board, we decendants of colonists have truly mixed Celtic names like Mac...Mc... with anglo/saxon names are common in our lineage, perhaps not so common in the UK, but very much so elsewhere in the world. We are neither "English people" or pure Celts, but a mixture of what we in North America call anglo/saxon and celt. And yes, anglo/saxon is a commonly used term throughout North America. That's why it's in Websters folks. So, if "English people" is all that is acceptable for the people of the UK, fine, but it's not the best nor only acceptable term for the rest of us in the world, especially we descendants of colonists. And I can't believe the discussion of 'celts' not being a distinct cultural group, which by your own wikipedia definition, includes 'kinship'. Believe me, Celtic kinship is seeing explosive growth in North America. There are Celtic festivals all over the place, and Celtic rock music is popular. Those who try to dismiss 'celts' as a cultural group are expressing views that seem to be politically motivated. Ldjenks 01:11, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• Those who try to dismiss 'celts' as a cultural group are expressing views that seem to be politically motivated.

This is possibly the most hypocritical thing I have ever seen posted on a wikipedia talk page, and I've seen a bit. Who has dismissed Celts as a cultural group? In fact Celts are not a cultural group, they are a collection of several cultural groups that have different languages and traditions, that may or may not be ethnically related, some clearly are related, such as the Brettons, Cornish and Welsh, but the link between the Brythonic and Goidelic groups is far less obvious. It is hardly a dismissal to claim that these are cultural identities, culture is the thing that binds members of a group together, it's how we identify like with like, it's about the most important thing any group of people that identify with each other can share in common. Without a common culture a group fails to be anything other than a collection of strangers, with no common identity or framework to bind them. It is your insistence that there is no such thing as an English culture that is both offensive and racist. You seem to be under the delusion that somehow genetics is more important than cultural affiliation.

• Celtic rock music?

I've never heared such bollocks, if there is such a thing then it's by people like Gorky's Zygotic Mynci, Gruff Rhys, Catatonia, Tebot Piws, Meic Stevens, who actually are from a celtic country and many of who actually sing in Welsh, a Celtic language, ever heared of them? Alun 05:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• with anglo/saxon names are common in our lineage

I'd like to know which Anglo-Saxon names are common, most Anglo-Saxon names have not been used for a thousand years, a few have survived, like Edward, Edwin and Alfred, but I haven't seen any Æthelflæds or Wulfstans recently, take a look at some proper Anglo-Saxon names in these articles List of monarchs of Mercia, List of monarchs of Wessex, List of monarchs of Northumbria. Alun 05:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• We are neither "English people" or pure Celts

What the fuck is a pure Celt? This is just racist bollocks. The Iron Age peoples of Europe were descended from a mixture of the paleolithic hunter gatherer peoples that populated Europe after the end of the last major glaciation (about 9000 years ago) and an incomming neolithic population that brought agriculture and came from the Near East. No Europeans are of any pure origin (whatever that's supposed to mean), and a good thing too, the larger and more diverse a gene pool is, the healthier the population is, any geneticist will tell you that inbreeding is a bad thing. So in fact both indigenous Brythonic people and immigrating Anglo-Saxon people are descended from the same two populations, paleolithic and neolithic. Celts and Anglo-Saxons have the same origins. See Estimating the Impact of Prehistoric Admixture on the Genome of Europeans. Alun 05:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Ld, you obviously don't have even the semblence of a basic knowledge of the subject you are talking about, you seem to be saying that English people shouldn't have a right to assert their existence because a few uninformed and apparently biased Americans don't think they should exist, give it up. Alun 05:44, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Wobble, clearly I have touched a nerve with you and some others. To clarify, perhaps "English" is not necessarily the best term for people outside of the UK. We have an identity that is different from the people within the UK. Furthermore, I have discovered that many people of Australia are identifying themselves as Anglo-celts, a fact that is noted on wikipedia. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-saxon These terms are not available to tick off on census boxes, but to many people of the former colonies, English is our only option for those of mixed celtic/anglo/saxon backgrounds . We can't tick of only Irish, Scottish Or Welsh, which I believe are options, because we also have ancestral lines in the "England" part of the UK. You should know that in Canada we are given the option of ticking off more than one box on the census form if we want to, so when you see the number of people in the Canadian census who say they are English, many are also ticking off another box such as Irish, Scottish, etc, They are not truly saying they are pure English, but a mix. Therefore, the numbers you are reporting for Canadian "English" people on this "English people" page are somewhat unverified.

