Talk:Cheddar Man

Problems with this article

U5a is most common in Finland and areas near Finland (not France or Spain). High frequencies are found in Finland, Estonia, Russia (european side), Sweden and especially in Norway. Ancestors of the Cheddar man most likely came from Fennoscandian peninsula or area next to it. Mtdna in european populations:

http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/AJHG/journal/issues/v68n3/002146/002146.tb3.html

On another topic, the article says "the cannibalism practiced in the area". I think that should be rephrased to make it clear that the cannibalism was practiced in the area at the time of cheddar man.

I changed that sentence. Let me know if it's not clear enough. -BlackTerror 14:12, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

The link above no longer works. Should there be a reference in support of the assertion that cannibalism was practised in the area? 139.163.138.15 (talk) 05:50, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

Is Cheddar man a real "fossil" in the true geological sense of the word? Some would say it is simply a well preserved skeleton. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.159.15.46 (talk) 10:47, 26 February 2018 (UTC)

It's a little older than the arbitrary limit of 10,000 years before present. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:17, 26 February 2018 (UTC)

Middle eastern origins

"...may have originated in West Asia"

"...lends extreme credence to the theory that modern-day Britons are not all descended from Middle-Eastern migratory farmers"

These two phrases contradict each other. Grant | Talk 10:33, 1 May 2007 (UTC)

Not when considering that the beginning of agriculture is considered to be much later, and came from the middle-east in another, much later, wave. It's just saying that they are not the "migratory farmers" of that later wave. Nagelfar (talk) 05:21, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

This is completely off topic to the "Cheddar Man" topic. It is well known that Paleolithic Europe was colonized from West Asia around 40 kya, the dedicated entry for that being European early modern humans. It is also well known that this lineage (dubbed "WHG") contributes substantially, but to less than 50%, to most modern European populations, the other significant contributions being EEF (Neolithic) and ANE (Chalcolithic). Cheddar Man is just a data point in this topic. The problem with writing this kind of article based on journalism is that the journalists are going to give a garbled overview of the wider field related to the topic, but our encyclopedic articles should instead try to remain focused on what is WP:DUE. Please discuss Cheddar Man's genome here, but discuss the WHG lineage at West European Hunter-Gatherer, and the general topic of the genetic ancestry of British populations at Genetic history of the British Isles, and then refer to these pages for details. Also avoid using journalistic "references" as much as possible, it is just as easy and much more useful to just cite the original paper directly. All that we need to note here is that Cheddar Man is compatible with WHG. If there are any details on genetic difference to the WHG reference genome, do point them out, but don't go on a tangent explaining what WHG means, let alone how "modern-day Britons are not all descended" from this or that stock (which is true a priori because of the undue weight carried by the all in this sentence). --dab (𒁳) 15:25, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

WHGs were different than Paleolithic Europeans or even only slightly older El Miron cluster. Oranjelo100 (talk) 16:59, 9 February 2018 (UTC)

repeated addition of students name

I noticed that Sarah Bollard the name of one of the students of Adrian Targett had been added to this article. I have removed it as I do not think it this is significant enough to add into an encyclopaedia, but if anyone knows why this should be included could you explain here?— Rod ^talk 11:14, 23 January 2010 (UTC)

Category Mummies

I don't believe that the Cheddar man should be in the category "mummies" if the article states that he was a complete human skeleton. --Your's Truly,
Parasect ^(Discuss) 18:45, 25 December 2010 (UTC)

Yeah, good point. Fixed. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 03:46, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

Sources

I have looked into the sources cited a bit more based on my comments above. Two observations:

• the result that Mesolithic European populations (WHG) appear to have had dark skin and blue eyes dates to 2014 and is already well represented on the relevant Wikipedia articles. There are several Mesolithic genome analyses supporting this, from Spain, Luxembourg, Sweden, and possibly elsewhere, which have been published academically since 2014. They are cited at the appropriate place, in the blue eyes and European early modern humans.
• the 2018 Cheddar Man study appears to align this individual with WHG, which is plausible, but the study has apparently not yet been published(?). The best source we seem to have is this, which seems to imply that this was done for a Channel 4 program. The tendency to publish scientific findings in television programs before they have even been peer-reviewed is absolutely deplorable, and if this is indeed the case here, this needs to be pointed out front and center in the article. --dab (𒁳) 15:53, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

