Richard III Plantagenet Y-DNA and Armory

[Michael OHearn via]

Greetings,
My thoughts are that Richard III was legitimately Plantaganet. The male line goes back to Hugues du Perche, coming from a place near Alençon, where the migrating Alans of Sarmatia settled within the Roman Empire in the 5th century. They then most likely became part of the early Frankish military aristocracy. Their modern day descendants include the people of Ossetia, having the highest level of type G Y-DNA which is very rare in Britain. The genetic break more likely occurred in the Beaufort line. IMHO

My Y-DNA is O'Brien. Irish heraldry incorporates clan arms although some believe that armorials are inherited only by individuals as part of the feudal system. Henry VIII granted to O'Brien a differenced version of his own as part of surrender and re-grant. The current Chief has extended permission for use by the entire O'Brien clan. Recently the arms were changed with the Chief's approval, and are now virtually the same as the Plantagenets.


Sent from my iPhone

[taf]

On Sunday, December 6, 2015 at 7:48:59 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:

> My thoughts are that Richard III was legitimately Plantaganet. The male
> line goes back to Hugues du Perche, coming from a place near Alençon,
> where the migrating Alans of Sarmatia settled within the Roman Empire
> in the 5th century. They then most likely became part of the early
> Frankish military aristocracy. Their modern day descendants include the
> people of Ossetia, having the highest level of type G Y-DNA which is
> very rare in Britain. The genetic break more likely occurred in the
> Beaufort line. IMHO

Didn't you use a similar argument for the Bourbons? That didn't exactly turn out well.

You can't conclude that Richard's Y-chromosome was the ancestral Plantagenet haplotype based solely on the Alans settling in the Roman Empire 1000 years earlier.

taf

[Randy Jones via]

Thanks

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[Richard Smith]

The Y-DNA analysis of Richard III's skeleton found he had the somewhat
unusual G-P287 Y-DNA haplogroup, and testing of the descendants of Henry
Somerset, 5th Duke of Beaufort, suggests his haplogroup was R1b-U152.
Both of them cannot be male-line descendants of Geoffrey V, Count of
Anjou; possibly neither are.

But there's another family alive today that are frequently speculated to
be male-line descendants of Geoffrey V: namely, the Warren family of
Dove and their American descendants. So far as I'm aware, there is only
weak circumstantial evidence that William Warren, progenitor of the
Dover family, was the same man as William, son of Sir Lawrence Warren of
Poynton and a male-line Plantagenet descended from Geoffrey's
illegitimate son Hamelin de Warrenne, Earl of Surrey. Were this link to
be proven, I think there are many people alive who could claim to be
male-line Plantagenets.

It would be interesting if several of these Warrens, ideally distantly
related individuals, were to have Y-DNA tests. If they came up G-P287,
that would be particularly interesting, especially if Y-STR analysis was
consistent with the modern Warrens being 35 meioses away from Richard
III. Although some way from absolute proof, it would tend to confirm
both the Poynton origin of the Dover Warrens and that there was no
non-paternity event in Richard III's descent from Edward III.

Is anyone aware of such a study?

Richard

[taf]

On Tuesday, December 8, 2015 at 1:04:26 PM UTC-8, Richard Smith wrote:
> The Y-DNA analysis of Richard III's skeleton found he had the somewhat
> unusual G-P287 Y-DNA haplogroup, and testing of the descendants of Henry

Unfortunately, this is a broadly defined haplotype. Had they investigated more marker sites, we could be more precise about the distributions, and be more sure of a match.

> But there's another family alive today that are frequently speculated to
> be male-line descendants of Geoffrey V: namely, the Warren family of
> Dove and their American descendants. So far as I'm aware, there is only
> weak circumstantial evidence that William Warren, progenitor of the
> Dover family, was the same man as William, son of Sir Lawrence Warren of
> Poynton and a male-line Plantagenet descended from Geoffrey's
> illegitimate son Hamelin de Warrenne, Earl of Surrey. Were this link to
> be proven, I think there are many people alive who could claim to be
> male-line Plantagenets.
>
> It would be interesting if several of these Warrens,

. . .

> Is anyone aware of such a study?

I am unaware of such a study. There are other Warren families as well that have claimed a descent from Warren of Poynton. (It must be said that the Plantagenet descent claim of Warren of Poynton is itself taken for granted, but perhaps shouldn't be. There are also claims that Warren of Ightfield were Plantagenets, but IIRC they likely descend from Warren of Whitchurch, themselves derived from Domesday tenant Ranulph de Warenne, who may have been kinsman of the pre-Plantagenet Earls.)

DNA could perhaps produce valuable results even were there no definitive pedigree. If you find a perfect match with the Somerset haplotype, it would represent a seeming confirmation of both pedigrees (if you look at enough markers, then the chances of two families that are not recently related coincidentally having the exact same detailed haplotype becomes increasingly slim - unfortunately, I don't think Richard III's, as reported, is precise enough for coincidence to be excluded as an explanation).

There is also another cluster of people that could be tested. There have been claims of various people named Cornwall/Cornwell to descend from the illegitimate sons of Richard, 'King of Germany'. The same logic applies.

taf

[Richard Smith]

On 08/12/15 21:43, taf wrote:

> There is also another cluster of people that could be tested. There
> have been claims of various people named Cornwall/Cornwell to descend
> from the illegitimate sons of Richard, 'King of Germany'. The same
> logic applies.

Interesting. I hadn't realised that family was still (possibly) extant.
I'd though it went extinct with the last Baron of Burford in the 18th
century.

Richard

[taf]

Just to be clear, I am not saying any of those making the claim have anything but the surname and wishful thinking as their basis, just that it is a formal possibility. Still, if a Cornwall were to be found with exactly the same haplotype as a Warren and the Somersets, . . . .

taf

[Richard Smith]

On 09/12/15 00:57, taf wrote:

> Just to be clear, I am not saying any of those making the claim have
> anything but the surname and wishful thinking as their basis, just
> that it is a formal possibility. Still, if a Cornwall were to be
> found with exactly the same haplotype as a Warren and the Somersets,
> . . . .

Are those three families the only illegitimate lines that lasted more
than a generation or two in the male line? What about the Langlée
descendants of Thomas, Duke of Clarence? Or the descendants of William
Longespée? Is there any suggestion that these lines may have continued?

Richard

[taf]

On Wednesday, December 9, 2015 at 5:58:29 AM UTC-8, Richard Smith wrote:

> Are those three families the only illegitimate lines that lasted more
> than a generation or two in the male line? What about the Langlée
> descendants of Thomas, Duke of Clarence? Or the descendants of William
> Longespée? Is there any suggestion that these lines may have continued?

