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Project aims to map our Viking heritage
WHITBY has always celebrated its Viking heritage – and now DNA genetic finger-printing could tell us if we belong to the Danish or Norwegian side of the pool.
The arrival of the Vikings in Britain more than 1,000 years ago was a dramatic event that left a lasting legacy on our language, landscape and place-names.
And academics are now hoping that Whitby people will take part in a massive project to try and map the extent of the Scandinavian influence in the area.
The Viking era was a bit of a carve-up for North as warring tribes grabbed different areas.
A settlement was established down the road at Scarborough, for example, around 950AD by a Viking raider called Thorgils Skarthi.
However, the community was soon burned to the ground by a rival band of Vikings including Harald of Norway.
York was established as Jorvik by the Danes, but in 1066 came a Norwegian attack that led to the battle with King Harold at Stamford Bridge, shortly before the Battle of Hastings.
However, population shifts during the industrial revolution mixed things up and only now can science determine how far east the Norwegians penetrated.
In one of the biggest projects of its kind, academics from the world-famous Department of Genetics at the University of Leicester, home of DNA fingerprinting, are beginning a new study to map the extent of Viking ancestry in men who live in the north of England.
A member of the team, Prof Steve Harding, who is based at the University of Nottingham, said of the new project: “The Viking influence in Yorkshire is very strong.
“The goal is to pinpoint to what extent the Vikings have influenced the ancestry of modern Yorkshire where people still tend to think of themselves as Viking.”
The researchers want to recruit male volunteers whose father’s father was born in North Yorkshire.
“As well as analysing the Y chromosomes, we are also interested in the surnames, because they are passed down the generations in the same way,“ said researcher Dr Turi King. “Surnames help us to make deeper links into the past, and tease out the signal of past Viking presence.”
Sampling is done by post, and involves simply brushing the inside of the cheek. In return for participating, volunteers receive a description of their own Y-chromosome type when the work is completed.
Men interested in taking part are asked to e-mail Turi King at surnames@le.ac.uk, or telephone 07512 586 493.
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Friday 25 May 2012
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