The Western Hunter-Gatherers like Cheddar Man were themselves relative newcomers to Europe — their population had expanded from the south after the Last Glacial Maximum, replacing or absorbing the earlier Paleolithic Europeans who had survived the glacial maximum in southern refugia.

The Neolithic farmers who replaced the WHG had themselves been moving for thousands of years before reaching Britain — expanding from Anatolia, crossing the Aegean into southeastern Europe, moving up the Danube valley and along the Mediterranean coastline, eventually reaching the Atlantic margin and crossing to Britain.

The Bronze Age steppe pastoralists who came after the Neolithic farmers had their own complex prehistory on the Eurasian steppe, involving admixture between earlier Eastern European hunter-gatherers and populations from the Caucasus region.

Each of these populations was itself the product of earlier movements and mixings.