I have not looked at the Langlee so I can't answer how long they persisted. I know of no evidence of any Longespee male beyond the third generation. Of course there could be any number of unrecognized illegitimate lines, and it is distinctly probable that some of them persist to this day, but we would never know who they are.

taf

[Stewart Baldwin via]

Richard Smith wrote:

>Are those three families the only illegitimate lines that lasted more
>than a generation or two in the male line? What about the Langlée
>descendants of Thomas, Duke of Clarence? Or the descendants of William
>Longespée? Is there any suggestion that these lines may have continued?

The same question could be asked about the counts of Perche, who are obvious (but conjectural) candidates for male-line relatives of Hugo Perticae. Do male-line descendants (or claimed male-line descendants) of that line survive? If so, the results of y-DNA tests from them would be interesting to see.

In another direction, do any individuals who have already had their y-DNA tested have a close enough match to the y-DNA in Richard's probable remains to suggest a possible relationship within the last thousand years or so? If so, how far back are their paper-trail lines traceable?

Stewart Baldwin

[taf]

On Thursday, December 10, 2015 at 8:37:07 AM UTC-8, Stewart Baldwin via wrote:

> In another direction, do any individuals who have already had their y-DNA
> tested have a close enough match to the y-DNA in Richard's probable remains
> to suggest a possible relationship within the last thousand years or so?
> If so, how far back are their paper-trail lines traceable?

I took a quick look at the paper the other night and it doesn't look like they tested enough sites to allow this level of discrimination. At least what they reported only allowed it to be identified as G2 (P287). This arose more than 6000 years ago, and is the branch of humanity to which Otzi the Iceman belongs (his haplotype is actually known more precisely, so he is now placed in a specific branch of G2). They just didn't test (or at least didn't report) enough sites to allow matching in a genealogically relevant timescale (although it can exclude anyone who is not a G2).

I am reminded of a distant cousin who back in the early days of Ancestry's testing submitted his own DNA and that of someone else who happened to have the same surname (a surname that arose independently in at least 6 different English counties, plus there was a strong likelihood that the other person descended from an illegitimate son who took his mother's surname, so there would be no Y-chromosome continuity). They reported to him that, YES, indeed, they were related. He came away planning a major research project to find the link. However, in technical language that would not have meant much to the average reader, they went on to quantify the degree of relationship, which was that they were as closely related as any two people of English descent, and no closer. I could never quite get across to him that rather than disappoint him by reporting no relationship, they had fallen back on the fact that all humans are related if you go back far enough to report a positive result that was nonetheless genealogically irrelevant.

taf

[Peter Stewart]

On Friday, December 11, 2015 at 3:37:07 AM UTC+11, Stewart Baldwin via wrote:
> Richard Smith wrote:
>
> >Are those three families the only illegitimate lines that lasted more
> >than a generation or two in the male line? What about the Langlée
> >descendants of Thomas, Duke of Clarence? Or the descendants of William
> >Longespée? Is there any suggestion that these lines may have continued?
>
> The same question could be asked about the counts of Perche, who are
> obvious (but conjectural) candidates for male-line relatives of Hugo
> Perticae. Do male-line descendants (or claimed male-line descendants)
> of that line survive? If so, the results of y-DNA tests from them would
> be interesting to see.

I think survival of this male line would be very unlikely - the main branch, viscounts of Châteaudun, the family Hugo Perticae is conjecturally attached to, became extinct in the 13th century when Geoffrey VI was succeeded by his daughter Clementia.

Their agnatic collaterals, counts of Le Perche, came to an end in the legitimate line when Thomas was killed in battle at Lincoln in 1217. However, I don't know if there may be alleged modern descendants of this line through Bertrand, an illegitimate son of Rotrou le Grand (died 1144). It has been speculated that this Bertrand was father of Gilbert, count of Gravina and Loritello, who was father of Bertrand, count of Andria, and at least one other son. I haven't looked into this line, but claims of agnatic descent from Norman counts in the kingdom of Sicily are a dime a dozen.

Peter Stewart

[Peter Stewart]

I don't think there is a need to speculate that Gilbert of Gravina belonged to this male line - he was said to be a kinsman of both Margarita of Navarre, queen & regent of Sicily, and of Etienne of le Perche was was chancellor of the kingdom.

This is most readily accounted for by identifying Gilbert as the son of Gilbert I of l'Aigle and Juliana of le Perche who was mentioned by Orderic, making him a maternal uncle of the queen and a first cousin of the chancellor.

Since this is so obvious I assume it must have been either proposed or rejected (if not both) well before now, but I don't have time to go looking.

Does anyone know of reasons that have been canvassed for or against?

Peter Stewart

[Michael OHearn via]

Over a third of present day male Ossetians also tend to be type G2 based upon recent studies. Can we at least agree that whether or not Richard II descends from Alan migrants, that at least he was part of the broader milieu of Neolithic Copper Age agriculturalists?

Sent from my iPhone

[Peter Stewart]

I think the speculation that Gilbert of Gravina belonged to the male line of the counts of Le Perche can be practically discarded.

This was proposed by Kathleen Thompson, on the grounds that Gilbert was described as brother's son to Étienne of Le Perche, chancellor of Sicily (pseudo-Hugo Falcandus, *La historia, o Liber de regno Sicilie*, edited by Giovanni Battista Siragusa (Rome, 1897), p. 109: 'compertum est Stephanum comitis Perticensis filium in Siciliam venientem ad comitem Gravinensem fratris sui filium').

Thompson noted that Gilbert had an adult son by the 1160s and so could not himself have been the son of either of Étienne's full-brothers, who were not old enough to fit with this. Instead she suggested that his father could have been an illegitimate half-brother, and supposed that the most likely candidate was 'Bertrand, whose existence can be inferred from the presence of Geoffrey Bertrandi, grandson (nepos) of Count Rotrou in Spain ... Some support for this hypothesis is given by the names [sic] of Gilbert of Gravina's son, Bertrand'.

However, 'nepos' in her source almost certainly did not mean grandson since this was used to describe Rotrou II's relationship to his castellan in Tudela in 1131 ('[senior] in Tudella Retro comes Alpertici et Gaufridus Bertram nepus [sic] eius' - Geoffrey (or Godfrey) Bertran had been castellan in September 1128 ('comite Pertico dominante et Tutela Godefre Bertran in illo castello de Tutela'). Rotrou was still a child ca 1080, perhaps born ca 1076, so it is fairly implausible that he could have had a grandson holding a critical military post by the late-1120s.

In any case, patronymics were not usually given to Frenchmen in Spain - the castellan's name probably indicates that he belonged to the Norman family surnamed Bertram/Bertran, seigneurs of Bricquebec. This was suggested by André de Mandach, who thought he was perhaps a son of Robert II Bertran and Adelisa of Aumale, in which case 'nepos' presumably meant a younger kinsman rather than a nephew.

