This expansion is considered the last of the great North Germanic migrations. These seafaring traders, settlers and warriors are commonly referred to as Vikings. The North Germanic peoples of the
No, Vikings aren't a Germanic tribe. The fact of the matter is that Germanic tribes consisted of an umbrella of various tribes that speak different languages commonly grouped together. Moreover, Vikings were only a subgroup of different peoples that included the Germans.
No, The Scandinavians (later called Vikings), like the Anglo-Saxons (English) were a sub group of the Germanic peoples. Germanic is a broad umbrella term for the people that speak a group of languages that are interrelated and lived in the northern part of Europe.
“Were Celts and Germanic people originally the same, and if so, when did they split?” No. Both refer to linguistic families. While there is genetic overlap that is pretty much true for all of Europe.
The homelands of the Vikings were in Scandinavia, but the countries of Scandinavia as we know them today did not exist until the end of the Viking Age. Wherever they lived, the Viking-age Scandinavians shared common features such as house forms, jewellery, tools and other everyday equipment.
“Vikings were not restricted to genetically pure Scandinavians,” says Willerslev, “but were a diverse group of peoples with diverse ancestry.” In fact, some who adopted the trappings of Viking identity were not Scandinavian at all.
As descendants of the Vikings, people from Scandinavian countries—Denmark, Norway, and Sweden—are the most likely to carry Viking DNA. However, their genetic footprint extends far beyond Scandinavia due to the Vikings' extensive exploration, raiding, and colonization during the Viking Age (around 793-1066 AD).
The modern English are genetically closest to the Celtic peoples of the British Isles, but the modern English are not simply Celts who speak a German language. A large number of Germans migrated to Britain in the 6th century, and there are parts of England where nearly half the ancestry is Germanic.
While Highland Scots are of Celtic (Gaelic) descent, Lowland Scots are descended from people of Germanic stock. During the seventh century C.E., settlers of Germanic tribes of Angles moved from Northumbria in present-day northern England and southeastern Scotland to the area around Edinburgh.
German ethnicity emerged in medieval times among the descendants of the Romanized Germanic peoples in the area of modern western Germany, between the Rhine and Elbe rivers, particularly the Franks, Frisians, Saxons, Thuringii, Alemanni and Baiuvarii.
New research shows that the Irish definitely have their fair share of Viking heritage–in fact, the Irish are more genetically diverse than most people may assume. The Irish have Viking and Norman ancestry in similar proportions to the English.
The North Germanic peoples of the Viking Age went by various names among the cultures they encountered, but are generally referred to as Norsemen.
West Slavs originate from early Slavic tribes which settled in Central Europe after the East Germanic tribes had left this area during the migration period. They are noted as having mixed with Germanics, Hungarians, Celts (particularly the Boii), Old Prussians, and the Pannonian Avars.
However, it's difficult to say for certain whether most scholars would refer to the Dutch as Vikings. We do know, however, that the Dutch people originate largely from the same culture and Nordic Bronze Age as the Norse, which links them to the Viking group.
As the Nordic Bronze Age culture spread south into northern Germany and came in contact with Celtic tribes and eventually the Roman Empire, it became known as Germanic to the (mostly Roman) historians at the time, which is why we today also refer to it that way.
“It's pretty clear from the genetic analysis that Vikings are not a homogenous group of people,” says Willerslev. “A lot of the Vikings are mixed individuals” with ancestry from both Southern Europe and Scandinavia, for example, or even a mix of Sami (Indigenous Scandinavian) and European ancestry.
Irish is a Celtic language (as English is a Germanic language, French a Romance language, and so on). This means that it is a member of the Celtic family of languages. Its “sister” languages are Scottish, Gaelic, and Manx (Isle of Man); its more distant “cousins” are Welsh, Breton, and Cornish.
Where did Scottish people come from? Early Historic Scotland was a melting pot of different groups – the Britons, the Picts, the Angles, the Gaels (Scots) and the Norse – and you can see this mixture reflected in place-names around the country, from Ben Macdui (Gaelic) to Stornoway (Norse) via Aberdeen (Pictish).
Today, the term 'Celtic' generally refers to the languages and cultures of Ireland, Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, the Isle of Man, and Brittany; also called the Celtic nations. These are the regions where Celtic languages are still spoken to some extent.
The Welsh are the true pure Britons, according to the research that has produced the first genetic map of the UK. Scientists were able to trace their DNA back to the first tribes that settled in the British Isles following the last ice age around 10,000 years ago.
From as far back as the 16th century, historians taught that the Irish are the descendants of the Celts, an Iron Age people who originated in the middle of Europe and invaded Ireland somewhere between 1000 B.C. and 500 B.C. That story has inspired innumerable references linking the Irish with Celtic culture.
The modern French are the descendants of mixtures including Romans, Celts, Iberians, Ligurians and Greeks in southern France, Germanic peoples arriving at the end of the Roman Empire such as the Franks and the Burgundians, and some Vikings who mixed with the Normans and settled mostly in Normandy in the 9th century.
“The Vikings had a lot more genes from southern and eastern Europe than we anticipated,” said Willerslev. “They frequently had children with people from other parts of the world. In fact, they also tended to be dark-haired rather than blond, which is otherwise considered an established Viking trait.”
Where is the most Viking blood? According to the DNA tests, Scotland – heavily populated by Norsemen in the Viking age – has the highest proportion of descendants; the next biggest population is in the North; and the incidence of Viking blood decreases the further south you go.
The study shows the genetic history of Scandinavia was influenced by foreign genes from Asia and Southern Europe before the Viking Age. Early Viking Age raiding parties were an activity for locals and included close family members. The genetic legacy in the UK has left the population with up to six per cent Viking DNA.