The Fomorians
There are many oblique references to the presence of Black people in ancient Ireland. Ancient Irish mythology refers to the original inhabitants of the island as being a giant, sea-faring people called the Fomorians (Fomors), which means “dark of the sea”. According to the ancient lore, they were a cushitic people from the African continent. Often depicted as demons, they defeated the first few incoming waves of invaders, but could not defeat the Firbolgs, who settled the land and lived side-by-side with the native Fomors.
Those myths may have a factual historical basis. It is proposed that the Formorians were a real people who were in all likelihood sailors from the African continent.
Two more invasions, the first led by the godly Tuatha de Danaan, and the second by the Celtic Milesians, took control of Ireland, mixing together with the Fomorians until they were no more.
There are credible sources for the African association with Ireland. The most likely of these is that they were Phoenicians and/or Egyptians. The Phoenicians were Canaanites, which came from the line of Ham. Ham is the mythological ancestor of the Black nation.
The Phoenicians were also well-known for their sailing skills, and are said to have traveled to the British Isles, which they called the “Tin Islands”. Perhaps, before Ireland was a Celtic domain, which it wasn’t until a few centuries BCE, the Phoenicians colonized it. It is noteworthy that the name Fomorians sounds a bit like Phoenicians.
There is also a legend that an Egyptian princess, Scota, left Egypt with some followers and journeyed to Ireland. Legend has it that Egyptians left many ancient tin mines all over Britain but especially Ireland which was their major source of the valuable metal.
Another idea is that they were Taureg Berbers. The Berber language is Hamitic, and the Berber people live in an area from which travel to Ireland would be easily accessible. The Berbers perhaps set sail from western Morocco, and settled on Ireland before the Celts, making it their new home.
Moorish Science Temple founder Drew Ali teaches that Ireland was once part of a Moorish empire, and that the Irish are a Moorish people. Perhaps there is a common root between the “moor” sound in Fomor and the word Moor?
Selkies and Half-Breeds
Another Irish legend tells of the Selkies, a sort-of “wereseal” that is a seal during day, but a human by nightfall. Sometimes, in an Irish family of fair-skinned, light-haired people, a child is born with dark hair eyes, and skin, and is called a Selkie.
The concept of the Selkies appears to make subliminal reference to the half-breed children that resulted from the extensive miscegenation that occurred between the Celts and the dark skinned original inhabitants that they had met upon their arrival in Ireland.
Many people of Irish descent have distant and recent African roots, and these features can still be seen in the people and in the culture. There are some Irish people with Afros (just like Andre the Giant a late continental European wrestler with afro-hair). In Southern Ireland, some people, referred to as “Black Irish”, are noted for their strikingly dark features, as opposed to the fair-skinned, light-haired north.
Although many Irish descendants are particularly pale, they do have pronounced Africoid facial features, as well as dark brown eyes, and dark brown hair that is sort-of kinky, especially in moist conditions. A sub race of the Irish called the Bronn are noticeably Mediterranean (read: African) in features especially their hair.
In addition to all of this, Celtic music is distinctly different from the rest of Europe, and easily comparable to African music.
Black, Viking and Irish
Unlike Scotland and England, Ireland was never colonized by the Romans. As a result, Ireland remained relatively isolated.
The Vikings established port cities like Dublin. The Viking texts left stories and descriptions of African soldiers captured in Ireland whom they called blaumen[blue-men].
Most Viking references to ”black” in Norse would have signified having black hair as opposed to skin color but blaumen meant black skinned. Most of these blaumen were captured soliders from Moorish Spain. It was observed that:
“A prominent Viking of the eleventh century was Thorhall, who was aboard the ship that carried the early Vikings to the shores of North America. Thorhall was “the huntsman in summer, and in winter the steward of Eric the Red. He was, it is said, a large man, and strong, black, and like a giant, silent, and foul-mouthed in his speech, and always egged on Eric to the worst; he was a bad Christian.””
