British Isles British Isles The British Isles are an archipelago in the North Atlantic Ocean off the north-western coast of continental Europe that consists of the islands of Great Britain, Ireland, the Isle of Man and over six thousand smaller isles. They have a total area of about 315,159 km and a combined population of just under 70 million, and include two sovereign states, the Republic of Ireland (which covers roughly five-sixths of the island of Ireland) and the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. The islands of Alderney, Jersey, Guernsey and Sark, and their neighbouring smaller islands, are sometimes
People of the British Isles People of the British Isles The People of the British Isles (PoBI) is an ongoing population genetics project based at the University of Oxford. The project began in 2004 and is ongoing. Professor Sir Walter Bodmer founded and leads the project. The first anatomically modern people to colonise Britain arrived in around 30,000 BC, as shown by the Red Lady of Paviland. During the last Ice Age, in particular in the Last Glacial Maximum, the British Isles was probably deserted but people began returning about 15,000 BC. Whether or not the British Isles were deserted during the last cold period