The 2004 study by Dr Bradley is rather dated now. His conclusions concerning Scots and Irish being descendents of early migrants from Northern Iberia have since been verified in later more detailed studies by Professor Bryan Sykes and Professor Stephen Oppenheimer (both of Oxford University). However, both Sykes and Oppenheimer have concluded that it does not only apply to the Scots and the Irish, but to most of the people of Britain and Ireland, and that the migrations began soon after the ice receded at the end of the last Ice Age between 12,000 and 15,000 years ago.

The more extensive genetic survey by Sykes (over 10,000 samples) reveals that overall, 72.9% of Scotsmen share an ancient Northern Iberian ancestry (ranging from 59.9% in Orkney and Shetland to 83.5% in the Grampian region).

In England the overall figure is 64% sharing ancient Northern Iberian ancestry (ranging from 51.2% in East Anglia to 78.2% in the Southwest, i.e. Cornwall, Devon and West Somerset).

In Wales the overall figure is 83.2% sharing ancient Northern Iberian ancestry (ranging from 78.5% in North Wales to 86.4% in Mid Wales).

When these early migrations occurred, the Celtic languages (Brythonic and Goidelic) did not exist, so the early post-Ice Age migrants may have spoken an early non-Indo-European language similar to the Basque language at that time. However, after a few thousand years a Celtic language established itself in Iberia (Celtiberian), and it is thought that Celtic speech spread to Britain and Ireland either through later smaller-scale migrations from Iberia or from trading links.

One myth that these studies clearly destroy is the one that the English are predominantly of Anglo-Saxon ancestry, and therefore fundamentally different from the Scots, Irish and Welsh. It would seem from the genetic surveys that most English have the same ancient ancestry as the Scots, Irish and Welsh. Therefore the name “England” (meaning ‘land of the Angles’) could be construed as being inappropriate. Similarly the name “Wales” (meaning ‘land of the foreigners’ in Old English) is also inappropriate. Even the name “Scotland” is derived from the name of a minority invading Irish tribe “Scotti” (or ‘Dalriada’), so perhaps a more appropriate name would have been the old one of “Caledonia”.

How does "X Marks the Caledonian" sound?