“Another Viking, more notable than Thorhall, was Earl Thorfinn, “the most distinguished of all the earls in the Islands.” Thorfinn ruled over nine earldoms in Scotland and Ireland, and died at the age of seventy-five. His widow married the king of Scotland. Thorfinn was described as “one of the largest men in point of stature, and ugly, sharp featured, and somewhat tawny, and the most martial looking man… It has been related that he was the foremost of all his men.””
What about Scotland and Wales?
“Any comprehensive account of the African presence in early Europe should include England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and Scandinavia. The history and legends of Scotland confirm the existence of “purely Black people.” We see one of them in the person of Kenneth the Niger. During the tenth century Kenneth the Niger ruled over three provinces in the Scottish Highlands.
The historical and literary traditions of Wales reflect similar beliefs. According to Gwyn Jones (perhaps the world’s leading authority on the subject), to the Welsh chroniclers, “The Danes coming in by way of England and the Norwegians by way of Ireland were pretty well all black: Black Gentiles, Black Norsemen, Black Host.””
Ogu Eji Ofo Annu
Sources:
Ancient And Modern Britons, by David Mac Ritchie
Nature Knows No Color-Line, by J.A. Rogers
to waverleyman
First of all can you actually read a post before you comment on it.
Secondly I never claimed that the word slave (taken from slav) originated in Africa. I said that Slavic peoples were enslaved and brought to Africa. The word itself is suspected to have developed in the Iberian peninsula where these peoples were shipped from, or possibly by those who captured them.
I never claimed that slavery in Africa was “same as” or “worse” than the slavery that developed during the Atlantic Slave Trade. I believe I made quite clear that the Atlantic Slave Trade changed the meaning of slavery and the beliefs that seemed to go with it (ie the creation of the belief in different “races” in humanity). But regardless of this, slavery has always been an evil. And to your belief that a POW status seems beter than a slave…….. well ask those who are innocently held against all international laws in Guantanamo Bay. But if the slaves in Africa were really eventually given their freedom as you say, why are the slave of Africa today born in to servitude with no chance of being free? ( http://fading-hope.blog-city.com/modern_slavery.htm) Also you convieniently forget about the millenia that African slaves were traded to the Arabian peoples. I don’t have many facts about the fate of these slaves but if you are going to say that they also recieved their freedom and “human rights” please quote me your sources of the information.
You also say “… and by the belief that African people were sub human property to be treated as such. ” This is very true. What you didn’t research was the fact that the Irish were considered sub-human untill fairly
recent times. The Irish were’t even considered “white” untill the 1900s
Your most flawed reference to my post……”and there is no evidence that they were more expensive”. I said in my previous post ( and will do again) Irish slaves were CHEAPER than African slaves. African slaves were bought from African traders. Irish slaves were just kidnapped off the land (therefore cost next to nothing). In the heights of the Atlantic slave Trade African slaves cost between £20-£50 while an Irish slave cost about £5.
The ill treatment I referred to has been documented. The reason why the Irish slaves were more ill treated than the African was because of the price. If you badly maim or kill a £5 Irish slave, its not as bad as maiming and killing a £20-£50 African slave. The difference in treatment was purly based on economics. In the later stages of slavery African slaves became cheaper and their treatment worsened as well.
If you want to check my sources, there is a short list at the bottom of my post.
As the subject of Irish slavery has been “brushed under the carpet” it is very hard to find many facts and figures. Unlike the trade of African slaves, the trading of Irish slaves has not been well documented, but the evidence is there. If anyone else here has any information on it please share.
And for people like Waverleyman. I don’t want to argue about who was the worse treated slave or who captured who or where the most slaves were sent etc. Instead we should realize we have a lot more in common than we may of previously believed. When I see the way Irish and African people act around each other in Ireland I wonder how they would treat each other if the had full knowledge of our shared histories. And if “Afro” Americans and “Irish” Americans knew. Maybe they would learn a new respect for each other.
