You looked very "Eastern European/Jewish" to me when I met you a few years ago--think it's your darkish coloring, and all that hair, of which I'm *still* jealous. <g> Although not of Scandinavian extraction in the *least,* I did grow up in an area settled by a lot of Norwegians, and my family (of generally British Isles extraction ranging from 1 to 4 centuries in the US) did NOT look like my neighbors, who tended to be tall, very blonde, and with that fair skin blondes get. With me, it was even more noticeable than the rest of the family, as I seem to have reverted to some odd combination of recessives (very fair skin with a strong tendency to freckle and blush, blue eyes and dark hair). It wasn't until I went to Ireland a few years ago, that I actually saw a lot of people whom I resembled--it was both odd, and really cool, to see folks with the same kind of coloring, height, etc. I figure I'm just a genetic quirk combining various Irish ancestors (and perhaps the Scots side as well). A couple of friends in my local SCA group are half generic American and half Syrian, and the range of skin tones, hair color/type, and other facial features in the family is actually quite various. I've never figured out quite what ethnic type I would best suit, historical costuming-wise. My particular genetic pool wasn't much painted or portraited ;o). The closest I've come is some of those 16th c. Flemish marketwomen in the genre paintings. --Sue
----- Original Message ----- From: "Robin Netherton" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: "Historical Costume" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, March 12, 2006 11:28 AM Subject: [h-cost] European ancestors (was: Danish ancestors) > > On Sun, 12 Mar 2006, Bjarne og Leif Drews wrote: > > > Yes in the end all you australian and american, would all be european > > origin. > > Well, um, no, not really. 200 years ago, almost true in the US (but there > were still Native Americans and some Africans). Now add the East Asian, > South Asian, Middle Eastern, South American, Pacific Islander, etc. and > the US population is well on its way to being majority non-European -- > can't remember the last time I heard a demographic prediction of what year > that would occur, but it's not far off. > > Of course every such prediction makes sense only on paper, because in > reality intermarrying gives a lot of people here part-European part-other > ancestry. > > Getting this back to costume: This came up on the list a few years ago, > when we were discussing the typical facial characteristics associated with > particular European historical populations, and how historic > costumes/headdress styles generally developed to flatter the dominant > facial "look" of the local population (e.g. Italian, Germanic, Russian, > Flemish) -- something especially true for Medieval and Renaissance periods > when regional populations were mostly homogeneous. In the US, there is no > dominant "look," and indeed many people here do not have features that can > be uniformly compared to any one particular historic population because > most of us have a mix -- even if it's a mix of various European heritages. > > As someone pointed out at that time, the difference is noticeable when you > look at a group portrait of a European re-enactment group, when pretty > much everyone in the picture is from the same general gene pool, and it's > close to the same gene pool as the population they're re-enacting. Then > compare that with an American re-enactment group; even if everyone's > dressed to the same place/period, their faces show a huge variety of > features, colors, etc. It's something I've found that the Europeans take > for granted because they're used to looking at the same general type of > faces every day. > > Yes, this is changing in much of Europe now, particularly in the larger > cities, but genetically the mixing is way behind what we see in the > States, and it takes a few generations to get a mix significant enough to > affect the overall visual look of a group. Often in a specific locally > based European re-enactment group you can pick out a couple of outliers -- > in the American groups all the faces are different from all the others. > > It is my costuming bane that I have a face that is Middle Eastern filtered > through Russian, which means I look best in Italian, ethnic Greek, and of > course Russian costume ... none of which I am remotely interested in. No, > I had to get interested in Franco-Flemish, me with the tiny forehead and > heavy dark brows and pointy chin... > > --Robin > > _______________________________________________ > h-costume mailing list > [email protected] > http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list [email protected] http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