Skin colour

The article claimed that Cheddar Man had black skin even though the sources only say "dark complexion" and "dark skin". According to this article and video on bbc.com, which shows the "official" reconstruction of Cheddar Man, based on the DNA analysis, his skin was brown, not black. I was about to change it, but an IP beat me to it, but just to avoid edit-wars over it I thought I'd post a link to the video here... - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 20:34, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

It may have been me that introduced that term as I saw the Guardian article this morning which said "dark to black skin" and quickly edited the article before going to work, but happy for a consensus term to emerge.— Rod ^talk 20:43, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

I changed it to black, based on the independent article, the citation i added to the previous sentence. I am happy to go with the consensus.-- BOD -- 23:37, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

We really need a recent pic for the article...its a classic example where an image explains it better than words -- BOD -- 23:40, 7 February 2018 (UTC)

The Guardian is not a source. This is about journalists asking "could we even say ... black?" until the scientists go "yes, if you must", hence the headline "ZOMG FIRST BRITON WAS BLACK". If you want encyclopedic information on WHG skin color reconstruction, don't go to journalists. The Cheddar people are just reporting they have found an allele in this skeleton that has already been well described elsewhere. For the description of said allele, go to SLC24A5 and SLC45A2. "Derived immune and ancestral pigmentation allelesin a 7,000-year-old Mesolithic European" Nature, January 2014. doi:10.1038/nature12960 and related publications. [1]: Wilde, S. et al. "Direct evidence for positive selection of skin, hair, and eye pigmentation in Europeans during the last 5,000 y." Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U. S. A. 111 , 4832-4837 (2014).

Whatever you do with this, make sure the discussion is based on actual publications, ignoring journalism. --dab (𒁳) 06:14, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

Yes, if available, academic and peer-reviewed publications are usually the most reliable sources, in fields such as in history, medicine, and science. However reliable non-academic sources may also be used in articles about scholarly issues, if the source, particularly material from high-quality mainstream publications, has a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy. Deciding which sources are appropriate depends on context and availability.-- BOD -- 11:33, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

Unfounded conspiracy claims
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
But the sources in question are essentially tabloids. It’s academically dishonest to claim Cheddar Man had black skin. The same genetic evidence they are basing his darker skin on also applies to modern Europeans such as some Estonians and Southern Europeans, none who would be considered black. Black is specifically being used dishonestly within the context of Africans. To be even more specific, Sub-Saharan black Africans who are worlds apart in cranial features and phenotype from Cheddar Man. Your tabloid source is just globalist establishment propaganda trying to further the elimination of borders and mass importation of dark skin migrants and by convincing the natives that they were “black” they will become more accepting. The timing of this also comes alongside when a member of the royal family is marrying a half Sub-Saharan black African. Tabloids are not reliable sources and I suggest you edit out the reference to black immediately — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2600:387:4:803:0:0:0:88 (talk) 17:42, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

The Telegraph, The Independent, The Guardian, The BBC, The New Scientist, The Natural History Museum and the University of Central London are simply not tabloids. The rest of what you have written is not worthy of a reply.-- BOD -- 20:01, 10 February 2018 (UTC)

Your conspiracy theory that they aren't tabloid,especially the guarding, the bbc and the dailht telepgraph proves they are based on previous tabloid behavior and articles. Elvis is still alive is considered tabloid. and since you didn't have a argument and admitted you were wrong since you didn't address the other argument then yes, they are tabloids and the rest was true aswell.77.53.219.61 (talk) 00:15, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Can haplogroup issue be clarified, please?