Gilbert of Gravina was a kinsman of Margaret of Navarre (whose dowry when she married William of Sicily included Tudela), and she was first cousin once removed to Étienne of Le Perche who was said to be Gilbert's uncle.

Graham Loud has suggested that pseudo-Hugo Falcandus may have misstated the relationship, noting that 'the name Gilbert was also used in virtually every generation of the L'Aigle family in Normandy; thus Queen Margaret's mother had a brother called Gilbert, and it is just feasible that the count may have come from that side of the extended family grouping'.

This fits well chronologically - Margaret's maternal uncle Gilbert was called 'puer' (usually meaning aged 7-14) in a charter of his mother Juliana, sister of the chancellor Étienne and of Rotrou II, when she was ruling Le Perche during the latter's absence in Spain, that is in the mid- to late-1120s.

There appears to be no other person named Gilbert who was related to both Margaret of Navarre and Étienne of Le Perche with whom the count of Gravina can be identified. It's not a big stretch to imagine that pseudo-Hugo Falcandus wrote brother's son when he should have written sister's son. The alternative is to risk adding fiction to potential error by postulating the existence of a Gilbert who is not otherwise recorded.

Peter Stewart

[taf]

On Saturday, December 12, 2015 at 7:20:00 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
> Over a third of present day male Ossetians also tend to be type G2 based
> upon recent studies.

Yes, there is a high rate of G2 in the Caucuses, but analysis of genetic diversity suggests that it is a late intrusion there (whatever 'late' means in this context - it really can't be dated without ancient DNA) rather than representing the origin of the haplotype.

> Can we at least agree that whether or not Richard II descends from Alan
> migrants, that at least he was part of the broader milieu of Neolithic
> Copper Age agriculturalists?

He and just about everyone else in Europe at his time (although not in the male line).

taf

[Peter Stewart]

By goofing I have done just that, oversimplifying the mistake imputed to the medieval source and in the process inventing not just one but two people whose existence is not recorded:

As far as we know, the chancellor Étienne of Le Perche did not have a sister named Juliana or a nephew named Gilbert - his paternal aunt Juliana married Gilbert II of l'Aigle and their youngest recorded son was named Gilbert. This is the man speculatively identified with the count of Gravina.

Consequently pseudo-Hugo Falcandus may have done better than me in stating the relationship between the count and the chancellor, though very probably he too did not get it right.

Étienne's legitimate brothers were too young, and pace Kathleen Thompson we don't have evidence of an older illegitimate brother who could have been Gilbert's father except by postulating one to satisfy the statement 'compertum est Stephanum comitis Perticensis filium in Siciliam venientem ad comitem Gravinensem fratris sui filium'.

This can't be amended by changing 'fratris sui' into 'sororis suae'; if the speculation about Gilbert is correct it should be 'amitae suae', adding a generation as well as changing the gender to complicate the error.

The family of L'Aigle was Norman, whereas the counts of Le Perche were Franks, so the former is for that reason somewhat more likely to have provided a count in the kingdom of Sicily. But we have no assurance that Gilbert belonged to either - many historians have settled for calling him a Spaniard, on the basis that he was summoned from Spain by Margaret's husband (pseudo Hugo Falcandus, op. cit. p. 29: 'comes Gillebertus consanguineus regine, cui rex nuper ex Hispania vocato Gravine dederat comitatum') and that he was allegedly a cousin (though we are actually told he was a kinsman, 'consanguineus', not 'consobrinus') to Margaret of Navarre, see for instance Antionio Sennis in *Dizionario biografico degli Italiani* vol. 54 (2000) and the sources cited there, http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/conte-di-gravina-gilberto_(Dizionario-Biografico)/.

Peter Stewart

[D. Spencer Hines]

Peter seems to enjoy dialoguing with himself.

I'll bet he chatters to himself in the shower too.

D. Spencer Hines

Exitus Acta Probat

"Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and
thine often infirmities."

Saint Paul 1 Timothy 5:23

"Peter Stewart" wrote in message
news:a2a9e607-bdd5-41db...@googlegroups.com...

[Richard Smith]

On 10/12/15 21:45, Peter Stewart wrote:
> On Friday, December 11, 2015 at 3:37:07 AM UTC+11, Stewart Baldwin
> via wrote:
>> Richard Smith wrote:
>>
>>> Are those three families the only illegitimate lines that lasted
>>> more than a generation or two in the male line? What about the
>>> Langlée descendants of Thomas, Duke of Clarence? Or the
>>> descendants of William Longespée? Is there any suggestion that
>>> these lines may have continued?
>>
>> The same question could be asked about the counts of Perche, who
>> are obvious (but conjectural) candidates for male-line relatives of
>> Hugo Perticae. Do male-line descendants (or claimed male-line
>> descendants) of that line survive? If so, the results of y-DNA
>> tests from them would be interesting to see.
>
> I think survival of this male line would be very unlikely - the main
> branch, viscounts of Châteaudun, the family Hugo Perticae is
> conjecturally attached to, became extinct in the 13th century when
> Geoffrey VI was succeeded by his daughter Clementia.

The seigneurs de Montfort-le-Rotrou are often given as descendants of
Rotrou, vicomte de Châteaudun, the possible cousin of Geoffrey II, comte
de Gâtinais. I've never seen a genealogy for that family that included
anything other than the main line of descent of the seigneury which went
extinct in the male line in the 13th century. Presumably somewhere
along that line there were siblings. Are any known?

(I should add I'm no expert on this family. I'm just reporting what
I've looked up in a few of the more obvious secondary sources.)

Richard

[Peter Stewart via]

Rotrou I of Montfort-le-Gesnois (known after him as Montfort-le-Rotrou),
was a brother of Hugo III of Châteaudun according to an undated charter
('Hugo, vicecomes Castriduni; Rotrocus frater ejus de Montfort',
*Saint-Denis de Nogent-le-Rotrou, 1031-1789: histoire et cartulaire*,
revised edition (Vannes, 1899), p. 117 no. 49).

It doesn't look as if any offshoots of this family established further
cadet male lines - the main branch evidently ended in or after 1269 when
Rotrou V was succeeded by a daughter. I am going by table 619 in ESnF
vol. 3 (1989), compiled by Detlef Schwennicke from a manuscript of
Andreas Schwennicke citing *Histoire de Pont-de-Gennes,
Montfort-le-Rotrou et Saussay* (1981) by Jean-Pierre Debuisser, that I
have not seen.