In North America, the term to identify us has often been anglo/saxon, (sometimes in a derogatory manner by other cultural groups) and the more deragatory 'wasp'. Just as an aside, in Quebec a new sports team's new logo is 'frogs', once a derogatory term to French Canadians, but now embraced by them. In the same way, people descended from the UK are now embracing the terms anglo/saxon, and celt.

You can't imagine how difficult it is to be unable to accurately tell someone, coining a simple universally accepted phrase, of one's ethnicity. African Americans had a difficult time coming up with an acceptable term. We are in the infancy in North America of creating a term acceptable to those of us who trace our ethnicity entirely to the United Kingdom and Ireland. "Anglo/saxon celt" is growing in popularity in North America to the same extent Anglo-Celt is growing in popularity in Australia. (I am even seeing people in the UK use the term "anglo/saxon celt".) A lot of this ethnic identity crisis is the result of massive immigration in North America of groups who have clear ethnicity as well as the recognition of the politically powerful and united "Acadian" nation in Canada. We know we have ethnicity as well; we are just having trouble coining the correct term. And let's not forget that the DNA research has focused extensively on the research of the 'celt' and 'anglo/saxon' genetic markers. Ldjenks 23:22, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

• You should know that in Canada we are given the option of ticking off more than one box on the census form if we want to, so when you see the number of people in the Canadian census who say they are English, many are also ticking off another box such as Irish, Scottish, etc, They are not truly saying they are pure English, but a mix.

This comment makes no sense at all. I'd like to know eactly where in the English people article it states that people that identify as English in Canada and the USA are considered exclusively English. Indeed the numbers reported are for people claiming English descent, no mention is made that they claim no other descent. I agree with you that descent is not the same as ethnicity, it would be better to be able to produce figures for people that define themselves as ethnically English, but no such figures exist as yet. If you take a look at the footnote for English people in New Zealand you will see that there is a big discrepancy between the numbers for the 1996 census and the 2001 census, this is due to the fact that the 1996 census seems to have measured descent (giving a figure of 281,895), whereas the 2001 census was thought to more accurately measure ethnicity (and gave a figure of 34,074). We have used the lower figure here. If someone in Canada were to tick the English and Welsh boxes on the census, then they would appear in the figures for both Welsh and English people in Canada. You seem to be labouring under several misapprehensions:

1. Ethnicity is not exclusive, if someone identifies with several ethnic groups, then they can and should be included in all of the groups.
2. Descent is not ethnicity, I am not ethnically like my paleolithic ancestors, indeed I do not know what language they spoke, nor indeed anything about their culture, but I am still descended from them. One can be descended from an Anglo-Saxon and a Brython and a Danish-Viking and not be ethnically any of these things, nor indeed have any ethnic identity with any of the modern ethnic groups that are derived from these extinct groups. You should understand that Anglo-Saxon and ancient Briton ethnic identities no longer exist, their lifestyles and cultures are not relevant to the modern world, in the modern world the ethnic and national identities are more accurately called Welsh, Scottish, Irish and English. These ethnic and national identities have existed for a very long time, they certainly pre-date the genocide inflicted on the New World by European settlers.
3. If you want to accurately describe your descent (and it is not ethnicity, there is no such thing as Anglo-Saxon/Celt ethnicity), then you should describe yourself as of British and Irish origin. But please be aware that this is geographic origin and biological descent, it is not ethnicity. Most people on the British and Irish Isles would consider you Canadian. If you told them you were descended from British and Irish people, they would still consider you Canadian.Alun 05:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

• And let's not forget that the DNA research has focused extensively on the research of the 'celt' and 'anglo/saxon' genetic markers.

