 What's the genetic history of Cornwall and its neighbour, Devon? Two historical counties in the south-west of England. Cornwall today is the only region of England that still speaks a Celtic language, Cornish, which is a Barthonic language related to both Welsh and Breton, and historically would have been related to Cumbric and even Pictish. One fascinating aspect when you look at the genetic landscape of Cornwall is that there is a clear genetic distinction between Cornwall and Devon, even though the two counties border each other, and this genetic distinction tracks quite well with the modern boundaries, the county boundaries, today. In fact, the genetic differences between Cornwall and Devon are comparable to, or even greater than, the differences between Northern English samples and Scottish samples. A key explanation for this is that the Saxon influence was much greater in Devon than in Cornwall. Despite the fact that Cornish is one of the six Celtic languages still spoken today, the people of the British House study did not find that there was a single Celtic genetic group. In fact, the Celtic parts of the UK, Scotland and North of Ireland, Wales and Cornwall, are among them was different from each other genetically. For instance, the Cornish are much more genetically similar to other English groups than that are to the Welsh or the Scots. This study also found that there is a notable imprint from Northern France in many parts of the UK, but this is absent in Wales. This suggests that there was a sizable migration of people from Northern France into Britain after the original settlers of Britain following the last Ice Age, but before Roman times. This genetic footprint from Northern France is present in both Cornwall and Devon, and across the UK in general, reaching as far north as Orkney, although it's not really present in Wales. A 2015 study published in Nature essentially looked at the reverse of the previous scenario, looking at Northern France or Brittany and Northern France, and deciphering whether there was a footprint from people from Cornwall or Devon who had moved into that area. The historical sources say that some people from Cornwall and Devon had moved into Northern France into Brittany following the collapse of Roman power in Britain, and obviously the Anglo-Saxon migration, which forced many people, native Britons, to flee Britain, and many went to Brittany and France, taking their Celtic language with them. Hence why people in Brittany speak Breton, one of the six Celtic languages today. This 2015 study did not find any genetic footprint of people from Cornwall and Devon in the samples of people from Brittany in this study. This may be a limitation of the analysis and the sample sets, or it may be a reflection of the fact that it was a very small group of people who moved from Devon and Cornwall into Northern France around 1500 years ago. As we have seen, Cornwall and Devon are not just beautiful places in the world today. They have fascinating histories that speaks to the genetic legacy of migrations over the centuries in that part of the world. Thanks for watching. If you like to support this work through Patreon, buy me a coffee, or donate through PayPal, all the links are in the description below. Subscribe and hit the bell, and tell your friends and family about this channel. Thanks for watching, and I'll speak to you next time.