Article says:

In 1996 ... Cheddar Man was determined to have belonged to Haplogroup U5 ....

Around 10% of Europeans belong to Haplogroup U5 .... it was suggested that the sequence was from contaminating modern DNA.[7]

The full genome was extracted ... in 2018.[8] The result was compatible with a West European Hunter-Gatherer (WHG[9]) ancestry

Can this please be clarified?

Is it now thought that Cheddar Man really did belong to Haplogroup U5 or really did not belong to this group?

(It's not obvious to the lay reader whether West European Hunter-Gatherer ancestry rules out membership in Haplogroup U5 or is compatible with it.)

thanks -- 189.60.63.116 (talk) 02:18, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

We don't know, because the recent "information" on this is not based on a publication but entirely on a Channel 4 television program. There is nothing to report until they publish their study. To answer your question, I believe U5 is correlated with WHG, but we cannot expect any population, even a Mesolithic one, to have just one haplogroup: this would indicate a very serious population bottleneck in the recent past: so while U5 might "indicate" WHG, neither does it establish it, nor would non-U5 be sufficient to establish non-membership in WHG. Identifying "ancestry" based on haplogroups was just the best they could do back in the 1990s, but we have much better tools now, and the popular reliance on mt/Y haplogroups stands in no relation to the quality of results that can be expected in modern studies. This does not translate to, as the NYT seems to think, "10% of British people are WHG and the remaining 90% aren't WHG". This is just nonsense.

About 10% of Europeans have U5, which might be an indication that roughly 10% of European ancestry is WHG derived. In other words: I would recommend removing the entire "U5" part as a 1990s red herring. Fwiiw, U5 is more frequent (higher than 10%, but still lower than 50%) among Basques and Finns, suggesting that Neolithic and Indo-European admixture was weaker in these regions. --dab (𒁳) 06:16, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

Yes, Basques, Estonians, Sami and Finns are shown to have some of the highest Mesolithic hunter-gatherer ancestry among native Europeans, as per Haak et al, 2015. Also, Western hunter-gatherer, Mesolithic Europeans have only been found to have Y-chromosome haplogroups I and C, with I being specifically only a Caucasoid and European/Eurasian subclade, completely restricted to Europeans and those of European descent.Haak et al, 2015 2607:FEA8:1C5F:ECA3:14C0:C1FE:7247:5A2F (talk) 22:08, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Cheddar Man is not related to modern-day Britons

According to the article by the Natural History Museum, Cheddar Man shares only 10% DNA with modern Britons. This should be added.

I quote: "Modern-day British people share approximately 10% of their genetic ancestry with the European population to which Cheddar Man belonged, but they aren't direct descendants. Current thinking is that the Mesolithic population that Cheddar Man belonged to was mostly replaced by the farmers that migrated into Britain later." — Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.89.94.135 (talk) 13:32, 8 February 2018 (UTC)

Sykes made some rather silly headlines with his suggestion that the local population was the direct descendant of Cheddar Man. Quite possibly, as Cheddar Man died fairly young, he had no direct descendants at all. The NHM article appears to have been written by a "digital data manager" (https://uk.linkedin.com/in/kerrylotzof) rather than an actual scientist, but it makes that point clearly enough. Nevertheless, the genes of the first European population, of which Cheddar Man was a part, are still with us and form about 10% of our genetic make-up. The rest is, as we now say in the article, from later immigrants. I hope this helps. Richard Keatinge (talk) 10:07, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Actually, they are direct descendants, as the average is 10%, but it is more for groups like the Irish, especially from western Ireland, southwestern English, Welsh and Highland Scots, for example, where pre-Celtic ancestry and physical types (swarthier complexion) are more frequent. Indigenous British and Irish have part of their ancestry to the Mesolithic aboriginals. The rest is mostly of Yamna/Indo-European stock, specifically Celtic or Anglo-Saxon, with some also from Neolithic farmers, as per the massive study by Haak at al, 2015. 2607:FEA8:1C5F:ECA3:14C0:C1FE:7247:5A2F (talk) 22:03, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Also, this bust of Cheddar Man is at odds with every other Mesolithic European specimen which show that they had light or olive skin, such as the unveiling of the bust of this Mesolithic Greek girl from a few weeks ago: [2]