//Peter Stewart

[Michael OHearn via]

Just a footnote. The original publication on Richard III lab results identifies his Y-DNA type as G-P287 classified as G2. It is now G3 according to Familypedia. Apparently the antecedent type is from Alan / Ossetian or other subgroup of Neolithic G2, and Richard's type, being rare, is further downstream, although there is no indication when the cluster first came into being.

http://dna-explained.com/2014/12/09/henry-iii-king-of-england-fox-in-the-henhouse-52-ancestors-49/comment-page-1/

Sent from my iPhone

[taf]

On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 6:25:19 AM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
> Just a footnote. The original publication on Richard III lab results
> identifies his Y-DNA type as G-P287 classified as G2. It is now G3
> according to Familypedia.
>

> http://dna-explained.com/2014/12/09/henry-iii-king-of-england-fox-in-the-henhouse-52-ancestors-49/comment-page-1/
>

I am not sure Familypedia is the place to go for the current scholarship on DNA haplotypes, and you may want to reconsider when you say that 'It is now G3' according to that revered source - 'now' was apparently no more recent than 2007, the date of the most recent citation on the Familypedia site (and I suspect it was wrong even at the time - G3 was originally assigned as G-M287, before P287 was discovered). It is perhaps unwise to correct 2014 material with that from 2007, no?

A detailed mapping of haplogroup G was published in 2012 and is summarized in the following link. Note the tree shows G-P287 placed just after the initial split within the G haplogroup, which has just two branches, G1 and G2.

http://dienekes.blogspot.com/2012/05/major-new-paper-on-y-chromosome.html

So what happened to G3? With more information, we 'now' know the branching pattern more precisely. The haplotype (M287) previously called G3 is actually a branch within the G2 lineage, and thus has been renamed G2b. According to the following diagram, this change had already been made by 2008. Indeed, it seems the discovery of P287 is what led to the reorganization of the G tree.

http://isogg.org/tree/2008/ISOGG_HapgrpG08.html

> Apparently the antecedent type is from Alan / Ossetian or other subgroup
> of Neolithic G2, and Richard's type, being rare, is further downstream,
> although there is no indication when the cluster first came into being.

This is all backwards. The Caucasus G haplotypes show less diversity than the global population - that means they are farther downstream (a small population from one branch of G2 went into the Caucasus and gave rise to the tightly clustered G we see there now, G2 did not originate there). As we have talked about previously, nobody can say that the Alans were haplogroup G and it is unlikely given that G is lower in the areas of Western Europe where they settled than in areas they didn't. Rarity is no measure whatsoever of where a haplogroup falls on the tree. Perhaps the rarest of them all, found just in one district of Cameroon (I think it was) and a single African American family, represents the branch farthest back (upstream), the earliest to split off of all. Richard's type (as reported) is basal to all of the G2, representing the vast majority of G globally, ancestral to everyone from the Ossetians to Otsi.

taf

[Michael OHearn via]

Not suggesting previously that rarity implies being further downstream, just making that observation that Richard III DNA is indeed quite rare.

As to the Alan signature Y-DNA, the few tests done on skeletal remains do indeed point to G2 and I types, which makes perfectly good sense as migrating hordes tend to be made up of an amalgam of different peoples. The conclusion being that present day Ossetians do indeed descend from ancient Alans and not simply from undifferentiated Sarmatians who were there in the Caucasus region before the Alans arrived from the East, as previously and erroneously assumed. Again, the Alan / Ossetian G2 derivation is just one plausible explanation for Plantagenet Y-DNA.

Sent from my iPhone

[Michael OHearn via]

The 2014 Alan burial remains has of 6 all type G2 Y-DNA with all having type I mtDNA which suggests a family connection. There being no type I Y-DNA present so please disregard my previous statement to that effect.

In 2015, the Alan kurgan burial remains turned up one G2a and one R1a which can be a sign of the ongoing diversification of the population. The Sarmatian samples in that study were one type J and one type R1a.

Sent from my iPhone

[taf]

On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 11:26:51 AM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:

> As to the Alan signature Y-DNA, the few tests done on skeletal remains do
> indeed point to G2 and I types, which makes perfectly good sense as
> migrating hordes tend to be made up of an amalgam of different peoples.

OK, I found the research to which you probably refer, a 2014 paper which, as far as I can tell, appeared in a collection of invited papers in tribute to a Caucasus archaeologist. I can't tell if it was peer reviewed or not, but we can give them the benefit of the doubt for the time being (anyone out there read Russian?).

> Again, the Alan / Ossetian G2 derivation is just one plausible explanation
> for Plantagenet Y-DNA.

And yet, as just one of innumerable possible explanations, you continue to focus on it as if it had the slightest evidence to support it. It has no such evidence.

There was a time when this was a noteworthy hypotheses, but that time has long since passed. Recent progress on several fronts has removed any reason to look upon it favorably.

First, in the very early days of haplotype analysis, a critical assumption was made - that by cataloguing the frequencies in existing populations, one could extrapolate the area where a haplogroup originated. G was highest in the Caucasus, so it must have come from there. Since he Alans were known to have gone from there to Europe, it represented a plausible mechanisms for its introduction into Europe. In retrospect, this entire assumption was deeply flawed, and we already knew of multiple cases where this assumption failed (these at the time were viewed as exceptions). However, over the past five years it has become increasingly apparent that current distributions give no indication of the case 3000 years ago, that European prehistory consisted of repeated waves of migration and population displacement, such that modern distributions can in no way be taken as representing ancient distributions - just because G2 is highest in the Caucuses doesn't mean it came from there.

Second, we now know from more precise analysis that it didn't come from the Caucuses, it went to there. The diversity of the G2 haplogroup in the Caucuses is significantly less than that of other places. This demonstrates that G2 originated elsewhere, and that just one branch of G2 took it to the Caucuses, so there is no longer any reason to favor its introduction into Europe by looking for a group from the Caucuses.

Third, we now know that the 'second wave' of humans who moved into Europe and displaced (and to a lesser extent subsumed) the hunter-gatherers were G2. The place with the highest G2 in Europe is also the place where the genetics of these earliest farmers persist, most uninfluenced by later migrations that brought R and E (along with the Indo-European language) into Europe - Sardinia. G2 is found in the agriculturalists in Northern Turkey, right before they moved into Europe, and it is found among the members of this migration after they settled in Europe (one from Germany, one from the Alps). This tilts the scales even further. Not only is it now entirely unnecessary to attribute a G2 in Europe to the Alans, it a violation of Occam's Razor, introducing an additional entity than is necessary to explain the phenomenon (to put it plainly, if G2 is already in Europe, then it is entirely unnecessary to invoke an invading population as its source).

While an Alan derivation is a formal possibility, its relative likelihood hardly merits giving it special mention, let alone making it the featured explanation.

taf

[Michael OHearn via]

I agree that Alans were unique in settling from East Asia to the Caucasus area. Their G2 Y-DNA then would ultimately derive from their eastern origins, i.e. Iran. The Kurgan theory postulates just such a mixture of people in forming what is commonly designated as Indo-European language and culture.

The earlier people tended to be matriarchal and worshipped the earth goddess, whereas the conquerors from the East were warriors who worshipped the god of the sky. The Sarmatians kept to older ways as noted by Greek writers. The Alans considered themselves as a separate people of Aryans living in Sarmatia.