But there would always be the few ignorant racists who can only focus on whats different.
http://www.raceandhistory.com/cgi-bin/forum/webbbs_config.pl/noframes/read/1638
http://republican-news.org/archive/1997/February20/20stkt.html
http://www.giftofireland.com/IrishSlaves.htm
http://www.wvwnews.net/story.php?id=396
http://www.understandingrace.org/history/society/colonial_exp.html
The word slave in the English language originates from the Middle English sclave, from the Old French esclave, the Medieval Latin sclavus, the early Greek sklabos, from sklabenoi Slavs, of Slavic origin; akin to Old Russian Slovene, an East Slavic tribe.[8][9] The term sclavus originally referred to the Slavs of Eastern and Central Europe, as many of these people had been captured and then sold as slaves.
Thanks for that enlightening peice of History…it makes me ashamed at my own racism, demonstated in the above posts.
I am learning to love and raspect and celebrate all our ancestors, after all it is so amazing that, thru all they would have had to go thru, that we are here at all…a tribute to the human spirit, what strength, tenacity and pure indomitable survival skills and self sacrifice they must have demonstated for our very existance today
Blesssings and Love
Sistren Nyah I
A differnt approach to history, not one that I have ever heard beforeGrave maintenance and Care – Ireland!
Greetings Ises in the Name Of Jah Rastafari.
InI find these reasonings crucial and Issential to overstand eachothers views these discussions as heated as they become at times show InI that everyone one has some basic knowledge of the past and their hunger for knowledge can only be a good thing some ah we are Blessed to have had the truth revealed while others less fortunate and have to seek a little harder a little longer for it to be revealed Bless up idrens the truth shall set yuh free when we overstand its not about being the most African Irish English blackest whitest rightest wrongest but accepting each other as Individuals showing love and raspect and uniting to make the world a better place for ALL a we to live in
Peace and Love
No race or culture is de facto any better or worse than any other. It is the deeds of those in that race or culture and its leadership that determine that value. I am of Irish descent, and the oppression of the British Crown against Ireland after A.D. 1500 is well documented, but the genetics of the British and their royalty are virtually identical to the Irish despite claims of British superiority. So genetics has little to do with how one group oppresses another, or is superior to others.
Side note: The assertion that the Celts emerged from Russia or Central Europe and moved through western Europe conquering the older, native populations is out-dated knowledge that has been surpassed by recent studies which include genetic studies of European populations emerging from the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). The Celtic populations (R1b1c, et al) while being gentically similar to the Basques spread *eastward* through Europe, not west, from their LGM refuge in Spain. Ireland and Britain were populated from Spain, and were Celtic speaking from the beginning. Ireland preserves the modern example of the ancient Celtic language which survived from before the LGM, a derivation of the Proto-Indoeuropean language spoken before the Dreyfus event which caused the LGM.
egypt is the proud of africa, it has always been, and never needed any other country, look at som pharaos shoes, under their feed you will find pictures of dead nubians, in ancient time egypt was never located to africa, it was asia, everything east of the nile was asia, even abysinnia or parts of it, at least the axumite kingdom, the axumites hated the egyptians and nubians, thats why they destroyed meroe( under king ezana around 350ad) jus remind the 3 indias… if they were black or white it doesnt mind, it only minds to racists, ethiopians(sudanese) are egyptians in origin(kush=egypt). the sons of noah, started from where? the north! kush originated in egypt(between aswan/abusimbel) so dont run com talk shit about addis ababa, which has no history at all, this is som rasta shit, no serious thing, there is no city representing africa, only for racists, even black people, hating other african countries, like nowadays ethiopia does.. each city represents africa, and addis ababa is not on top for shure, you ever been to addis ababa? if you say it represents africa, youre a fool, go look around it, its a shame for africa..the city itself and its people, peer bandits and racists…nowadays ethiopians are stealing the glory from egypt, forgetting that all their culture, language, music… came from there, because most of them are arabs nowadays, and if they are not arabs, they are not black enuff…som people here have really big knowledge, but dem blinded by their skincolour…as sombody said before me, no race no better than no race…intellectual fools