By Debbie McGoldrick

And we thought that Pierce Brosnan was the only Irishman who could lay claim to portraying the British superspy James Bond. Now it turns out that Sean Connery, the quintessential Scotsman, has lots of Irish blood flowing through his veins. Researchers in Co. Wexford, according to a local paper in the country, have discovered that his great-granddaddy was a traveller from Co. Wexford.

The granddad in question, James Connery, was a poor Irish traveller who left Ireland for greener pastures in Scotland at the turn of last century. The elder Connery, a Catholic, found work as a labourer, but died of bronchitis in 1914.

Connery played a Chicago Irish cop in The Untouchables in 1987, and - we didn’t know this - the Irish accent he used in the film was voted “worst accent of all time” in a poll. We didn’t see the film, but the brogue must have been a real doozy to earn that (dis)honor.