Of course with the agricultural expansion into Western Europe there were undoubtedly many G2 settlers long before the Alan migrations, notably the Iceman of the Tyrol who is also G2. So statistically there were undoubtedly more G2 men who were not of the Alans in Western Europe at the time of the Plantagenets.

Considering how the Frankish military aristocracy likely arose at the end of the Roman Empire, I tend to agree with the view that the early feudal nobility was comprised of remnants of warlords co-opted by the Romans and part of the diverse Roman military apparatus in Gaul, thus including the Alans as likely potential precursors of the later appearing Plantagenet monarchs.


Sent from my iPhone

[taf]

On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 2:57:00 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
> I agree that Alans were unique in settling from East Asia to the Caucasus
> area.

Agree with whom? I don't know of anyone who places them in East Asia.

> Their G2 Y-DNA then would ultimately derive from their eastern
> origins, i.e. Iran.

It would derive from their origins, wherever that was, but that is rather tautological.

> Of course with the agricultural expansion into Western Europe there were
> undoubtedly many G2 settlers long before the Alan migrations, notably the
> Iceman of the Tyrol who is also G2. So statistically there were
> undoubtedly more G2 men who were not of the Alans in Western Europe at
> the time of the Plantagenets.

Genealogy is not statistical in nature.

> Considering how the Frankish military aristocracy likely arose at the end
> of the Roman Empire, I tend to agree with the view that the early feudal
> nobility was comprised of remnants of warlords co-opted by the Romans and
> part of the diverse Roman military apparatus in Gaul, thus including the
> Alans as likely potential precursors of the later appearing Plantagenet
> monarchs.

We don't even know the Plantagenets were G2. We don't know that they originated in the region settled by the Alans. If (as you suggest) the Alans were a mixed tribe, we don't know that the Alans who settled in that part of France were G2 (certainly modern genetics show G2 less frequent in the area where these Alans settled. We don't know that it was the Alans who provided the warlords that would be elevated into the regions nobility (if this even happened). We don't know what other G2 men might have been warlords in the Roman period. This is all a house of cards, with the conclusion fore-ordained.

taf

[norenxaq via]

On Dec 19, 2015, at 3:49 PM, taf via wrote:

> On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 2:57:00 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
>> I agree that Alans were unique in settling from East Asia to the Caucasus
>> area.
>
> Agree with whom? I don't know of anyone who places them in East Asia.
>

one theory of the alans origin is that some of them were descendants or remnants of the ruruan, a people who ruled a region north of china

[Ian Goddard]

Do you mean theory, testable hypothesis or untestable hypothesis?

--
Hotmail is my spam bin. Real address is ianng
at austonley org uk

[norenxaq via]

On Dec 19, 2015, at 4:06 PM, Ian Goddard via wrote:

> On 20/12/15 00:02, norenxaq via wrote:
>>
>> On Dec 19, 2015, at 3:49 PM, taf via wrote:
>>
>>> On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 2:57:00 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
>>>> I agree that Alans were unique in settling from East Asia to the Caucasus
>>>> area.
>>>
>>> Agree with whom? I don't know of anyone who places them in East Asia.
>>>
>>
>> one theory of the alans origin is that some of them were descendants or remnants of the ruruan, a people who ruled a region north of china
>>
>
> Do you mean theory, testable hypothesis or untestable hypothesis?
>

theory that I believe is being investigated. thus, a and b

[taf]

On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 4:02:59 PM UTC-8, norenxaq via wrote:

> one theory of the alans origin is that some of them were descendants or
> remnants of the ruruan, a people who ruled a region north of china

What I see places the coalescence of the Ruruan in the 4th century AD, making them unlikely predecessors of the Alans (and particularly their remnants, their state was still extant in the 6th century). Anyhow, such an origin among the proto-Mongols is unlikely of a tribe that (if the aforementioned Russian research is authentic) seems to have been G2, putting their origin in West Asia rather than East.

taf

[Matthew Langley]

On Wednesday, December 9, 2015 at 5:58:29 AM UTC-8, Richard Smith wrote:

When the Richard III and Somerset DNA came out it piqued my interest since I'm a paternal Langley descendant and I tested U152 like the Somerset descendants. I have yet to find a paper trail back to an immigrant ancestor to America up my Langley line. Obviously this let the imagination run a bit considering the Langlee descendant (and the random idea of Edmund of Langley possibly having a bastard line taking that name).

That run of the imagination ended when I read that the Somersets tested negative for all of the main known sub-clades of U152, including L2 that I test positive for.

[Michael OHearn via]

There is plenty to support my contention regarding Plantagenet origins. Conjecture on this digest already includes Jewish antecedents albeit not in the direct paternal line of descent. Yes, the Alans were allied with the Khazars and there is a high probability that the high level of type G2 among Jews outside Palestine at that time originated with the Alans.

Beyond all this, we do not need to establish beyond the shadow of doubt each and every one of the factors leading to our conclusion. Suffice it to say that in general Alans have demonstrated, throughout their brief span of history, that they were just the type of opportunistic assholes having the capacity most likely to attempt such a power grab through marriage with a Norman princess so characteristic of Plantagenet rise to power in both France and England.

Sent from my iPhone

[norenxaq via]

the ruruan were conquered in the 550s. it was after this that some of the survivors joined the alans

[taf]

On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 6:23:48 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:

> There is plenty to support my contention regarding Plantagenet origins.

There is absolutely nothing to support it, other than that Richard III had the G2 haplotype, which may or may not have been that of the Plantagenets.

> Beyond all this, we do not need to establish beyond the shadow of doubt
> each and every one of the factors leading to our conclusion.

Who said anything about shadow of a doubt? More likely than the miriad more mundane alternatives would be an improvement over what we have now.

> Suffice it to say that in general Alans have demonstrated, throughout their
> brief span of history, that they were just the type of opportunistic
> assholes having the capacity most likely to attempt such a power grab
> through marriage with a Norman princess so characteristic of Plantagenet
> rise to power in both France and England.

Ah, the a$$40le correlation hypothesis. Population X weren't nice people; family Y weren't nice people; therefor family Y must have been members of population X. QED

taf

[taf]

On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 6:23:48 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:

> Suffice it to say that in general Alans have demonstrated, throughout
> their brief span of history, that they were just the type of opportunistic
> assholes having the capacity most likely to attempt such a power grab
> through marriage with a Norman princess so characteristic of Plantagenet
> rise to power in both France and England.

