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Those Middle-Eastern women are only relatively pale, because obviously they are covered all day from head to toe. If they had the freedom to expose themselves as we do, they would be darker than the average white Portuguese person. The skin phototype system was made to compare people skin types by their reaction when exposed to sunlight, skin type IV which is usually Europe's darkest skin type is most commonly found in Southern Europe, but it becomes even more common in the Middle-east! The average Portuguese according to studies made by Candille et al in the GWAS 2012 when comparing them to Italians, Poles, Irish nationals shows that their skin tone when unexposed to sunlight to be not that much different from the people of Poland which is in north-central Europe. The fact that a European has brown eyes doesn't mean that he/she doesn't have the gene for blue/green eyes. Remember light eyes are recessive(weak) on a genetical level
That is the problem. It is about averages, the majority of the Portuguese live in Northern Portugal and are mixed with old Germanic tribes who used to have little empires there.
Look at this population density map of Portugal and know why the average is what it is: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...f_Portugal.PNG
Many people in the hinterland and south, however, get much darker than people from Porto etc.
Of course a person with brown eyes can have recessive genes for light eyes, everybody knows that and that has never been the issue. My point is that regardless of what eye color people actually have, there are Europeans that simply don't have the recessive genes.
You don't have to be a rocket scientist or a student of biological anthropology as I am, to know that European Gypsies who originally came from northern India, have acquired European admixture because they have been residents in Europe for hundreds of years. In fact many of them should not even be called "gypsy" anymore. What kept them apart is not self-segregation, rather is rejection and racism on the part of Europeans. The Nazi regime for example still had their evil plan to eradicate them. As a whole they are generally darker than other European groups, whether in skin, hair, eye color, but there are individuals who are blondes, blue-eyed,etc... The same for European Jews who are mostly Jewish only by religious confession, while others do have in fact genetic links to the Middle-East, but are still predominantly European. Jews have been in Europe since the Roman times, plenty intermarried with Europeans. This reveals itself in genetical studies, their general pigmentation which is very diverse, as a whole is similar to that of Southern Europeans. Nevertheless if we compared European Jews, to Jews who remained in the Middle-East, Africa, Asia, the answer is clear, it's among European Jews that light eyes/light skin would more common. Today there are more blonde people in Israel than they would ever be in Iran/anywhere else in that part of Asia, the answer is clear European ancestry is higher among them.
Gypsies and Jews are completely different cases. European Jews and their offspring around the world are indeed often partly or even mostly Germanic or whatever. Gypsies have always stuck to themselves, not only because of racism towards them (which has not always been there, for some time they were even welcome in some places in Europe), but mostly because of self-segregation based on their very particular culture and values.
Even today the government and lots of organizations here are trying to integrate them into society, but most of them just don't want to. They only do high school, often not even that as they drop out early. Their culture is all about getting married and having children, attending college and marrying non-Gypsies is kind of taboo for them. I have seen several documentaries about Gypsies down here. They live in a parallel society...
Gypsies and Jews are completely different cases. European Jews and their offspring around the world are indeed often partly or even mostly Germanic or whatever. Gypsies have always stuck to themselves, not only because of racism towards them (which has not always been there, for some time they were even welcome in some places in Europe), but mostly because of self-segregation based on their very particular culture and values.
Even today the government and lots of organizations here are trying to integrate them into society, but most of them just don't want to. They only do high school, often not even that as they drop out early. Their culture is all about getting married and having children, attending college and marrying non-Gypsies is kind of taboo for them. I have seen several documentaries about Gypsies down here. They live in a parallel society...
You're not fooling any one. Gypsies suffered greatly in Europe, due to the extreme racism they had to face from Europeans. In Eastern Europe, Gypsies lived in ghettos in inhuman conditions.
That is the problem. It is about averages, the majority of the Portuguese live in Northern Portugal and are mixed with old Germanic tribes who used to have little empires there.
Look at this population density map of Portugal and know why the average is what it is: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...f_Portugal.PNG
Many people in the hinterland and south, however, get much darker than people from Porto etc.
Of course a person with brown eyes can have recessive genes for light eyes, everybody knows that and that has never been the issue. My point is that regardless of what eye color people actually have, there are Europeans that simply don't have the recessive genes.
Yes it is about average not extremes. There will always be extremes, just like the average German has most likely medium/light brown to dark blonde hair, blue eyes and a fair skin. This doesn't mean that there are no Germans who are lighter or darker than that. The average gives you a more or less rounded picture. Since the majority of Portuguese live in the north, that's where you find the average, this has nothing to do whether Germanic empires were there or not. Obviously there are probably people in southern Portugal who might be darker, but the difference is not as great as you put it! Portugal over-all is a Mediterranean country.
