What does 'Black Irish' mean?
In: Irish History [Edit]
In the 1700s Irish protestants and British formed a vigilante military called the"Orangemen" to keep the Roman Catholic Irish subserviant. The Roman Catholic Irish countered by starting their own military called the "White boys". Any Roman Catholic Irish that chose not to defy the orangemen or joined the whiteboys were known as the "black irish" of which most immigrated to North America. It has nothing at all to do with ones complexion, hair or eye colour.
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C?Chonnacht is the region known for the term "Black Irish". Dark haired people with unblemished, white skin and blue or hazel eyes. Supposedly descended from the Spanish Gaels of the Armada shipwrecked in Galway Bay during the latter 16th century. Genetically impossible to have descended from these people with such a small gene pool. Native Irish don't recognise this term "Black Irish or Black Scots". Original inhabitants of Ireland were known to have dark hair, as archaeological digs of Bronze Age ruins and peat bog mummies show. Genetics of the native Irish hair didn't begin to change until the invasions of the Vikings and the Anglo-Saxons. The Chonnacht O'Connor side of my family are referred to as "Black Irish", while the McCords and Mabees are referred to as "Black Scots". Possible Roman and Iberian influence to create the unfreckled, dark tanning skin, but no research with merit exist.
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I have been called this by many blond or red headed Irish in the Boston, MA area. My family is from Dublin and Belfast and are Protestant origin from Scotland. Over time they intermarried so some have traces of red or blond hair (often full red heads if they marry red haired people. Most of us are black haired. I don't think of it so much as the Spanish interbreeding as much as it being a "blaggard" label since the black haired Scotch were probably lowland Scotch?English on the Plantation in the North displacing the natives.
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Black Irish are distinctive enough to be classified as far outside the normal range of any northern-European ethnic group in that they are born with perfectly jet-black hair which is generally straight or only slightly curled. Also, almond-shaped eyes are seen occasionally among the Irish. For instance; Frank McCourt reported that his schoolmates used to tease him, calling him ?squint-eyed Jap.? You?d think someone would put two and two together, especially since every now and then Asian women--many of whom never saw a white man in their lives--living in remote parts of Western China and Outer Mongolia to this day sometimes give birth to blue-eyed babies, and sometimes even babies with red hair and freckles.
If that isn?t enough, however, recently archeologists have uncovered Celtic mummies buried in the deserts of Western China.
http://www.upenn.edu/pennnews/features/1997/090997/mummies.html
It would be nearly impossible for a Celtic population, what with their horses and wagons and nomadic tendencies, not to have traded with the Chinese and establish colonies in far-off places, then routinely intermarry and take their families back to the west coast of Europe.
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The dark irish are directly linked to the dark britons, silures, who inhabited the west coast of britain and ireland since the last ice age.
They were described as having black curly hair by tacitus and strabo, and are regularly referrred to as the "aboriginies of britain". They migrated from the area now known as libya or north africa, near carthage some 10-15000 years ago. Straight black hair is a mixture of indo-european (germanic) and indo-african (indiginous britons)
They traded with most of europe before successive germanic invasions, blond, red and ginger blue eyed peoples.
The people were pushed over to the west coast of ireland to maintain the freedom they enjoyed.
There is a castle and ploughed land on the west coast of mayo that dates back some 7000years, the oldest in europe.
Farming and sheep came from the middle east. The majority of stone circles are in north africa. The theory goes that western britain and ireland was a place that middle eatern and north african farmers used to grow livestock and ship back for a large profit.
Profit is easily achievable by looking at the amount of grazing land in the middle east is minimal while ireland is green and lush. Makes good business sense.
Ireland was not covered by an ice sheet, the ground is too soft today compared to the rest of britain.
Refering to an old irish race as "black" in a derogatory sense, shows how many nazi sympathisers lived in ireland and the legacy lives on in ignorant comments.
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In my family the term "Black Irish" was used to denote highland Scots who worked as gallowglass mercenaries. It was believed they spoke either scots or Scots Gaelic and that they kept highland customs of dress and in fact, considered themselves Scottish not Irish or British. They came into coflict with their neighbors be- cause of their general loyalty to the Stewart Dinasty They were seperated from the Green Irish often by religion and from the Orange Irish lack of loyalty to the crown (hence they were Blackguards).
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The name Black irish in my family seems to be portrayed as a small history lesson: long ago the was a great ship of Spaniards and their boat crashed along an Irish coast. Supposedly they interbred and we now have Spanish-Irish. I am very Spanish and Irish myself. It could be true.
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My family is black irish and the explanation given to me is they were slaves taken by neil of the nine hostages on a raiding party in Spain that intermarried with the Irish.
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They don't really exist. It's just a superstition. Originally Ireland was populated by a people called the Fir bolg, when they were replaced by a crowd called the Tuath de denaan (or something like that) they became described as black. Later explanations revolve around the Spanish armada and descendents of survivors but theres no evidence for it. Another explanation is the old english belief that irish were white negroes and black people in turn were toasted irish.