And here I thought it was because they descended from Melusine, daughter of Satan. I guess if you think Satan is bad, he's got nothing on the Alans.

taf

[Michael OHearn via]

To argue that we don't know with 100% certainty that the male Plantagenet line was G2 is simply a way of begging the question. What we do know undisputedly is that Richard III Plantagenet was G2. What we do know undisputedly is that Ossetians who traditionally descend from Alans have a high ratio of G2 in the male line. What we do know undisputedly is that of the few Alan specimens tested, 2 out of three male Alans were found to be G2 with the other being R1a, even if we grant that the six G2s in the 2014 project share the same descent as members of the same family and count them all as one. This ratio is almost identical with the 60% ratio of G2 found among males in North Ossetia with 32% of all males of North Ossetia testing G2a1a the most common G2 variety.

Couple this with the historical characteristic of Alans being opportunistic assholes who apparently intermarried with the Khazars, and yes a strong case exists that the Plantagenet rise to power in France and England by way of marriage with a Norman princess was in fact just one more in a long history of Alan power grabs.

Sent from my iPhone

[Peter Stewart via]

On 20/12/2015 6:33 PM, Michael OHearn via wrote:
> To argue that we don't know with 100% certainty that the male Plantagenet line was G2 is simply a way of begging the question. What we do know undisputedly is that Richard III Plantagenet was G2. What we do know undisputedly is that Ossetians who traditionally descend from Alans have a high ratio of G2 in the male line. What we do know undisputedly is that of the few Alan specimens tested, 2 out of three male Alans were found to be G2 with the other being R1a, even if we grant that the six G2s in the 2014 project share the same descent as members of the same family and count them all as one. This ratio is almost identical with the 60% ratio of G2 found among males in North Ossetia with 32% of all males of North Ossetia testing G2a1a the most common G2 variety.
>
> Couple this with the historical characteristic of Alans being opportunistic assholes who apparently intermarried with the Khazars, and yes a strong case exists that the Plantagenet rise to power in France and England by way of marriage with a Norman princess was in fact just one more in a long history of Alan power grabs.
>
>

So much for the nature v. nurture debate, if through a whole millennium
Y-DNA = moral character.

Eat your heart out, Charles Darwin.

Peter Stewart

[taf]

On Saturday, December 19, 2015 at 11:33:16 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
> To argue that we don't know with 100% certainty that the male Plantagenet
> line was G2 is simply a way of begging the question. What we do know
> undisputedly is that Richard III Plantagenet was G2.

What we know from the only study to address the question is that one individual of documented (on paper) Plantagenet male-line descent is G2 and a second individual of documented (on paper) Plantagenet male-line descent is something other than G2. Far from 'begging the question', to suggest that this means there is less than 100% certainty that the basal Plantagenets were G2 is accurately portraying the scientific finding.

> What we do know undisputedly is that Ossetians who traditionally descend
> from Alans have a high ratio of G2 in the male line.

Irrelevant.

> What we do know undisputedly is that of the few Alan specimens tested, 2
> out of three male Alans were found to be G2 with the other being R1a,
> even if we grant that the six G2s in the 2014 project share the same
> descent as members of the same family and count them all as one.

I am provisionally willing to accept this, but not without concern over the venue chosen for publication.

> This ratio is almost identical with the 60% ratio of G2 found among males
> in North Ossetia with 32% of all males of North Ossetia testing G2a1a the
> most common G2 variety.

Where to start? First, a quantitative (as opposed to qualitative) comparison of haplogroup ratios in different populations separated by 1500 years has no validity whatsoever. Even if the two had absolutely identical ratios to 12 decimal points, this would be a coincidental curiosity, not a probative finding. Genetic drift and other vicissitudes of families (to borrow from Round) can dramatically alter ratios over time even in populations known to be linked by direct descent, so there is no reason two linked populations would be expected to maintain the same ratios, nor that two populations with a given haplogroup in the same proportion must be directly connected as ancestor-descendant. Equally important, no percentage based on sampling with an 'n' of three has any kind of statistical rigor whatsoever. (Example: if you flip a coin three times and get two heads and a tail, what are the proportions of heads and tails on a coin?) Three is too small a sample to tell you anything other than that these two haplogroups were present, and even then you are combining ratios from different sites, which may have had different proportional makeups. Most importantly however, the Ossetians are still irrelevant. Whether or not we accept the Ossetians as descendants of the Alans has no bearing on the question of the descent of the Plantagenets from Alans.

> Couple this with the historical characteristic of Alans being opportunistic
> assholes who apparently intermarried with the Khazars, and yes a strong
> case exists that the Plantagenet rise to power in France and England by
> way of marriage with a Norman princess was in fact just one more in a long
> history of Alan power grabs.

Human history is replete with opportunism and bad behavior. To suggest this is an inherited marker of descent from one particular tribe that was not appreciably more opportunistic than their neighbors (or the Romans for that matter) is a dubious proposition. And I am afraid to ask why intermarriage with Khazars supports the Plantagenet descent from Alans.

taf

[taf]

On Sunday, December 20, 2015 at 1:29:02 AM UTC-8, Peter Stewart via wrote:

> Eat your heart out, Charles Darwin.

I am more concerned with the Oxonian, William of Ockham.

taf

[norenxaq via]

On Dec 19, 2015, at 5:17 PM, taf via wrote:

[Stewart Baldwin via]

Michael OHearn wrote:

> [snip]
> ..., thus including the Alans as
***********
*> likely *
***********

> potential precursors of the later appearing Plantagenet monarchs.

[Emphasis with *'s is mine]

Your misuse of words like "likely" (as above) is one reason (of several) why you are encountering so many disagreements from others regarding your postings on this implausible theory. As pointed out on several occasions, individuals having Alanic descent formed only a small percentage of those having the G2 haplogroup. To give an example, let us say that during the time birth of Hugo Perticae, roughly 1 out of N adult men living in his neighborhood and social milieu having the G2 haplotype were of Alanic male-line descent, where N is a large number. This comes out as barely possible (1 chance out of N), but hardly "likely".

Suppose, hypothetically, that someone (call him "Mr. Argue") wanted to enter the fray by claiming that Hugo Perticae "almost certainly" did not have Alanic y-DNA. With a probability of N-1 chances out of N, his statement would be N-1 times as likely as your statement. Still, I would also not consider the mythical Mr. Argue's statement a responsible way to deal with this problem, because no evidence has been put forward to suggest that Alanic y-DNA should be ruled out for Hugo (despite the extremely slim probability), but it nowhere near as bad as aggressively proposing a 1 out of N chance as "likely" or "plausible" without any specific suupporting evidence.

Stewart Baldwin

[taf]

On Sunday, December 20, 2015 at 11:36:12 AM UTC-8, Stewart Baldwin via wrote:

> Suppose, hypothetically, that someone (call him "Mr. Argue") wanted to
> enter the fray by claiming that Hugo Perticae "almost certainly" did not
> have Alanic y-DNA. With a probability of N-1 chances out of N, his
> statement would be N-1 times as likely as your statement. Still, I would
> also not consider the mythical Mr. Argue's statement a responsible way to
> deal with this problem, because no evidence has been put forward to
> suggest that Alanic y-DNA should be ruled out for Hugo (despite the
> extremely slim probability), but it nowhere near as bad as aggressively
> proposing a 1 out of N chance as "likely" or "plausible" without any

> specific supporting evidence.