He has dark olive skin, but not black, and these artists seem to intentionally have gone against the data of every other Mesolithic specimen, and about the specific markers they are referring to, which produce dark olive skin, not black. His bright blue eyes, wavy hair and facial and skull features are clearly Caucasoid, and actually still seen in some Europeans today with high WHG ancestry like Basques, Irish or Sami. 2607:FEA8:1C5F:ECA3:14C0:C1FE:7247:5A2F (talk) 23:28, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

Well, to correct one misunderstanding: The museum says "10% of their genetic ancestry", which is different from "10% DNA" - indeed, both Cheddar Man and we share 50% of DNA with a banana. About the rest: I'm a bit concerned about using a paper that does not even make a claim about Cheddar Man. It seems to be a case of WP:SYNTH. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:48, 11 February 2018 (UTC)

References

Pre-publication paper and FAQ

At this edit I have rewritten the article on the basis of the NHM's FAQ and their pre-publication paper. I have also used references in those sources. Since the FAQ includes details about the subsequent genetic inflow into the area, and possible natural selection over the last few thousand years, and since some of the blog etc. comment seems confused on the subject, I have included those details in the article. I hope that suits everyone, but if not, do discuss here. Richard Keatinge (talk) 16:33, 12 March 2018 (UTC)

I remain concerned that 50% of this article is not about the actual subject matter. But the has been many edits including and reverting this additional information that it maybe best to let it settle as it is.-- BOD -- 09:57, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for your response. I appreciate your concerns. I reviewed several papers, and also rather too many of the products of distressed people who are having trouble coping with the idea that the earliest Brits, including a proportion of their personal ancestors, were at least quite dark-skinned. On balance, I now feel it's best to include a very brief explanation of what we now understand of the genetic history of Europe in relation to Cheddar Man. The knowledge may not relieve their distress but it might bring some of them to a slightly better understanding of how biology actually works. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:46, 13 March 2018 (UTC)

(Very) dark-skinned inhabitant of Britain

It's pretty definite that he was both of those, and the category Black British seems indisputable. Admittedly he's not a part of the modern population, and doesn't share culture with any modern inhabitant of the British Isles, so another subcategory might be appropriate, aboriginal black British for example. But the fact of (near) blackness and indisputable Britishness make it bizarre to exclude him. Richard Keatinge (talk) 11:50, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

• @Richard Keatinge: Whether Cheddar Man's skin was dark or not is disputed, with a number of scientists saying that it isn't possible to deduce the skin color from the DNA-sample they have, so we shouldn't put too much focus on the alleged dark complexion. And the article should definitely not say that he was black, since not even the scientists who claim they can tell what his skin color was claim that he was black, as can be seen from the "official reconstruction" they presented, which shows a man with brown skin, dark brown wavy hair and clear blue eyes. - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 13:31, 15 March 2018 (UTC)
  • "Black British" is one of those self-designation labels and is for those of " Black origins or heritage". In any case, it would be anachronistic to use such a term, "black" is relatively modern way of labelling people and shouldn't be used for prehistoric populations. Doug Weller talk 14:02, 15 March 2018 (UTC)
    • Which is why I reverted the repeated addition of Category:Black British people to the article... - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 14:11, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

