I heard that sometime in the 15th or 16th century, a naval battle between Great Britain and Spain resulted in the Spanish Armada being decimated, with surviving Spanish sailors taking refuge in Ireland. After some years of mixing between Spanish men and Irish women, there resulted an ethnic group known as 'Black Irish': Irish people with Mediterranean features. Is this true, or just an urban legend?
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Name : C19203, Gender : Male, Race : Black/African American, Age : 35, City : Pontiac, State : MI Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper class, Although the term black Irish isn't widely used it is true that the spanish armada did land in Ireland, Most Irish people from the Dublin area do tend to have dark features as well, however this is due to many other factors and can't be put down to just the spanish. for instance the Irish have always been a travelling nation and many darker (non celtic looking) Irish people can trace roots back to italian and romany blood (Like my family).
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Name : Tom, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 27, City : London, State : NA Country : United Kingdom, Occupation : Architect, Education level : 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, No, urban legend!! The term 'black irish' refers to those who hated catholics (or protestants - i forgot which)It reveals the religious differences NOT racial differences.
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Name : Jay20859, City : New York, State : NY Country : United States, I frankly wonder how much that story, if true, has been seized on by whites with someone Black or Indian in their family tree to try and explain away their darker hair or skin to fellow whites. Because the number of people, especially white Southerners, who claim that ancestry is way out of proportion to what a few hundred Spaniards four centuries ago could have done.
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Name : ACC25088, Race : Mexican and American Indian, City : Phoenix, State : AZ Country : United States, Occupation : Teacher, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, A friend of mine told me she 'black Irish', but she was born of Irish parents in London. Yes, your story is correct. But my friend is white-skinned, with jet-black hair.
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Name : Kent26466, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Episcopalian, City : Sydney, State : NA Country : Australia, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, Not so much an 'urban legend' as a long standing myth. The only bizarre feature of the so-called 'Black Irish' is typically just black hair. Granted there are quite a few variations of hair-eye-skin coloration within Ireland, the fact that these people are generally limited to pale tones has made the variations notable. Ireland's long-standing ethnically insular nature (though changing) has been noted by outsiders, and some presume that typical European immigration/emigration somehow skipped this place. All the tones of human coloration found in Western and Northern Europe can be found in Ireland. Those odd dark shades of Irish are now typically refered to as 'Black Irish' colloquially. But note, in America there are slightly different uses. This phrase has also been used to describe persons of both Irish and Italian or Spanish descent (like Eamon deValera), especially those with Irish surnames. Further, I have known this phrase to be used by African-Americans with Irish surnames, but wholely in a humorous manner. http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FA0F17FD3C550C748DDDAA0894DB404482
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Name : D31853, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Catholic, Age : 27, City : Brookyn, State : NY Country : United States, Education level : 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, I'm not sure about how the term developed. But I have heard people describe themselves as Black Irish when they mean they have pale skin and black hair, and either dark or blue eyes. Here's a short article about it: http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a930730.html
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Name : A24992, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 41, City : Philadelphia, State : PA Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper middle class, Yes, it is a myth I'm guilty of spreading, because I'm of partial Irish descent but people consistently think I am Greek or Lebanese. The Armada thing may well be just a romantic explanation. All I can say for certain, after having a look at web resources that cast doubt on the Spanish Armada story, is that I do appear to have Mediterranean features, and so did many Irish in Dublin when I visited there. I would say there are slight differences in our features than Greeks or Lebanese, however. My father is even darker than I am. He was almost arrested a few times when he visited Israel in the 60s, because they thought he was an Arab. However, the web-based comments merely state that the Spanish sailors were largely slaughtered, or ould have died out or only stayed for a small amount of time in Ireland. Honestly, I wonder how they could be sure of this. The West Coast of Ireland was a pretty wild and inhospitable place at the time. And many Irish records were destroyed in the uprisings in the early 20th century. Another idea is that the dark inhabitants may be aboriginal ancestors from before the Celts arrived, early Celts, or that they may be descendants of Moorish traders. One comment was that 'Black Irish' is mainly an American term, however, I can report that it is used in Australia and has been around for a while.
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Name : Ben S., Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Gay, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : New Age/Metaphysical, Age : 35, City : Melbourne, State : NA Country : Australia, Occupation : corrections officer, Education level : 4 Years of College, Social class : Lower middle class, I don't think so. I found a source that says 'that its origin lies in borrowing the color of the reason for the flood of Irish immigrants into the USA in the 19th-century - flight from the Black Blight - the Potato Famine of Black '47, a memory seared into the consciousness of the expatriate Irish who survived in America.' This is a term that was used fairly exclusively in the US and began around the time of the mass immigration from Ireland during the famine.
