One of the things I've noted about genetic genealogy is that the descendants of the present day inhabitants of Great Britain like to imagine that they went everywhere first, while the Chinese like to imagine that they were in situ first.
The Hans won't let Europeans test the DNA of the mummies of Urumchi, it's like a mania, "we were here first."
The Brits say, "look at these red-headed mummies with round eyes, beaky noses, plaid clothes, they're part of our far-traveling clan."
Broad generalization but it seems fairly accurate. We move, they stay. And for people who stay, it's natural to be obsessed with invasion, fear of being invaded, dislike of those who invade. (They want to trade with us, but they don't want us actually living in their country, smelling up the place, marrying into their families, and so forth.)
The Afghanis are white, the Uzbeks are white, and the Yuezhi were white. For that matter, it's likely that the Xiongnu were white (Turkic). What's the problem?
But Hans are like that. They also insist that the Xiongnu were actually descended from the Han. But Xiongnu = Hun, and the Huns were white.
Obsesssion with history and prehistory is all very interesting, but the question is, what sort of predictive value shall we derive from the paths of ancient nomads? Why is Jay obsessed with who invaded whom many years ago?
That is the puzzlement.
We are all descended from people who originated in Africa maybe 50,000 years ago. Even if humankind in general was out of Africa longer ago than that, our own ancestors were not. And Jay, I am sure, doesn't think he should go back to Africa.
I doubt he could explain it himself. Fear of contamination from pink-faced, hairy, beer swilling soccer hooligans? Fear of loss of control? Fear of humiliation? T'is a puzzlement. |