On Monday, December 7, 2015 at 4:03:36 PM UTC-8, taf wrote:

> (And I have a statistical argument that supports it as well: there have
> been 10s of thousands of populations in human history, and the Alans are
> just one of these. Thus you have a 1/10,000+ chance of being right, and
> I have a 9,999+/10,000+ chance of being right!?! That's a hell of a lot
> more likely, right?)


I hope it is clear that when I made this n-1 statistical argument two weeks ago it was with tongue firmly planted in cheek.

taf

[Stewart Baldwin via]

I should point out that when I wrote the above posting, I wasn't thinking about your previous posting, so my apologies if you thought that I was calling you "Mr. Argue." :-) I think that the tongue-in-cheek nature of your above statement is pretty obvious, and I was just trying to emphasize the hypothetical nature of my scenario.

One thing that is still unclear to me is whether there is more than one person following this thread who thinks that this "Richard III might have Alanic paternal descent" theory is even plausible.

Stewart Baldwin

[Peter Stewart via]

On 21/12/2015 11:17 AM, Stewart Baldwin via wrote:
> One thing that is still unclear to me is whether there is more than
> one person following this thread who thinks that this "Richard III
> might have Alanic paternal descent" theory is even plausible.

It's not quite clear to me that there is even one - maybe he is trying
to provoke rather than persuade.

In any case, though I may be in a minority of one, I can't get remotely
interested in how one person may be related to another over 1,000+ years
based on conjecture without specific evidence. If Alans settled in
France we're probably all descended from them - so what, if we have only
DNA to indicate it as a possibility? Pedigrees without much closer
continuity than that are not genealogy, they are just scientific (or in
this case quasi-scientific) doodles.

Peter Stewart

[D. Spencer Hines]

Agreed.

DSH

"Sic gorgiamus allos subjectatos nunc!"

"Peter Stewart via" wrote in message
news:mailman.141.14506630...@rootsweb.com...

[Michael OHearn via]

There are still other indicators of Plantagenet descent from Alan precursors in addition to the ones previously enumerated herein.

One item is the supposed connection with the Pisa Ebriaci merchant family of Jewish origin which is also discussed on this list. This fits in with the known alliance between the Alans and the Khazars before the migrations began. If indeed Alans intermarried with Khazars who had converted to Judaism, there is additional reason for possible Plantagenet descent including Ebriaci using the broom tree symbol on their family arms, as these types of family alliances and intermarriage tend to persist for centuries. (The broom tree being the source of the name Plantagenet according to some scholars).

Secondly, the heraldic blazon of Geoffrey Plantagenet includes prominently a lion rampant or (gold color). Later Plantagenets have one or three lions passant or. A lion passant or (gold color) is also the symbol on the arms of the nation of Ossetia-Alania who descend from the ancient Alans. This symbol though undoubtedly ancient in origin was specifically chosen by Ossetians during their recent struggle for independence without any idea that there might have been some connection between their forebears and the Plantagenet dynasty.

In addition, the Y-DNA tests on Alan skeletons demonstrating a high level of type G2 which also corresponds with male Ossetian DNA was taken from so-called "Medieval" specimens, i.e from people who lived during about the 5th century A.D. which was also the time Alans settled in different parts of Roman Gaul. So why not Alan male ancestry for Richard III who was also indisputably G2?


Sent from my iPhone

[taf]

On Monday, December 21, 2015 at 5:34:38 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:

> Secondly, the heraldic blazon of Geoffrey Plantagenet includes prominently
> a lion rampant or (gold color). Later Plantagenets have one or three lions
> passant or. A lion passant or (gold color) is also the symbol on the arms
> of the nation of Ossetia-Alania who descend from the ancient Alans. This
> symbol though undoubtedly ancient in origin was specifically chosen by
> Ossetians during their recent struggle for independence without any idea
> that there might have been some connection between their forebears and the
> Plantagenet dynasty.

The lion is the most common charge in early heraldry. It is not an indicator of shared genetic or cultural heritage.

> So why not Alan male ancestry for Richard III who was also indisputably G2?

"Why not" is the wrong question to ask in evidence-based scholarship. And of course if this was not the Plantagenet type, just Richard III's, then this game of free association becomes even more tenuous.

taf

[Peter Stewart via]

On 22/12/2015 5:16 PM, taf via wrote:
> On Monday, December 21, 2015 at 5:34:38 PM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
>
>> Secondly, the heraldic blazon of Geoffrey Plantagenet includes prominently
>> a lion rampant or (gold color). Later Plantagenets have one or three lions
>> passant or. A lion passant or (gold color) is also the symbol on the arms
>> of the nation of Ossetia-Alania who descend from the ancient Alans. This
>> symbol though undoubtedly ancient in origin was specifically chosen by
>> Ossetians during their recent struggle for independence without any idea
>> that there might have been some connection between their forebears and the
>> Plantagenet dynasty.
> The lion is the most common charge in early heraldry. It is not an indicator of shared genetic or cultural heritage.
>
>

It would make about as much sense to say "Richard was born under the
sign of Libra with Leo rising, therefore he was descended from the
ancient Alans". Horoscopes were no doubt more important to him than
Ossetian-Alanian symbolism.

I don't think this Plantagenet connection actually rises to the level of
an "idea", so it's no wonder the Ossetians didn't have one.

Peter Stewart

[Michael OHearn via]

It would be a simple matter to resolve the question of whether Richard III and by implication the entire Plantagenet male line were descended from Alans of Sarmatia. Simply take the DNA samples already found to be type G or G2 of each group or individual including King Richard, the Alan skeletal remains, and a representative cross section of the male Ossetians tested, and subject them to deep clade testing. This will give us a good idea of when each of the three sample types branched off from a most recent common ancestor vis-a-vis each of the others. Usually the testing labs preserve these items of scientific research to allow for further testing.

On a different note, the hypothesis of a connection between the Alan and Sarmatian peoples who were stationed in Roman Britain and the legend of King Arthur has become the subject of much criticism.

Sent from my iPhone

[Richard Smith]

On 22/12/15 01:34, Michael OHearn via wrote:
> There are still other indicators of Plantagenet descent from Alan
> precursors in addition to the ones previously enumerated herein.
>
> One item is the supposed connection with the Pisa Ebriaci merchant
> family of Jewish origin which is also discussed on this list.

Am I missing something? The connection with Ebriaci family of Pisa was
indirect and much later. So far as I can see, Henry V was the first
Plantagent to have a documented descent from Ugone Ebriaci.