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Name : CP31874, Gender : F, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 33, City : Broomfield, State : CO Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, The once well-known pop singer Samantha Mumba is
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Name : Anonymous23728, Gender : F, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : Black/African American, Religion : Christian, Age : 15, City : Anonymous, State : WA Country : United States, Occupation : High School Student, Education level : Less than High School Diploma, Social class : Upper class, This is a legend. I am going mainly by Garrett Mattingley's classic account 'The Defeat of the Spanish Armada'. While it is true that several Spanish warships were wrecked on the Irish coast while trying to get back to Spain, he concludes that at most only a handful of the sailors would have found wives and settled there, so they cannot have influenced the appearance of the people. Many sailors were drowned in the shipwrecks, many were massacred by the English who controlled Ireland at that time, since they did not want to take the risk of holding a large number of prisoners of war in the politically unstable situation there, but some did escape back to Spain, mainly by way of Scotland which was still independent then. There is a tendency to ascribe anything a bit odd from round the coast of the British Isles to the Spanish Armada.
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Name : Campbell McGregor, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Disability : asperger's syndrome, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Atheist, Age : 43, City : Glasgow, State : NA Country : United Kingdom, Occupation : school crossing patroller, Education level : 4 Years of College, Check out 'The Black Irish Myth' at http://www.darkfiber.com/blackirish/ Also, there are people who actually are a mixture of Black and Irish, eg, the late great Phil Lynott, lead singer of Thin Lizzy.
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Name : Kevin26337, Gender : M, Race : Black/African American, Age : 35, City : Houston, State : TX Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, I'm an American of Irish descent and am always interested in this kind of subject. I have studied Ireland's history quite a bit and I think the 'Black Irish' story is just an urban legend. Here's what I know about it: In 1588, Catholic Spain was in a power struggle with Protestant England for global domination. The Irish, also Catholics, were bitter enemies to the English and had been catching Hell from their richer, stronger neighbors for already 300-some years. Hoping for some kind of salvation, they became commercial and military partners with England's Catholic enemies, like France and Spain. The Spaniards and Irish wanted to establish a base in Ireland and use Spain's wealth and power to destroy nearby England, but while the Spanish Armada was on its way up, storms wrecked the ships off various points on Ireland's southern and west coasts. The survivors who made it to shore were mostly captured, robbed and killed by English and Irish alike. I'm sure some Spanish guys lived and I'll bet several even mixed with the beautiful local colleens, but not enough to make a significant impact on Ireland's genetic make-up. There is, however, another group that has been called 'Black Irish' (or 'Black Scots'): mixed-race descendants of African and Irish/Scottish slaves. As the poorest and most disenfranchised white people in Europe, the Irish (and also their Celtic brothers, the Scots) were often derisively referred to by the English as 'black'. In the old days, the English often sent their convicts, usually Irish or Scottish rebels, to work as indentured servants or slaves in the colonies of America or the Caribbean. These white slave men often intermarried with black (or Indian) slave women and their progeny assimilated into the local darker-skinned culture. Consider the Irish or Scottish origins of many of the surnames of well-known American or Caribbean black people: Shaquille O'Neal, Toni Morrison, Bob McAdoo, Bob Marley, Peter Tosh, Mariah Carey, Marcus Garvey, Bo Diddley (real last name McDaniels), Solomon Burke, Patrick Ewing, Bernie Mac (real last name McCullough), Tim Duncan, John Coltrane...
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Name : Teague, Gender : M, Race : White/Caucasian, Age : 28, City : Portland, State : OR Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper class, I honestly don't no, but I'd like to. You see, I am a white person of Irish descent, but I have been noted for my Mediterranean features. I have dark, curly hair and olive skin, not the typical Anglo-Saxon thing going on. I have done some research that seems to indicate populations of people with Mediterranean features in England.
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Name : Dan, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Catholic, Age : 21, City : Houston, State : TX Country : United States, Occupation : Student, Education level : 2 Years of College, Social class : Middle class, I'm no ethnologist, but I can tell you what my family legend is, for good or ill. My mother is Black Dutch, which is supposedly the same derivation, but in the Netherlands rather than Ireland. The family story is that it's the influence of the Spanish and Portuguese who came ashore as survivors that introduced dark eyes and black hair into the gene pool. True? I don't know for sure. It's just what my dark haired dark eyed dark skinned mother told me.
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Name : Don, Gender : M, Sexual Orientation : Straight, Race : White/Caucasian, Religion : Taoist, Age : 56, City : Neptune Beach, State : FL Country : United States, Education level : Over 4 Years of College, Social class : Upper middle class, 
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