As a sample of one, my husband was quite surprised when our mixed child turned blonde after birth, apparently that was not the norm in his family of pure Danes, she now has the same hair color as her dad (light brown with blond highlights).
I just asked my husband if he would believe me if I said that half of danes are blonde, he very quickly said “I don’t think so!”.
Neither of us have been to Finland, which is apparently the “blondest” Nordic nation, so I can’t tell you if half or more of them are blonde.
Belgium has many blondes too, maybe not as many as scandinavia but flemish people have a lot of blondes, brussels and the french speaking part have more brown haired people though… Maybe you have sticked in highly multicultural cities, I have been to rural Sweden and Denmark, including mid cities, small cities and towns and the majority are blonde, same goes for the Netherlands.
Random comment: a month or so back I actually learned that Marilyn Monroe dyed her hair too - her natural hair was very dark brown. I don’t know, it might be common knowledge, but for some reason it came as a surprise to me.
Because danish people have a very different definition of what is blonde compared to Americans, most of those “hollywood blonde boys” would be considered brunettes in Denmark.
Random crowd of ethnic danes in Roskilde festival (denmark).
I just point out that Germans are way blonder as a whole than white americans, aussies or british people. And this thread is about why brits are considerably darker featured than Scandinavians, Dutch and even Germans, if they are supposed to be northern-european by genetic make up.
Random german football players (back in the day when bundesliga was mainly composed by ethnic germans)
Here’s a map of light hair distribution in Europe from wiki’s blond page. Blond hair originated in Scandinavia and the Baltic Sea countries, so that’s the epicentre of blondism.
There is no way most of england and scotland are on the same category as Denmark or Sweden, it makes no sense, I have been to most of the UK and the vast majority of people have brown (or even black) hair and blue or hazel eyes.
From the countries I’ve been (which is pretty much all of europe bar iceland, montenegro and macedonia) I have found the blondest people in Finland, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, The Netherlands, Estonia, Latvia and Iceland (although I havent been to the last one and just speaking from people I have met abroad)… Some other areas like Northern germany ,Northwest Russia and Lithuania come close though.
I don’t think they are supposed to be Northern European by genetic makeup. History tells us that people from many different places have settled in and/or invaded the British Isles. I’ve heard that genetic testing indicates that the British are most closely related to the people of France and Spain, although the Angles, Saxons, Jutes, etc., also left their genetic mark.
Well, Sweden and Denmark are closer to the blondism epicentre than the British Isles so I would imagine that the instances of blond hair there would be higher.
While the OP makes a good point, it’s not wholly accurate. For example some of the Beatles, John Lennon notably and even Ringo Starr, were NOT that dark haired, in fact they were light brown. This evident in colorful pictures and videos, not black and white pics of the Fab Four
I think the average hair color of a Brit is medium brown, something like Prime Minister David Cameron or Piers Morgan as examples.
Also brown eyes are not the majority, even among brunettes, light eyes seem to be common, actress Emily Watson(not Emma Watson of Harry Potter fame) being a prime example.
And to state that blond(e) hair is rare in the British Isles, is stretching it too far. Blondes are found quite in good numbers in England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland. Take Princess Diana, Princes William. Blond hair is rare in say the Middle East, and most of Asia.
Britain’s current Permanent Representative to the United Nations, or UN ambassador is a blond, Matthew Rycroft. And taking Queen, while guitarist Brian May was dark, drummer Roger Taylor is blond.
So in closing native Brits come in different hair colors, take a look at any British movie, and the characters tend to be brown, dark brown, blond and that one red head.
I have lived in Germany for 19 years, and the above is simply not true. I know people whose hair colours range from white-blond to jet black, but the majority of people in Germany have brown hair.
This seems to be the case with Brits also and many other Western Europeans.
By the way I have to add since I had forgotten, true jet black hair is rare among Europeans, even Southern Europeans with dark hair, really have dark brown.
Even many people outside Europe with dark hair in reality have dark brown hair, with brown highlights as opposed to true black hair which looks blue/purple in the sun.
And again very dark hair is not the most common hair color among the average British.
