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Is "Southwest English" the same as "Cornish" here?
I don't know. I don't know the source of the "Cornish" data that was posted, and I don't know how that would compare with the "Cornish" or otherwise SW English samples of the British project.
Given that the folks at the People of the British Isles project have properly screened samples, they would be the ones who could do the best comparisons, yes?
A lot will also depend on what the genomes of the "Anglo-Saxons" show, who, the authors stated in their abstract, are closer to the modern British.
In the meantime, just for general analysis purposes, I would think that it might be informative if someone ran this sample through someone else's calculators. The DIY software is available. I'm not a fan of the Eurogenes calculators in general, and of that one in particular, partly because it was obviously done using the Hellenthal et al populations. I have yet to find out where those samples were taken. If someone knows, perhaps they could post here. The only clue I have is that they mention a study on, if my memory serves me, cystic fibrosis. In my experience, doctors don't ask a patient if all four grandparents came from the same area when they collect a sample. Perhaps in this case the researchers did get the information. I don't know. I do know that the southern Italian samples on that run plot very strangely. What I also know is that two studies on Italy are useless because the questions were
not asked.
As to the difference between the Lazaridis EEF/WHG/ANE figures for the
modern English and the
calculator figures for this
Iron Age sample, there are some differences. I don't place total faith on these "calculator" results. They are internally inconsistent and inconsistent with the academic results. However, for the purposes of discussion, let's take them at face value. If it was admixture post Iron Age which caused the change, it would have to have been some admixture with a slightly more "southern" orientation. I have difficulty imagining the Anglo-Saxons as more EEF. The Normans might have been, but how large was their input?
Or, is it because of admixture into the English "heartland" from the periphery of the Islands? I don't see how it could be from very recent migration from Scotland, given that their EEF numbers are even
lower than the Iron Age sample. I don't know what properly sourced samples from, say, far western Ireland or Wales would show.
Which leads me to the fact that as Aberdeen suggested, if I understand him correctly, by the time of the pre-Roman and pre-Saxon "Britons", there might have already been slight differences east/west as well as perhaps north/south in the British Isles. Could it be that the far western inhabitants of Iron Age Britain had more of that kind of a signature? We would need ancient dna from there, yes? Absent that, which modern population could serve...perhaps far western Ireland or northern Wales as I mentioned above? I would leave that to experts in British genetics.
Just generally, if I can make an analogy with Italy, which I know much better, I would be very surprised if all the "Indo-European" groups, largely labeled "Italics" who came into the peninsula from north of the Alps were absolutely identical genetically, not to mention people like the Ligures, for example, who may also have been Indo-Europeans.