You clearly have not read the relevant research papers, or if you have you have not understood them. There has been a lot of what I can only describe as shit written about these research papers, mainly by misinformed journalists who have seriously distorted the original conclusions of the research, only the original papers constitute reliable sources. They certainly do not provide any support for the spurious idea that a single ethnic group, the Anglo-Saxon/Celt group has ever existed. These papers do not deal with ethnicity.Alun 05:21, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Alun, perhaps The Brits see us exclusively as "Canadian". But you are missing a very important point. And now I have to get political, something I did not want to do. In Quebec, the 'English' population has nearly been wiped out. Despite statistics you may read, there are 'hidden' numbers you never hear about. Like the one that reveals that out of a provincial civil service of nearly 55,000,000 people in Quebec, only about 400 are English. Imagine a place where a boy can never dream of becoming a fireman or a cop, and that place is Quebec. Try as hard as you can and you will have a hard time finding an "English" boy who is a fireman or cop. But here is where the problem lies. Because the people who are having the most trouble in Quebec are not immigrants who may identify as "English" because of their language, but the people of anglo/saxon celt descent, who have all those last names that origin in the British Isles and the UK (and for heavens sake, I'm talking about LAST names, not first names). Now this very same problem is spreading in Canada. Google the the Air Canada page and look at all the executives and you will find that there are very new people whose last names are of British Isle and Irish descent and when you find them, they have one foot out the door to retirement. We're in big trouble in Canada, and as a result of never ending bickering in the UK and Ireland, we have been unable to attain the united face we that we all know we urgently need in Canada. And now you, Alun, want to also transfer the political issues of the United Kingdom and Ireland onto Canada yet again. This is not good for Canada's population which is descended from the UK and Ireland that people like you do this to us. I had an excellent conversation with a recent immigrant from England last year. He said that in the UK the people of the various areas of the UK and Ireland don't really mingle with each other and stay within mainly their Irish, Scottish, etc. social boundaries but he noticed that in Canada we all got along well. He further observed that the fact we are getting along in Canada seems to be necessary for our survival because we are losing a lot of ground. Now you come along, refusing to acknowledge that there are any other people from the UK who exist. Well, we do, and millions of us live in North America and still consider the UK and Ireland to be our mother land.; I'm moving there on an ancestral visa this fall with a dependent child, and we are both anglosaxoncelts, or, if you prefer anglo/saxon celts. Sorry if you don't like it, but stop assuming that UK and Irish tensions, which are permeating this discussion, also exist in Canada or the USA. They don't anymore, and we need unity here because we have issues of our own. Please remember Anglo/saxon is a very popular term in North America.

• a provincial civil service of nearly 55,000,000 people in Quebec, only about 400 are English.

According to the Wikipedia Canada article the population of Canada is about 32,500,000, I fail to see how Quebec can have a civil service of 55,000,000, this is far greater than the population of Canada.

• He said that in the UK the people of the various areas of the UK and Ireland don't really mingle with each other and stay within mainly their Irish, Scottish, etc. social boundaries but he noticed that in Canada we all got along well.

This is not my experience at all. I am from Wales and have lived in Lancashire, Cheshire and Yorkshire (Huddersfield and Hull), I have had Irish, Scots, Pakistani-English and English friends, one of my best friends here in Finland is English, and my best man when I got married was also English (he is also married to a Welsh woman). There has been significant internal migration in the UK over the last three centuries or so.

• And now you, Alun, want to also transfer the political issues of the United Kingdom and Ireland onto Canada yet again.

I have made no comments regarding politics in Canada or the British and Irish Isles. I simply told you that I think most British people would consider you Canadian. There are many people in the world who would consider it a privelage to be Canadian, Canada has one of the best standards of living and social welfare systems in the world.

• we have been unable to attain the united face we that we all know we urgently need in Canada

Surely you are doing what you accuse me of. You are bickering about Francophone and Anglophone internal divides instead of seeing yourselves as all Canadians. I fail to see why this means that English people do not have a right to have their own page on Wikipedia.