OK, and thanks both of you for engaging. From https://www.biorxiv.org/content/biorxiv/early/2018/02/18/267443.full.pdf, which looks scientifically pretty robust and refers for the relevant science to https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00439-017-1808-5, "Cheddar Man is predicted to have had dark or dark to black skin, blue/green eyes and dark brown possibly black hair". With high probability, he was black-skinned or close to it, and blue-eyed or close to it. And he died, and presumably lived, in the area now called Britain. It would also be odd if he didn't have "black origins and heritage", in fact it's hard to imagine what other origins he could possibly have had. His parents would presumably have resembled him in these respects. Now, I don't think we have added him to the category "Blue-eyed British people", but I can't see any earthly reason why we shouldn't. Or why he shouldn't if he was alive today, tick the census box that says "Colour of eyes: blue". These things are a straightforward description of phenotypic fact (or best guesswork, as in this case). They are not limited by time, by culture, or by a family history of relatively-recent migration from Africa. (Or are they? Are we using a definition of "blue" that has nothing, literally and absolutely nothing, to do with colour? In which case I can only go away and weep at the graveside of the English language.)

Yes, I know that the census hasn't, yet, asked about eye colour. It doesn't carry the same social significance in modern Britain as skin colour does. And I know that identification as "black" or "white" in modern Britain is for those of mixed genetic heritage and intermediate skin shade often a matter of cultural self-identification. I take no issue with that. Cheddar Man is unlikely to have faced any cultural issues of that sort. But the same arguments apply to the colour of eyes as to colour of skin. Cheddar Man was black-skinned by modern definition, he was found in and was presumably from the area now known as Britain, and while he may very well need a new subcategory, it seems as plain as the nose on my face that he was black, British, and black British. Richard Keatinge (talk) 15:34, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

British? How do you know he wasn't an immigrant? That's a serious question. And Britain wasn't an island at that time, he was found with fossils of animals native to mainland Europe who probably moved back and forth seasonally. He was Western European and a hunter-gatherer, but how do we know what else? And although he certainly would have had an African heritage, that might have gone back many generations. He would also have had Neanderthal heritage and they were never in Africa, or to be more precise, Africans don't have Neanderthal heritage. Doug Weller talk 16:26, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks again, also for the reminder not to take this point too seriously. No, I don't know that he wasn't an immigrant, his ancestors within a millennium or so certainly would have been. Nor do I know if he limited his diet to certified 100% British food (insert sidesplitting joke about migratory Cheddar cheese here). But he's taken the trouble to die in the Cheddar Gorge, not that anyone called it that at the time, he didn't live in a hypermobile modern society, and for practical purposes he can be regarded as native. Though not, as you say, to the British Isles, which at that time consisted of Ireland and various minor islands, the modern island of Great Britain being part of the continent of Europe, not that the toponyms "Britain" or "Ireland" were in use then either. But I digress. With high probability, he was native to the area that now forms the largest British isle.

The interesting point about his obvious blackness is precisely that it forces us to consider the definition of the term. No human has a skin colour of "pure black", absorbing all incident visible light. Nor "pure white" either. Therefore, "black" or "white" skin colour is to an extent socially constructed - but, I'd like to suggest, it has a strong basis in observable phenotype. We cannot apply to him any suppositions about recent African ancestry or culture, but it's a fair bet that if he were to dress up in modern clothes and wander down any British street, he'd be identified by passersby as black. After a chat about his origins, I suggest that most of those passersby, plus any census officials, would still label him as black, British, and black British. Though, parenthetically, without any recent African history or culture. Richard Keatinge (talk) 18:06, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

I note the article on Black British starts with a very brief reference to Roman period, the is no reason why it should not now correctly start with Cheddar Man. Cheddar Man maybe the earliest known example, but he belongs to the Category:Black British people -- BOD -- 19:34, 15 March 2018 (UTC)

Would anyone object if I were to add a new subcategory of Category:Black British people, namely Category:Prehistoric Black British people, to this page? Richard Keatinge (talk) 10:40, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

I'd strongly object to it for several reasons:

1. Black British is a modern ethnic group. Anachronistically applying it to a person who lived ten thousand years before that group existed is dubious and totally unsupported by reliable sources (not tabloid coverage etc.) The same logic would apply to Category:Prehistoric English people, etc. – it's self-contradictory.
2. Drawing any connection at all between the Cheddar Man and contemporary Black British people is similarly anachronistic. It's invokes the very modern concept of essential races, which is again dubious and totally unsupported by reliable sources.
3. Per WP:NONDEF. Skin colour is not a defining characteristic of prehistoric remains in Britain. It is an interesting aspect of the phenotype of this one individual.
4. Per WP:SMALLCAT. As far as I know, there are no other articles that would potentially fit into such a category.

