Are none of you really interested in where you came from?

Answer 1

I know where I came from.

Answer 2

I am and very much indeed! In fact in the last months I've been trying to trace both my family (a part of it coming from present day Northern Greece) but the origins of the people who founded the state to which I presently belong - Bulgaria.
During the summer I love visiting, sometimes almost ''discovering'' forgotten archaeological sites. It is a strange feeling - to see the ruins of forgotten cities, to step on pieces of pottery broken thousands of years ago.
And now it is amazing what you can read, and, more importantly, the connections you can make over countries and continents with a click of the mouse. It is also amazing how things come into place, like the pieces of a puzzle, which emerge unexpectedly from various places. (Today, for instance, my curiosity lead me to the Tarim basin mummies).
One thing is clear, however, we are all related much stronger than we think.

Answer 3

I think Clive H has it about right! I'd be interested to discover my own origins but, frankly, how far back does one go? To me, once you investigate much before 1066 and all that, what's the point? In any event, I'm not so sure any research would unearth specific family information before the Middle Ages. I'm thankful I call myself British (well, English really but then I'm told that my forefathers hailed from Scotland. Oh dear!)

Answer 4

Yes, very interested. Research like this can reveal many surprises ; finding out is very helpful in discovering who exactly you are. It could be of the most importance to you. You will know of your origins, and even of your present/ current nationality.You should know, even if your original ancestry originated in a far off country 300 years ago, or was a recent arrival, 40 years ago.

Answer 5

I have a family tree for my dads mums side of the family it is very interesting the Brown name is on a plaque in Buckingham Palace as someone served for one of the queens or kings. A man also designed the first moterised road sweeper his company was eventualy bought out by Laker Automotive

I would like to know about the rest of my family it is nice to know your history

Answer 6

Although history is a great love of mine, I posess little, if any interest in my geneological background. My mother's people came from Scotland and France. My father's people, as far as I know, are of German and Irish extraction. I don't really affiliate with any of them.

Answer 7

It's important that we all have an in-depth knowledge of both our local and national identities. I come from Blackburn and I am extremely proud of our industrial past and the pivotal role we had in the world's economy.
I am also proud to be British, my mother is Scottish and my dad is English, although I was born in England, and I class myself as English, I am also proud of my Scottish ancestry.

Answer 8

I wish I had the time to study more about the history and culture of my country but right now I work too hard to find time to read.

Answer 9

Not really. Problem is there are so many conflicting ideas presented to the public here in UK as to our origins.

Look at it like this. For all of my life I believed that I am Welsh and therefore by race a Brythonic Celt. We now learn to our horror that the Romans who conquered Britain did not classify us as Celts. I'd like to know what exactly they thought of Queen Boudica? Cannot imagine any one more Celtic warlike and downright dangerous.

Britain for many thousands of years has operated rather like a sponge. People from other parts of Europe have come to settle here and left their mark on the land and some of their culture remains.

Going back to the Celtis. A few years ago someone found a very rare burial up on the Pennines. It was a Celtic burial of a chieftain and his chariot and horses. It turns out this chieftain was no ordinary bloke - he was in fact the boss chief of the Parisii. Who are they you ask? The Parisii were the French Celts who occupied the area of Gaul now known as Paris. What was he doing here in Brit? How many of his mob settled here? And, when? Apparently after the Romans had left, sometime in the 4th to 5th centuries.

It's all getting rather mixed up and complicated now. Then there was the recent burial ner Stone Henge of a guy who it turns out came all the way from what we now call Switzerland. Pardon? Who invited him?

When we start looking at all of this, we really do have a problem deciding who we are and where we came from.

On one of those TV shows where they do archaelogy on the BBC, they dug up a Celtic chieftain in a small village in Sommerset. A French doctor who was with the digging team took DNA samples from the corpse and also from volunteers in the village - presto - six of these villages, all of whom claimed they were English, were directly descended from this bloke.

It just goes on getting more and more complicated.

Recently I heard of a group of men living in Yorkshire who having had DNA tests done were found to have 'African DNA' - all are white and it is believed they may be descended from Roman legionaries who came from Africa and were stationed in the North of England. Well, I do know there were two auxhilliary legio from Ethiopia stationed here in the 3rd century AD.

Who knows.

Then there was the theory that nearly all of us are descended from Vikings. Then the Welsh discovered following years of DNA testing, that there's no Viking blood in Wales - only Welsh [Celtic] blood which points directly to Ireland. Blimey. The Welsh then may have come from Ireland.

The latest 'pet' theory is that most of us are descended from the folk of northern Spain, the Basques. Another bunch of Celts.

Before Julius Caesar began his campaign to come to Breten [Britain] he recruited and trained up two Legions in Germany. All of these Legionaries were Celts. When he arrived in Brit you could not tell the difference between these German Celts and the local Brits [Celts] even the names were the same. Blimey.

The story of Britain is very complex and played out of many thousands of years.

Oh yeah! One more thing. This one is about the Long Bow - one of which they found buried near Stone Henge. It had a pull of over 200 pounds and is dated to around 8 - 10 thousand years old. A replica of the bow was made and it was discovered that it could shoot an arrow for 300 yards. Blimey mate. The best that the Welsh longbow can manage is around 200 yards with a pull of around 120 to 140 lbs.

I have also found out while researching the slave trade that thousands of Saresan slaves [Turks] were imported into UK during the middle ages - the Holy Wars period. So there's probably a lot of them in us too.

We are a very mixed bag here in UK.

Answer 10

I came in through the bathroom window.
Can't speak for anyone else.