• refusing to acknowledge that there are any other people from the UK who exist.

What does this mean? Lots of people from the UK exist besides me, about 60 million I believe. I have never denied their existence.

• we are both anglosaxoncelts, or, if you prefer anglo/saxon celts

No such thing exists as anglosaxoncelts, admit it, you just made it up. You may well be of British and Irish ancestry, you can consider yourself Anglo-Celtic, but there is no such thing as anglosaxoncelt. You might as well call yourself jutebrythongoidel (see Jutes, Brython and Goidel) for all the sense it makes.

• Imagine a place where a boy can never dream of becoming a fireman or a cop, and that place is Quebec.

Any form of racism or xenophobia is a bad thing, and it is especially bad in a country that is supposed to pride itself on it's human rights. But this is irrelevant to our discussion. Alun 16:43, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Do not feed the troll

Wobble, just walk away mate. This is comical, but if he vandalises the page then we can fix it. If he tries to write an article on anglosaxoncelticcanadians then he'll need to source it. Won't happen so no worries. Wiki-Ed 21:32, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry for the numbers in Quebec. I meant to say the civil service is 55,000 people. And to you Wiki-Ed, I think your tone is condescending. As an educator, I may have to join the legions of educators who are telling our students that they cannot use wikipedia as a valid reference source. Wikipedia has been in the news lately for this kind of mean spiritedness. It's kind of sad. I'm trying to help find a solution to a growing problem. I see you are also from the UK. I hope you all don't act like spoiled conceited brats when we move there in a couple of weeks. I have seen what the Britts can be like. I have a brilliant son who is moving with me on an ancestral visa and I hope you all can behave better than you are on this page. In any event, wiki-ed, I can send you a file that is circulating Canada, which will likely really shock you, cause you clearly don't know what's happening over here based on your comment to me. Send an email address to [email protected] and I will send it on. It's a pdf about 900 k.Ldjenks 23:07, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

What, may I ask, is an "ancestral visa"? You clearly don't like us very much, so why are you moving here? Or do you think it's okay to slag off the population of a country that you're moving to? Not that I care, but just imagine what would happen if it was the other way round! TharkunColl 23:15, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I'm guessing what he means is this - not that I want to associate myself with any of his uh, comments. Bretonbanquet 23:33, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

One final note on this English people page. You have haphazardly allocated millions of Canadians as being "English people" from Canada. These people sign census boxes denoting more than one ethnic origin on a census box, a fact you stated on the English people page. These people are often not tracing their ancestry to the UK. Many tick of "French" and "English". Others - "Chinese" and "English" and so-on, often to indicate languages spoken. I have a Chinese friend who ticks off "English" and "Chinese" because she is married to a man who immigrated from the UK. She is 100% Chinese from China, but she ticks off the box for political reasons, mainly because the census determines the allocation of funding between English and French in Canada.

Furthermore, TharkunCo11, if you don't know anything about the visa issues of the UK, then I guess you are not nearly as well as informed as you think you are. Many of you people on this forum are shockingly ill-informed. You have virtually NO submissions from academic experts on this or any other issue. In making my submission, I was hoping to get input from such types of people, but I guess that's not forthcoming. Furthermore, topics increasingly are linked to topics inside of wikipedia, with little outside verification. I shall revert to standards such as the Oxford English Dictionary for future reference. Ldjenks 13:03, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

See WP:V and WP:RS. I wonder where your academic sources are? Alun 16:40, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

OK Alun I will consider another name for my webpage in Canada other than anglosaxoncelt. But I never did get any meaningful dialogue from this wikipedia site, other than the one link to anglo-celtic, and those people have no point of contact.

In any event, I am attaching an email that made the news in Canada. I received it from a so-called "English" Quebecor, who distributed it in bulk to the citizens of a bilingual community in Quebec. It is suspected that this email was massively distributed throughout Quebec. I have left it untouched. You can probably get copies of it on the Internet. This should tell you how complicated language AND cultural identity in Canada has become, and how politicized it is. Unfortunately, any statistics you take fromm Census Canada are suspect.