Gloomy climate gave rise to people with red hair, blue or green eyes and a very white skin with freckles which is extremely sun-sensitive, the frequency is highest in northwestern Europe.
You're not fooling any one. Gypsies suffered greatly in Europe, due to the extreme racism they had to face from Europeans. In Eastern Europe, Gypsies lived in ghettos in inhuman conditions.
Not always. In some areas they were even welcome for some time in history. They did not always suffer from their current bad reputation.
Plus, the racism and segregation not only came from others, but also from themselves towards locals. They are also partly to blame for their indeed often poor lives. When I permanently migrate to another region, continent even in this case, I have to adopt local traditions, languages, etc., else I am condemning myself to a life as an outsider, which makes me very vulnerable as it is easy to tell me apart. Let's be realistic, any people overwhelmingly thinks its culture is the best, so when others move there and don't adopt it, it is like saying I don't like you, which causes rejection.
Yes it is about average not extremes. There will always be extremes, just like the average German has most likely medium/light brown to dark blonde hair, blue eyes and a fair skin. This doesn't mean that there are no Germans who are lighter or darker than that. The average gives you a more or less rounded picture. Since the majority of Portuguese live in the north, that's where you find the average, this has nothing to do whether Germanic empires were there or not. Obviously there are probably people in southern Portugal who might be darker, but the difference is not as great as you put it! Portugal over-all is a Mediterranean country.
Statistically speaking brown eyes are most common in Germany, also not least due to the fact that most Germans live in the southern half, which is ethnically different.
Sorry, you are wrong. It has everything to do with the Germanic tribes which had settled in northern Portugal for centuries and gradually got absorbed in the local gene pool.
And yes, the difference between individuals is huge in Portugal. You will find anything from Nordic to the darkest Caucasians anywhere in the world. I see more of the latter than of the former here in the south. When I lived near Porto it was clearly different.
I was shopping today and saw a couple of very dark people just about an hour ago. Maybe because this is an agricultural areas, so that many people work outside and thus turn that dark. But they also look different otherwise, they seem to be shorter than paler Portuguese in the cities, and they are more slender, not as bulky as many other Portuguese. Some fishermen also look very dark. There can even be a kind of caste system and thus isolation as usually nobody decided to become a fisherman, that job has been passed down for many generations. Similar thing with farmers.
Funny, I have lived here for many years in various parts of the country, and the Portuguese themselves also know the differences, but you as an outsider think you know it better than we do
You're not fooling any one. Gypsies suffered greatly in Europe, due to the extreme racism they had to face from Europeans. In Eastern Europe, Gypsies lived in ghettos in inhuman conditions.
Definitely not in Russian Empire. Russia had a lot of space, so roaming Gypsy's tabors were part of a common landscape in the Western part of the country. They were source of weariness and thievery for local peasants and source of entertainment for Russian gentry, as it has been portrayed in this old classical movie based on Chekhov's novel
and next clip is yet another typical portrayal of Gypsies in Russia.
Yes it is about average not extremes. There will always be extremes, just like the average German has most likely medium/light brown to dark blonde hair, blue eyes and a fair skin.
Germans in Northern part of the country - yes, but Southern Germans look quite different.
Overall if you see enough of Germans from all over the place, you get the idea that they don't have a SINGLE unifying type among them; ( that blue-eyed- blond hair type as a "typical German type" is a result of imagination. Not that it's not there - it's there all right, and most likely it's really a Scandinavian type which is quite prominent among Germans, since Scandinavian tribes settled here and there among *Germans* earlier in history. That's what probably unites them as "one nation" so to speak at the first place. But originally, when you look at Germans from different areas, they come across as people from different and most likely unrelated tribes.
Never did I ever said that all Germans have blonde hair, blue eyes, fair skin, that's a Nazi illusion. North Germany is much lighter-pigmented than South Germany though. The pigmentation of Germany reflects Northern and Central European pigmentation. Over-all, Germans are mostly light-eyed and brown and blonde-haired, with very few redheads here and there. The very north of Germany approaches Scandinavian pigmentation similar to that of southern Denmark, while Southern Germany is similar to Austria, Switzerland, northeastern France. However if we separate regions by regions, then we'll get a different picture.
Last edited by saxonwold; 01-11-2014 at 09:13 PM..
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