– Joe (talk) 11:49, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

I second Joe Roe. This is anachronism - Cheddar man was neither black nor British.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 12:20, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks Joe. Just to make it clear, I noticed that this article was not part of WikiProject archaeology, added the template to this talk page and mentioned this discussion at the project talk page as it is extremely relevant there and could set a precedent. Doug Weller talk 12:00, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks again. Unless my grasp of the English language lets me down, "Black British" is a description of phenotype and population location, which until now could only be applied as far back as the Roman period because no black people were known to have been British before then. To apply it to Cheddar Man (and probably, in due course, to other members of Britain's Mesolithic population) is a straightforward statement of fact, supported by good science (see https://www.biorxiv.org/content/biorxiv/early/2018/02/18/267443.full.pdf, https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00439-017-1808-5).

The Mesolithic western hunter-gatherer population of which Cheddar Man was typical contributes about 10% of the ancestry of that majority of the modern British population who would describe themselves as "white British". Thus the fact of Cheddar Man's dark skin fundamentally challenges, not supports, the modern pseudoscientific concept of essential races. The connection to the modern Black British population is, precisely, phenotype and location. But not recent African ancestry or culture, neither of which is a defining feature of black people.

The only remaining objection is WP:SMALLCAT, a marginal objection as the category does have potential for growth; if this is felt to be cogent the obvious solution, until more British Mesolithic people are subjected to appropriate analysis, would be to include this page in Category:Black British people. Richard Keatinge (talk) 12:32, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Apparently it does let you down. People are not British simply by virtue of being located on the island of Britain, and they are not "black" simply because of the tone of their skin.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 13:12, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

The paper [3] you linked doesn't use the term Black British, or even just Black (capital B/noun form). They are consistent in using phrases like "has dark or black skin", because blackness is far more than a description of a phenotype. So describing the Cheddar Man as Black British is neither a straightforward statement of fact (see the objections above) or supported by good science. Describing people from the classical era as "black" is already stretching it, and this is eight thousand years further removed. – Joe (talk) 13:38, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Object? Yes, certainly, per above. Not so sure about the main category either. Johnbod (talk) 12:50, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

I'm intrigued. Could I ask for your definition of black people, since it seems to be at odds with the article and with reality, perhaps in specific reference to two hypothetical people. One of Australian Aboriginal ancestry, born in Great Britain and brought up there by their biological parents. Another of West African ancestry, born in Britain and brought up from birth by adoptive white parents without significant contact with African culture. Is either of them "black" by your definition? Richard Keatinge (talk) 13:39, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

There is an entire literature on race, on blackness and on black identity in Britain that you could explore to satisfy your curiosity.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 13:53, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Although I am not a professional anthropologist, I do have some awareness of this literature. I would appreciate it if you would apply your knowledge to engage with the issue at hand, namely whether an ancient native of Britain with very dark to black skin can legitimately be labelled either black or British. Or alternatively, whether there is any rational basis for regarding those descriptions as illegitimate, perhaps by limiting "black" to those of recent African ancestry or culture, and "British" to organisms from recorded history. (In which case the publishers of "British Dinosaurs" may need to be told that they have a problem.) Richard Keatinge (talk) 14:06, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

I have applied it above. It cannot. Being black and being british are not mere descriptors of phenotype and place of origin but social categories that make sense to apply to people today, but not to people from 1000 years ago. Making the category it is a bad idea, and you are not helping anyone by pursuing it further.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 14:20, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

