Researchers compared DNA extracted from Neolithic human remains found across Britain with that of people alive at the same time in Europe.
The Neolithic inhabitants appear to have travelled from Anatolia (modern Turkey) to Iberia before winding their way north.
They reached Britain in about 4,000BC.
Incredible. I never thought I would see DNA analysis come so far in my lifetime. I well remember exciting articles in Science Digest magazine in the 1960’s dreaming of what may “some day” become possible “if only human genomes could be mapped.”
I wonder when DNA sequencing will become so cheap that (1) health insurance companies will start paying for it as a tool for diagnosis, and (2) complete sequencing will become routine for newborn babies.
Y-DNA analysis has already allowed me to trace my paternal ancestry to a particular Scottish clan and likely geographical location—and a very interesting migration history.