See footnote 4 for explanation of figures for ethnically English people in Canada. We simply report the figures here, if they are suspect that is a matter of opinion and would need to be verified as such for this opinion to be included in the article. This is not a chatroom or helpline. Your comments about Francophone Canadians in Quebec are irrelevant to the article. Alun 07:40, 4 September 2006(UTC)

I've removed the e-mail. My French is not good enough to understand it all, but I'll assume it's politicised junk mail and has no place here. Just because this is a discussion page does not mean it is a soapbox. If it actually adds value to this discussion then it will need to be translated. Wiki-Ed 09:25, 4 September 2006 (UTC)

White Dragon Flag of the English

I've added the following sentence to 'Symbols' on the England page:

"A new or indeed old symbol being resurrected is the 'White Dragon Flag' of the English. This particular flag pays homage to the Anglo-Saxons. It is believed that Anglo-Saxons used the White Dragon Flag in battles against the Celtic Britons - who themselves used the Red Dragon flag(now found in the Welsh flag). Evidence of the White Dragon can be found on the Bayeux Tapestry,in Geoffrey of Monmouth's Prophecies of Merlin, Stentons's Anglo-Saxon Britain and Barlow's The Godwins. This flag pre-dates any other flags and symbols currently used in England."

The evidence is on the discussion page of England.

Perhaps it should be added here? I'm neutral about the flag, but as there is some historical evidence to support the symbol of English/Anglo-Saxon culture, could it be added here? A cut downn version is fine, it probably needs a mention. Note that English-Nationalists are beginning to support this symbol. White43 22:08, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

I have added a couple of sentences relating to this symbol. White43 22:36, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Can you provide the citation for the page in Stenton's Anglo-Saxon Britain? To be honest, I didn't realise he had written a book under that title. Perhaps you were thinking of Anglo-Saxon England. In any case, unless you can provide a citation I shall delete your additions. TharkunColl 23:04, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

Isn't there a Welsh poem or story about the Red Dragon ultimately defeating the White? I'll have a bit of a search for it. Alun 06:19, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

This is the story associated with Dinas Emrys, first mentioned in the Historia Britonum. The Historia Britonnum article gives a summary of it. It was later embroidered by Geoffrey of Monmouth. Rhion 07:25, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

To qoute what I said on Talk:England on this very subject two days ago: The white dragon as a symbol of the English certainly occurs in Welsh folklore - Nennius, Geoffrey of Monmouth, etc. The question is, is this derived from a symbol actually used by the English themselves? It would be supremely ironic to adopt a symbol invented for the English by the Welsh! As it happens, on some old maps a white dragon is used as a symbol of Mercia, which was obviously the kingdom with which the Welsh had most contact, and they might have mistakenly assumed that it was a symbol used by all the English, and not just the Mercians. Wessex, as has already been noted, used a gold wyvern, which - heraldically speaking - is completely distinct from a white dragon. Those four legged dragons on the tapestry near Harold are interesting, but the question is this - in 1064, Harold was still only earl of Wessex, not king of England. Perhaps it was just his personal banner, or the banner of the Godwin family. Basically, we simply don't know. TharkunColl 08:09, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Some sources, flags website, info about flag of Wessex and the White Dragon. One person claims that the flag of Wessex in the Golden Wyvern, and that Harold Godwinson fought under it at Stamford Bridge and at Hastings, another person states that the White Dragon is the standard of Wessex and that Alfred, Athelstan and Harold Godwinson all fought under it. It states Moves are now under way to once again raise the White Dragon flag, not as the flag of England, but as the flag of the ethnic-English community within England. I don't know how official the moves are, it can probably be used as a POV source, for example to verify that some people believe this or are trying to introcuce this idea. England, Wessex (White Dragon) claims that the white dragon is that of Wessex and gives this link and there's this as well. Much of this seems to be people trying to sell flags, one of the sites I came across in my search is a BNP site, so I wonder how much of this is just pushing a repugnant nationalism. The Serene Dragon only deals with the Red and White dragons fighting each other in the Welsh story, it states that this is from the Mabinogion story Lludd and Llewelys, which may be where I remember it from. So we have both White Dragon and Golded Wyvern for Wessex. The wikipedia article List of British flags states that the historic flag of the Kingdom of Mercia is A gold saltire on a blue field, which contradicts what TharkunColl says. The rulers of South Wales in antiquity must have had at least as much contact with Wessex as they did with Mercia, it's just across the Severn/Bristol Channel. The truth of this seems to be lost in history. Alun 10:43, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I was merely adding to 'Symbols' that Dragons were used by Anglo-Saxons. So it could be considered a symbol of England/English. I think it was a little unfair to remove it from England AND English People. I'd had to further objections to it - in fact someone said to stick in a few sentences!! TharkUnColl - Yes, you're right, I meant Anglo-Saxon England!!! White43 11:13, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