Richard

[Michael OHearn via]

>> Am I missing something? The connection with Ebriaci family of Pisa wasindirect and much later. So far as I can see, Henry V was the first Plantagent to have a documented descent from Ugone Ebriaci.

There is also descent to Alessia di Saluzzo, grandmother of Richard FitzAlan who married Eleanor Plantagenet as outlined in another thread on this list. Ebriaci apparently were of Sephardic roots differing in this respect from Khazars who interacted with Alans in the fifth century and before. So any connection with the Plantagenets is merely an observation such as similarity of armory, awaiting further confirmation to determine when the most recent common ancestors lived as between Plantagenet, Alans and Ossetians.

Sent from my iPhone

[taf]

On Tuesday, December 22, 2015 at 4:25:28 AM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
> It would be a simple matter to resolve the question of whether Richard III
> and by implication the entire Plantagenet male line were descended from
> Alans of Sarmatia.

To determine this for Richard III would not imply the type of the entire Plantagenet line. To say so ignores the possibility that the know crypto-paternity event occurred in Richard's ancestry.

> Simply take the DNA samples already found to be type G or G2 of each group
> or individual including King Richard, the Alan skeletal remains, and a
> representative cross section of the male Ossetians tested, and subject them
> to deep clade testing.

The Ossetians have already been well characterized and mapped: there is no need to type them further. Indeed, if we know Richard's type with more precision, we would have a much better idea where he falls.

> This will give us a good idea of when each of the three sample types
> branched off from a most recent common ancestor vis-a-vis each of the
> others. Usually the testing labs preserve these items of scientific
> research to allow for further testing.

Perhaps, perhaps not. Particularly with ancient DNA, you recover such small samples and already are dividing it for different analyses. Further, with RIchard, whose bones were to be (and now have been) reinterred, there would have been minimal sampling, with no opportunity for more. In other words, they may not have anything left to test. (With the Alans this is less likely, but may also be true. Part of what underlies the advance in aDNA analysis is discovering one particular bone that preserves more DNA than any other, but it is a very small bone in the inner ear, which likewise limits available DNA. I can't read the Alan paper so I can't tell if this is where they collected their sample or not.)

>
> On a different note, the hypothesis of a connection between the Alan and
> Sarmatian peoples who were stationed in Roman Britain and the legend of
> King Arthur has become the subject of much criticism.

And rightly so. What is it with the Alans that make they the linchpin of all European prehistory in your mind?

taf

[Richard Smith]

On 22/12/15 15:35, Michael OHearn via wrote:
>>> Am I missing something? The connection with Ebriaci family of
>>> Pisa wasindirect and much later. So far as I can see, Henry V
>>> was the first Plantagent to have a documented descent from Ugone
>>> Ebriaci.
>
> There is also descent to Alessia di Saluzzo, grandmother of Richard
> FitzAlan who married Eleanor Plantagenet as outlined in another
> thread on this list.

Yes, I know. I'm descended from that marriage. But it's some time
before you find any Plantagenet descendants of that marriage, probably
not until Henry IV.

In any case, the FitzAlan marriage isn't a marriage between a
Plantagenet and an Ebriaci: it's a marriage between a Plantagenet and
someone with an obscure Ebriaci ancestral. Maria Ebriaci was a 6-great
grandmother of Richard FitzAlan, and Richard was almost certainly
unaware of the connection. When the marriage between Richard FitzAlan
and Eleanor of Lancaster was being arrange, it was an alliance between
two important earls, Arundel and Lancaster. Richard's Italian
grandmother would not have been a relevant factor, although I'm sure it
was known. And we can be absolutely certain that neither party was
thinking about the alleged Alan ancestry of the Plantagenets and the
obscure Ebriaci ancestry of the FitzAlans.

Richard

[Michael OHearn via]

As has been pointed out in a linked article, there is at least one crypt in England containing the remains of at least one of Richard's royal male line predecessors. I doubt that anyone will get royal permission to exhume. Absent that, the presumption is still in favor of the legitimacy of the Plantagenet line insofar as certain things are unbefitting to a queen.

Sent from my iPhone

[taf]

On Tuesday, December 22, 2015 at 7:35:21 AM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:
>
> There is also descent to Alessia di Saluzzo, grandmother of Richard
> FitzAlan who married Eleanor Plantagenet as outlined in another thread
> on this list.

And this marriage can't be explained by the English politics of the era, such that you have to invoke the ancient interactions among steppe tribes to explain it?

> Ebriaci apparently were of Sephardic roots differing in this respect
> from Khazars who interacted with Alans in the fifth century and before.

So they are entirely different groups of Jews deriving from opposite ends of the Medieval world, but these interactions show a connection in the form of an inherited pro-Semitism? Really? When ELizabeth 'Plantagenet' married Richard FItz Alan, it was all because he was really Jewish? (and his name - Fitz 'ALAN' - doesn't that prove something right there?)

> So any connection with the Plantagenets is merely an observation such
> as similarity of armory,

The lion is also on the arms of Finland, Sri Lanka and the Philippines. Does that make them Alans too? Or maybe this means that the Alans were Tagalog or Tamils or Saami. THe conclusion that the common use of a lion in their heraldry means anything when so many unconnected groups used a lion is deeply flawed.

taf

[taf]

On Tuesday, December 22, 2015 at 8:15:54 AM UTC-8, Michael OHearn via wrote:

> Absent that, the presumption is still in favor of the legitimacy of the
> Plantagenet line insofar as certain things are unbefitting to a queen.

Richard's mother, grandmother and great-grandmother were not queens. If you want to make a statistical argument based on the number of generations, fine. If you want to make an argument about there being two bastards in the other line and who really knows the father of a bastard, well fine, but this argument about it not being something a queen would do, in a line with no queens, that just doesn't wash.

taf

[Patrick Nielsen Hayden]

On 2015-12-22 16:24:11 +0000, taf said:

> The lion is also on the arms of Finland, Sri Lanka and the Philippines.
> Does that make them Alans too? Or maybe this means that the Alans
> were Tagalog or Tamils or Saami. THe conclusion that the common use of
> a lion in their heraldry means anything when so many unconnected groups
> used a lion is deeply flawed.

Don't forget the heraldry of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Louis B. Mayer was
born Lazar Meir -- in Minsk! This proves everything.


--
Patrick Nielsen Hayden
p...@panix.com
about.me/patricknh

[Stewart Baldwin via]

Michael OHearn wrote:

>There is also descent to Alessia di Saluzzo, grandmother of Richard FitzAlan ...

In addition to the numerous other flaws in these arguments already pointed out, it should be added that alleged connections to the Alans involving female ancestors are irrelevant to an argument that supposedly relies on y-DNA.

Stewart Baldwin

[Craig Kilby via]

Because wishing makes it so?