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From:
Subject: Re: [DNA] NYTimes.com Article: Celtic Found to Have Ancient Roots
Date: Wed, 2 Jul 2003 19:59:44 EDT


Hi DNA Listers,
I am going to suggest an alternative hypothesis, based on recent
revelations regarding my own Scotch-Irish ancestry. Many of the Ayrshire and other
Lowlands Scots who migrated to Ulster Province with the Plantation of James I of
England in 1607 - 1650 (now known as Ulster Scots in Ireland) sunsequently
re-immigrated to Appalachia in the 1720- 1750 time period, where they became
known as the Scotch-Irish. I was supposed to be descended from these people --
and indeed I am -- but they are not primarily Celtic. Instead many of those we
have tested in the Melungeon DNA Project are coming out R1b, but centered in
Iberia, R1a and matching Ashkenazic Levites, some are flat out Semitic and
Berber and , yes, Hg G.
Further, it is these same Appalachian Scotch-Irish descendants who are ,
in several cases, now recognizing instances of crypto-Jewish (and rarer,
crypto-Muslim) religious practices among their ancestors. Perhaps most striking as
an example of this phenomenon is the Clan Cowan of Scotland, members of which
migrated to Ulster and then to Appalachia. Some persons from this group have
been found to have 12/12 matches with Ashkenazic Levites from Russia AND a
tradition of 'being Jewish' in their distant ancestry. One such person found his
great, great grandmother's gravestone in a Knoxville, TN cemetery labeled as
"Rebecca Cowan -- Mother of Israel".
So contrary to the 'Received View' among traditional historians, I
believe that
several of the Scotch-Irish (and Ulster Scots still in Nothern Ireland) were
originally Jews; many of whom subsequently adopted Presbyterianism. However
their genes remained unchanged, carrying evidence of their Mediterranean and
Middle Eastern origins; and in some cases, their ancestral religious memories
remained alive, as well.
It might also be of interest for you to know that the first printer was
brought to Aberdeen Scotland all the way from Germany in the early 1600's
(Edward Raban) and that the city fathers promptly requested him to print a copy of
the Psalms of David
(NOT the New Testament) and that embedded on the top of the cover page of the
book is the Hebrew word for God in Hebrew script.
All the best, Beth

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