You appear to be replying to me, but I did not remove your edits from either of these pages. Alun 12:09, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

The Mercians used a white dragon, but the yellow saltire was later attributed to the kingdom (it is actually the banner of St. Alban) - it occurs on the coats of arms of both St. Albans and Tamworth, the capital of Mercia. If we can draw a distinction, the white dragon is more a symbol of pagan Mercia, but it survived into the Christian period as well - and in any case, there is no reason why a kingdom can't have two totally different symbols, look at the English three lions and the cross of St. George. TharkunColl 11:14, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

So What are we saying here? Include something about the dragons or not? Mercia used a white dragon, Wessex did as well and of course Wessex eventually would dominate all South and West England. Harold used a Dragon at Hastings.... White43 11:29, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Here, incidentally, is a source for the white dragon being a symbol of Mercia, from the Flags of the World website [22]:

"There is a medieval map of the English "heptarchy", a period where there were seven Anglo-Saxon kingdoms at war with each other. This map, made I believe in the 12th Century after the heptarchy period is illustrated with banners of the kingdoms. Those shown for Essex, Kent and Sussex appear to be very similar to their "county standards" today, while East Anglia has three crowns on a white background, Mercia appears to have a white dragon of some kind. James Frankcom, 30 July 2001"

We also learn from this, for example, that East Anglia used three crowns, an arrangement identical to the Swedish coat of arms - perhaps not coincidentally, as there are Swedish archaeological remains in East Anglia and its dynasty may have been of Swedish origin!

The point is this - Mercia used both a white dragon and (later) a yellow saltire; Wessex used a gold wyvern but the Godwins, for some reason, appear to have used a white dragon; East Anglia used three crowns; and the other kingdoms used totally different designs. The white dragon is by no means universal, and it may just be a coincidence that Mercia and Wessex used vaguely similar designs. Heraldic beasts such as dragons are very common in European iconography. TharkunColl 11:47, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

You seem to have the greates knowledge of this TharkunColl. I'm happy to go with your explanation. I wonder if we should mention that some people want to introduce a White Dragon flag as a flag for the English people? We can certainly verify this, though it could equally be considered a tiny minority opinion and therefore not worthy of comment. What do you think? It's worth mentioning that Owain Glyndŵr used a Golden Dragon (otherwise identical to the Red Dragon) on a white background.[23] Alun 12:09, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

If there was a sizeable minority who sought to introduce such a flag then it would be worthy of mention. So far, however, I have yet to see any evidence that this has not been the work of a single individual who happens to run his own website. TharkunColl 12:15, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Good point. Alun 16:38, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Could it be worth mentioned that the Anglo-Saxons used a variety of Dragons in their banners? 2 or 4 legged? There seems to be consensus on this. Then it might be worth mentioning that someone has 'invented' a flag? If we consider that Wessex had the Golden Wyvern and that eventually Wessex dominated known England at the time, surely Dragons(Golden or White) play some sort of significance and are a symbol of old England? White43 21:48, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

