[MR] BBC Reel: Vikings Who Never Left Scotland

[Garth Groff and Sally Sanford]

Noble Friends, Especially Vikings and Scots:

Today BBC Reel is hosting a thought-provoking video about the Viking
invasions of Scotland, particularly Islay, a small island in the Hebrides.
For centuries Islay residents have identified themselves as Gaelic. Now DNA
testing and linguistic place-name analysis is shaking this notion, and
turning accepted history on its head.

Many of the Islay "natives" have a hefty load of Scandinavian DNA, which
suggests that the Vikings didn't just loot and leave. Rather they stayed,
after wiping out most of the Scottish-Irish residents. Later the Viking
settlers readopted the Gaelic language, self-identified as Scottish, and
came to believe they were descended from Gaelic survivors of the Viking
"raiders".

The video runs about eight minutes:
https://www.bbc.com/reel/video/p0cbfd0z/why-the-vikings-never-left-scotland
. Be patient, it sometimes takes a while for the program to load.

This makes me wonder about my own Scottish ancestry. The former Britthonic
kingdom of Strathclyde (west of Glasgow, where my real Napier ancestors
lived in the 1200s) was also overrun by 9th century Vikings:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Strathclyde . Maybe I should send
for that DNA test kit after all.  😳

Yours Aye,


Lord Mungo Napier, Laird of Mallard Lodge 🦆