To the extent that I can interpret your comment, it seems that you are applying social descriptors that encompass most modern black British people, and asserting that therefore other black British people who don't fall within those social limits are either not black, or not British. Is that what you're saying? It seems a straightforward non sequitur. It also excludes the (few) Roman Britons of demonstrated African ancestry, another result that I cannot regard as anything other than bizarre. Richard Keatinge (talk) 14:39, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

I reiterate my suggestion to familiarize yourself with the literature. But really it is more simple than that. If reliable sources do not describe Cheddar Man as "black british" then neither does wikipedia. So lets pause this discussion untill you present some sources that do exactly that.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 14:52, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

@Richard Keatinge: This discussion is leading nowhere. Several editors, me included, have tried to make you understand that the term Black British has a specific meaning, just like African-American has, and can not be applied to someone from 10K years ago who has only one thing in common with "Black British people", dark skin, and wasn't British since Britain as we know it didn't exist back then (it was a peninsula on a European continent that didn't look anything like Europe looks today...). It's also obvious that your addition of Category:Black British people is not supported by other editors, so why don't you just drop it? - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 14:53, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Correction. This editor Supports the inclusion of Cheddar Man to the Category:Black British people. He was black and living in the area known as Britain for the last 2400 years. -- BOD -- 15:25, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

(edit conflict) I wrote "not supported by other editors", I did not not write "not supported by any other editors", so no correction is needed. Those against adding it clearly outweigh those in favour of adding it. - Tom | Thomas.W ^talk 15:36, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

@Maunus: you didn't mean 1000 years! @Bodney: he lived here long before it was known as Britain. Doug Weller talk 15:34, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

That's not at all a useful argument. The article is of course in Category:Stone Age Britain. Please don't join the ranks of the idiots who pop up the whole time objecting to calling Michelangelo etc "Italian". Johnbod (talk) 16:25, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

I was responding to Bodney's comment about 2400 years, which I think was a response to Maunus's 1000 years error. But would you call Julius Caesar an Italian? My point about Cheddar man is we don't know where he came from. He might have come from Doggerland. Does anyone know how far hunter-gatherers might have travelled during this period? Doug Weller talk 16:55, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

He was obviously a Roman first, but plenty of his contemporaries are called Italian. Caesar famously invaded Italia by crossing the Rubicon. Johnbod (talk) 18:14, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

No that was one 0 too few.·maunus · snunɐɯ· 15:50, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Thanks Bodney, but Tom's advice is good, since we are clearly not getting a consensus for a reality-based definition. Or for a meaningful discussion of it. I have even failed to tease out what limits other editors are using for "black" and "British". They may wish to rewrite the article Black British, and indeed much of the anthropological literature on the subject, so that it actively excludes a minority of actual black British people. I'll leave that to them. Until I see any signs of changing consensus, I will drop the point. Richard Keatinge (talk) 15:35, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Black British people are people who identify, or are commonly labelled by others, as Black British. That is the very simple "reality-based" definition used in our article Black British and the vast majority of the relevant anthropological/sociological literature (which you profess to have read). The Cheddar Man was only "black" if you pointedly adopt a reductive and antiquated definition of blackness. – Joe (talk) 16:08, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Was Julius Caesar an Italian? Well, by some chronocentric definitions, relating to a specific concatenation of genetic, phenotypic, and social circumstances, no, by other definitions, yes. So, to categorize him as Italian would be reasonable, though some people might have said he didn't fit within their normal personal definition and others might simply have found the issue irrelevant to the concepts they routinely used. Nevertheless, to state that someone born and nurtured within the Italian peninsula definitely wasn't Italian at all would strike me as - peculiar. Now, when we're studying modern British sociology such a limited definition of blackness is useful and it's usually the only definition we need. It only becomes a problem when you over-interpret a rigid version of that definition to exclude some actual black British people... I'll drop it. Richard Keatinge (talk) 18:13, 16 March 2018 (UTC)

