Im not sure where the right place to post this was but here it goes.
Is there any events in history that talk about a population of dark skinned people comming to Ireland?
My brother is dark and so is my mother where as my brothers and father look typically Irish (my grandfather was Ginger) My Parents are Irish and so are all my traceable ancestors yet I have dark brown eyes, Jet black hair and a dark tan to my skin. In short I don't look Irish, so where did I come from?
I am constantly mistaken for a spaniard when ever I holiday in spain and my Iraqi barber is constantly asking me if I have arab/mediteranian roots since I look more Spanish/Italian/Romanian/Middle eastern than Irish and there are a few people like me that I see often enough.
I'm thinking maybe I could be a descendant from the Spanish Armada in Ireland refers to the landfall made upon the coast of Ireland in September 1588? or maybe there was some trading between the North of modern day Spain and the south of Ireland hundreds of years ago?
Again I'm sorry if this wasn't the right place so if you do know the right place please re direct me there. I have been wondering about this for a long time yet have never found anything concrete.
Have you ever been to Ireland? You might be surprised to know that you DO look like an Irish person. Contrary to popular North American belief, many people in Ireland have dark hair and dark eyes, and are not the freckled, ginger haired, blue-eyed stereotypes that most people imagine when they think of Irish people. Assuming you're North American, you've likely been misled by popular culture into assuming that you don't look Irish simply because you don't have stereotypical features that don't actually characterize many people in Ireland. Only about 10% of people in Ireland actually have red hair while the blue-eyed population is larger, at 50% (but that still means that half of the people in Ireland have dark eyes).
If you're looking for some massive change in Irish genetics to explain your physical features, you will be disappointed. Assuming you don't have some long-lost ancestor from somewhere else in the world, you and your ancestors are ultimately descended from Ireland's original Neolithic farmer-colonists who arrived around 4000 BC. That's because the Irish genetic makeup has been mostly unchanged since 4000 BC besides a few 'blips' coinciding with the arrival of population groups from the continent and Britain, and even these only altered it by a negligible amount.
Spanish Armada would be one. Lot of Spaniards got shipwrecked. Also, there was a lot of trade and different invasions down through the centuries, we weren't isolated or ignored. I went to school with a lot of dark-toned people. There's also /r/irishhistory if you want a lot more info on this stuff. Another thing might be that it's really difficult to trace family in Ireland, most records were destroyed in the civil war. It's doable, but there's gonna be a lot of guesswork, especially if you're outside the country. It's possible a (relatively) recent ancestor was from somewhere else.
How are dark hair and eyes not considered Irish looking?