The last phase in this element of ‘our’ story covers the ‘Scandinavian’ and ‘Anglo-Saxon’ expansion beyond the North West littoral of mainland Europe and their migration into Britain, Ireland and subsequently Iceland.

This period of migration coincides with an increased literacy within both Nort West European culture and certain strands of my lineage.

It is said – and is obvious – that everyone is related to everyone else at some epigenetic distance and, equally therefore, everyone currently living has some genetic relatedness to individuals who were designated noble – or even royal – in their own time.

Although our identity for most of the last five centuries has been ‘ignoble’ – as peasants, proletarians and citizens – there are plausible, discernible threads linking back to European aristocracies which, in themselves, offer insight into the manners and priorities of those times from which lessons might be drawn.  

My identity, however, rooted in these millennia of migration and inter-mingling, is formed out of four distinct, historical and ethnic identities : Native and Ulster Scots, Irish and West Highland Gael.