Mercia used a white dragon, Wessex used a gold wyvern. These two creatures are absolutely distinct heraldically. As for a flag of "old England", it is worth pointing out that the name "England" is derived from the Angles - therefore the Saxons (such as those in Wessex) were never English anyway. TharkunColl 01:17, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

TharkunColl. That's a very odd thing to say. 'Saxons were never English anyway'? The united Germanic tribes referred to themselves as 'Anglo-Saxons' In fact, was is not Alfred who called himself 'Rex Anglorum vel Saxonum' ? The Anglo-Saxons became the English. Not the Angles alone. If we follow your line of thinking then Perhaps the same logic should be applied to Scotland (Gaels, Vikings, Angles, Britons, Vikings). Or France (Bretons, Alsatians, Gascons, Lombards, Occitanians, Corsicans). Or Spain......... White43 09:22, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

According to the OED one of the first uses of Anglo-Saxon was to mean The Saxons of England or English Saxons, here's what it says: English Saxon, Saxon of England: orig. a collective name for the Saxons of Britain as distinct from the ‘Old Saxons’ of the continent. Hence, properly applied to the Saxons (of Wessex, Essex, Middlesex, Sussex, and perhaps Kent), as distinct from the Angles. But though English people are descended from Anglo-Saxons, thet are obviously descended from other groups that would not have been considered 'Anglo-Saxons. Though the words England and English are derived from the word Angle, it is demonstrably true that England and English also refered to Saxons, as the distinction between Angles and Saxons dissapeared as they began to see themselves as a single ethnic/national/political group. How this bears on the White Dragon issue I do not know. Alun 09:56, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

User:The Green Dragon has added this to the Symbols section The Saint George flag replaced the white dragon flag which consisted of a white dragon on a blood red background in the 12th century. The Flag is still in use today by the English[citation needed] and some wish for it to be re-instated as the national flag. I have added requests for citations. Should it just be removed? Alun 06:17, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

The evidence is dubious about this. Where's your evidence? Various incarnations of Dragon flags were used. Bernard Cornwell on his site seems to think it should be a White Dragon on a green background! I do concur with others that this 'White Dragon' flag seems to be an invention by a few people who want to sell it as a 'United' flag of White England.White43 11:27, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

It's not my edit and I'm not supporting it, which is why I have tagged it , so I don't need any evidence. If it's wrong or there are no citacions to support it then we should remove it. Alun 12:55, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I've only just noticed this and have removed it until citations are forthcoming. TharkunColl 12:56, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

I was just about to do it. Alun 12:57, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

English Democrats Party

Why is there a link to the website of this party? It looks a bit like an endorsement by Wikipedia. Or are they considered uniquely representative of English people? If so, why did they get 0.7% of the vote at the last by-election held in England? 193.39.172.1 07:31, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

I can't find the link you are refering to, where is it? If the website is supporting an assertion in the text then it is a citation and needs to be there. What makes you think it is an endorsement? I can't find the link, but if it does appear to be an endorsement then it should be removed or reworded to emphasise that it is just one point of view. There's a link to the Campaign for an English Parliament, for example, but it's just a citation in support of the fact that such a thing exists. There's a big difference between endorsing something and having something on the page for the purposes of verification. If you are going to claim that it looks like an endorsement, then it should be more than just a link that is being used to support an asserion in the article. Can you pont out where in the article it is please? Alun 07:47, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

"External links" "Can we talk about what it means to be English ?" The English Democrats Party. 193.39.172.1 07:51, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

OK, it certainly looks like nothing more than a promotion for the party, rather than a serious discussion of English identity. I'll remove it, if anyone has a problem with it they can give reasons why it should be in the English people article here. Good you mentioned it. Alun 09:22, 1 September 2006 (UTC)

List of English people

A think a List of English people within the 'Contribution to humanity' section adds to the article although there will no doubt be a debate about who to put here and who in the main list. But please see Wikipedia:Embedded lists. Wikipedia Style is to avoid the use of bulleted lists in an article ( except those in articles which are solely lists). Articles should try to describe their subject using prose and where a list is beneficial , use the Serial Comma method. Lumos3 12:43, 17 September 2006 (UTC)