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My family name is Dwyer, which means black and tawny (an orange-brown color). The name is in its old Gaelic form over a thousand years old. Though the date does seem to coincide with the general height of the Islamic Empire. I don't know if that qualifies me as black Irish, but the concept of some Irish people being called black or dark in color predates some of the stories I am reading here. The color possibly refers to hair color.
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Ever since i was little i was always told that i was black irish, yes i am caucasion but i was always told that irish people with black/ dark brown hair with dark blue eyes were always refured to as the black irish. But outside of my family i have never heard of the term because when you hear the word irish you automatically think red hair with green eyes and freckles
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I have black hair and most other people in Ireland have black or dark hair
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Well, judging by the entries here, the term is quite current. My mum's family refer to themselves as 'Black Irish' and its nothing to do with any African connection. They are either descendants of the Fir Bolg (Iberian Celts) or the Scots settlers who were planted in the North. Like a previous poster, I'm told it refers to Irish people with black or dark brown hair with dark blue eyes. Whenever mum goes to Spain or Italy on holiday, and gets a bit of sun, she always has local people come up to her and talk to her in their own language! But this makes me lean towards the Iberian Celt explanation. I am not American, and the term Black Irish is widely used among the Irish community in Scotland!
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Genetics is helping solve a lot of misteries and evaluate if some myths are based on reality or not. Here is what this link says:
http://www.innovations-report.com/html/reports/life_sciences/report-38766.html
By studying mitochondrial DNA, which is passed from mother to child, researchers have found that most of the actual European inhabitants seem to have come from re-expansion of hunter-gatherers populations, which have migrated from Iberia, Europe after the end of the last Ice Age reports an article in the January issue of Genome Research.
http://www.enter.net/~torve/trogholm/wonder/indoeuropean/indoeuropean3.html
This other suggests that the goidelic branch of Celtic languages might have come from Spain. In other words Black Irish might come from Spain, along with the "non-black" Irish... since genetically Irish are very close to actual Iberians including Basques and it seems that the Viking invaders might not have changed the genetic map of Ireland probably because they were a few of them. ?Did the Spanish interbread with the Irish as some people say here? No because when this people came from the Iberian peninsula after the Age Ice THERE WERE NO IRISH. They become the Irish, black and all.
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I've been called "Dark Irish" or "Black Irish" all my life by a variety of people. Just to confuse this forum further, the details cited to me are my black hair, hazel eyes, and a peculiar grey streak I have over my right eye . My skin ranges from pale to quite dark in the summer. I'm a mix of Swede, Irish, English, and Native American, and I'm obviously American.
I've been told the "Dark Irish" are a result of a group of Romans who occupied the the areas between Dublin and Limerick. Their temporary occupation brought darker skin, black hair, and this curious grey streak. Quite honestly I don't know, just what I've been told.
The "truth" may relate to historical and political reasons, but it seems the modern definition has evolved from a romantic aesthetic definition.
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Based on my research I have found that the most factual explanation for the name black irish is this. The peoples living in northern Spain called the Basques have lived on the Iberian peninsula for centuries. Their beginnings cannot be given exact dates, but many believe them to be from the first cromagnon man. Most information leads us to believe that these people migrated outward, spreading to Ireland. This explanation accounts for the darker hair most commonly found among people who call themselves black irish. This most common physical characteristics aside from the dark hair is a tendency for thick and wavy curls, darker eye color, mostly green, and an olive skin tone. Many black irish have very pale skin, but it is not the pinkish white found among the red-haired, blue-eyed variety of the irish.
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It is important to know that black irish is an american term not used in Ireland.The term refers to the Irish who arrived in America during the great famine of the 1840's. The migrants were poor and rural frequently gaelic speaking and the first wave of emigrents as distinct from settlers to arrrive in America. As such they were in a social class similar t oblacks in cities such as New York and competed for the same work and were refered to as the black irish to distinguish them from the earlier Irish settlers,(half the american revolutionary army were Irish) Similarly the Dutch famine migrants were refered to as the BLACK DUTCH.
The term has no meaning regarding skin ,eye or hair colouring.The Irish are most commonly brown haired varying from dark brown through light to blonde and occasionly red.In this respect they are similar to other northwestern europeans.the myth of Spanish Armada survivors is just that ,a myth. The survivors would have been far too few to affect the gene pool and historic records show that they were dispatched to crown forces for reward. All of north west europe share a genetic lagacy that dates back to a small ice age refuge in northern Iberia .Norhern Spanish,Irish , French ,German and Swedes among others share common phenotypes so hair and eye colour to not considered markers of ethnicity.A point of interest ,dark brown eyes or true black hair are very rare among the Irish as are facial freckles among adults. p.s I'm from Ireland.
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