Not to restart this discussion, but Cheddar Man was not "black" in the modern term. His skin phenotype was either "dark to very dark" brown. He was not sub-Saharan African in any sense of the word, and was not "black British" either, which refers to modern British citizens of sub-Saharan African descent whose ancestors have only been in Britain for 150 - 200 years at most, with the majority only arriving in the past 50 years. Western Hunter Gatherers were, and are (as people like Estonians and Sami still today have most of their ancestry from them) European, and Caucasoid. He had blue eyes, while modern black, sub-Saharan African Negroid and Capoid) descended people do not. He had wavy hair, not kinky hair as modern black British, or black sub-Saharan Africans do. He was not African or Middle Eastern of any legitimate sense either. Western hunter-gatherers had been in Europe for 45,000 to 20,000 years!!! They were also part Neanderthal. And they had been genetically isolated from the ancestors of modern black Africans for anywhere between 70,000 and 100,000 years (and far more in terms of the Neanderthal component, which modern people of black African ancestry do not possess). Cheddar Man in fact, genetically, is far less African than later Neolithic and Bronze Age pale-skinned Europeans are. His physical features are not found in modern Black British or black people either. His skull size and shape, his facial features, his blue eyes, his wavy hair and his genetics are only found in modern indigenous Europeans or those of European ancestry, since Western-hunter gatherer genetics of this population are not found in sub-Saharan Africans. Those with ancestry to the population of Cheddar Man have light skin today, and only they have facial and skull features from that population. Those who most look like Cheddar Man in appearance are modern light-skinned Irish, Highland Scots, Welsh and West Country English (Somerset, Devon, Dorset, Cornwall), or those with the highest WHG ancestry like Estonians.

Furthermore, his skin pigmentation was not black. Even the pigmentation in the Cheddar Man bust is closest to that seen in modern day peoples of India, not Africa. Are Indians black??? Obviously not. Are Tamils and other Dravidians black??? Obviously not. Would any intelligent person call a Tamil or other Indian, or a very dark Arab, in Britain today black?? Of course not. Even Australian aborigines and Papuans and Negritos are not "black" in the way sub-Saharan Africans or 'black British' are. They are genetically and physically extremely different. Physical appearance is not just about skin pigmentation. It is about head size and shape (see human skull, cephalic index, etc.), facial features, eye colour, hair colour, hair texture and a plethora of other attributes. Cheddar Man does not look at all like ANY modern black person or black person of sub-Saharan origins. Also, the only people in the world to have truly black (extremely dark) skin are some sub-Saharan Africans like the Nilotic peoples, and also Pygmies and extremely dark people of western Africa.

The only people in England today who have genetic links with Cheddar Man are those who are indigenous and now light skinned. Modern 'black British' who are of sub-Saharan African ancestry have not had any genetic connection to the WHG population that Cheddar Man was part of for 70,000 - 100,000 years, while not having any genetic connection to the partial Neanderthal ancestry of Cheddar Man. Only modern indigenous Europeans or people of European ancestry do, even though they now have lighter skin than Cheddar Man did in the Mesolithic. Libertas et Veritas (talk) 19:42, 17 March 2018 (UTC)

With regards to Julius Caesar, that is not a valid comparison at all. Julius Caesar shared much of the same genetics as modern indigenous Italians, the same language (Italian is the closest language to Latin, and Latin is still spoken in Vatican City), and had a similar culture (Italian culture derives almost entirely from the Latin and the Italic, especially in the Latium).

Cheddar Man, on the contrast, has very little to no cultural link, no linguistic link and abosolutely ZERO genetic link with modern 'black British' or African people in Britain, or people of black African descent, and hadn't for 70,000 to 100,000 years. Cheddar Man DOES have a larger (though still very small) cultural, linguistic (there is a Mesolithic and Neolithic substrate in Celtic languages like Irish Gaelic and Welsh) and certainly a strong genetic link with modern light skinned ('White British' in census categories), indigenous Anglo-Celtic British peoples like the English, and especially the Irish and Welsh who partially descend from the Western hunter-gatherer population of Mesolithic Europe. Libertas et Veritas (talk) 19:49, 17 March 2018 (UTC)