How a late-blossoming classics don became Britain’s most beloved intellectual

Re:How a late-blossoming classics don became Britain’s most ... by bergoid on Wednesday January 31, 2018 @07:54AM (#16273447)

> We have no reliable evidence regarding what proportion of Roman Britain was "black". We have good historical evidence that there were Romans present in Britain who we'd these days describe as black (e.g. an Ethiopian soldier garrisoning Hadrian's wall).

That "evidence" consist of one fleeting mention in a biography about Septimius Severus.

> For 101 reasons, the genetic evidence is not very informative, and certainly can't be used to justify that claim that Africans were a "statistically insignificant subgroup"

The lack of evidence (genetic or historical) puts an upper bound on the proportion of subsaharan Africans in Roman Britain that is several orders of magnitude lower than the BBC animated cartoon suggests.

> As Beard points out, even Norman DNA is not very well represented in the modern population, and we know for sure that plenty of Normans came over as a result of the Norman invasion.

For the presence of the Normans there is plenty of historical evidence. For the presence of subsaharan Africans there is just about nothing. So we should stick to the null hypothesis.

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Re:How a late-blossoming classics don became Britain’s most ... by foldr on Wednesday January 31, 2018 @08:03AM (#16273486)

There's quite a bit more evidence than that:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-...

>The lack of evidence (genetic or historical) puts an upper bound on the proportion of subsaharan Africans in Roman Britain

It does no such thing. Can you point to any reputable scholar who is prepared to state such an "upper bound"?

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Re:How a late-blossoming classics don became Britain’s most ... by bergoid on Wednesday January 31, 2018 @08:27AM (#16273629)

> There's quite a bit more evidence than that: > http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1464209/Borders-folk-...

A unit of "Moors". Again, Mediterranean looking North Africans. Despite the misleading title.

> It does no such thing. Can you point to any reputable scholar who is prepared to state such an "upper bound"?

Of course not. The evidence is so thin it wasn't even up for useful scholarly debate.

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Re:How a late-blossoming classics don became Britain’s most ... by foldr on Wednesday January 31, 2018 @08:30AM (#16273642)

There are plenty of people in North Africa who have dark skin. See e.g. the following photo that vidarh linked to in another comment:

https://www.flickr.com/photos/ingetjetadros/4603950662

The term "Moor" does not translate precisely to any modern ethnic term, and is perfectly compatible with dark skin. In fact, the article notes that "The unit is likely to have been composed of Berbers from North Africa, but may also have had darker-skinned soldiers from Nubia."

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