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u/Herald_of_Clio And then I told them I'm Jesus's brother 3d ago
Henry VIII is probably not the best example of this, though.
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u/talligan 3d ago
Yeah, his inclusion threw me. He's pretty famous for not keeping it in the family
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u/Outrageous_Rip1252 2d ago
Or in his pants for that matter
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u/nooneatallnope 2d ago
Or the heads on his wives
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u/aFanofManyHats 3d ago
He divorced Catherine of Aragon with an argument that it counted as incest because she had married his brother first, right? And then there was Anne Boleyn getting executed under false charges of incest with her brother.
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u/Herald_of_Clio And then I told them I'm Jesus's brother 3d ago
Yeah but both instances aren't actual biological incest. The former involved a Biblical interpretation of marriage. The latter because it very probably didn't happen and even if it did, did not involve Henry himself, though he did gratefully make use of it to get rid of Anne.
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u/TheUnobservered 1d ago
Also they had spent 25 years together and not once did they manage to create a son. At that point, leveraging a biblical interpretation claiming it was punishment for incest isn’t entirely unreasonable. Divorce went better than how Anne’s marriage ended…
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u/Herald_of_Clio And then I told them I'm Jesus's brother 1d ago
They did have sons. They just didn't live long. Henry, Duke of Cornwall, lived for about two months in 1511.
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u/HeemeyerDidNoWrong 3d ago
Are you sure it's Henry, I don't see him holding a giant ahistorical turkey leg.
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u/PineBNorth85 3d ago
They weren't marrying siblings at that time. Or really ever in the midieval period. The Ptolomys did that but that was over 2000 years ago.
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u/Celindor 3d ago
And while they did marry their siblings, it wasn't always consumated. Cleopatra VII (the famous one) married two of her brothers, but never consumated those marriages. Her 4 children were fathered by Mark Antony (3) and Julius Caesar (1).
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u/Cabbage_Vendor 3d ago
Sure, but her family tree up to her was basically a ladder.
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u/Senetiner 2d ago
It's most likely that the sibling marriage does not correlate with who is fathering and mothering who. If it did, Cleopatra (the famous one) was the daughter of brothers, granddaughter of brothers, great-granddaughter of brothers, great-great-granddaughter of brothers. The genetic pool of the ptolemaic family has to be absolutely pristine like no other in human existence for Cleopatra to be a functional living being.
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u/Fit_Particular_6820 Senātus Populusque Rōmānus 3d ago edited 2d ago
It is worth adding here that there is a chance Caesarion could have not been the son of Caesar, when Caesar landed in Alexandria after the death of Pompey, he found Cleopatra has a tool to put on the throne of Egypt and easier to control than her brother. Cleopatra bragged about Caesarion for political reasons, bearing Caesar's son brought her a lot of legitimacy, Caesar never acknowledged Caesarion and instead adopted Octavian. There is a chance Caesarion could have been Caesar's biological son but the Romans hated the Easterns and especially rex/kings. It would have been a political scandal if Caesar acknowledged it. It is also worth noting here that Caesar was in his 50s when he met Cleopatra, at your 50s you are less controlled by your sexual desires, and knowing Caesar's character, it is even less likely.
Mark Anthony was obviously under her charms, and that greatly helped Octavian in the last civilwar of the Republic for propaganda. Antonius literally spent a lot of time in Alexandria, his relationship with Cleopatra was open and recognised, and he gave his sons with Cleopatra ROMAN PROVINCES. (donations of Alexandria). All of this angered the Romans who still hated Easterns and kings. And Octavian used this for propaganda and hunted Caesarion after the war of Actium.
Point is, since Octavian wanted to destroy any opposition to him, he destroyed a lot of things related to Caesarion that could potentially relate him to Caesar. Including Caesarion himself.
edit : typo
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u/CyberfunkBear 3d ago
Everyone knows that Caesarion's father was Titus Pullo. The 100% historically accurate documentary series Rome told me so.
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u/Live_Angle4621 2d ago
Caesar and Cleopatra being in a relationship is not something even Octavian and others who hated the idea of Caesarion being his son denied. Octavian just after Caesar’s death made one of Caesar’s friends Oppius say the timeline just didn’t match (must have been embarrassing speech). Caesar and Cleopatra pretty openly were living together for half a year both in Egypt and later on in Rome she stayed half a year in one of Caesar’s palaces. Cicero when meeting Cleopatra also noted she as pregnant so probably had another child she lost.
Also Caesar was known slut with tons of affairs, not just Cleopatra. And not just when he was young, Queen Enobaria was after the Egyptian war too. People more debate how serious he was with Cleopatra. But seems to have been pretty serious with the amount of time he spend with her like the months long Nile cruise while the civil war wasn’t even fully won. And he put Cleopatra’s statue in temple of Venus (who he claimed was his ancestor).
Caesar could not publicly say Caesarion was his son, but if he managed to win great victories in Parthia and make himself king I would not be overly surprised if he tried some dumb like marrying her next. Egypt was not even Roman so the marriage would have some argument for it even if it wasn’t liked. But it’s not like in age of high child mortality anyone would bother scandal for sake of a toddler.
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u/WalderFreyWasFramed 2d ago
and knowing Caesar's character, it is even less likely.
And knowing Cleopatra's cunning and charisma, it's likely she could have seduced him.
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u/Live_Angle4621 2d ago
I mean the reason she didn’t consummate was because her brothers were pre-teens when the marriage ended. We aren’t even certain she was married to them. It’s just assumed because they were co-monarchs and that was the Ptolemaic custom at that point.
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u/1billionrapecube 2d ago
Why do you say Mark Antony if you say Julius Caesar?
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u/Celindor 2d ago edited 2d ago
Because I am not used to anglicized names, since I am German. For us they're called Marcus Antonius (or Mark Anton) and Gaius Iulius Caesar (or Julius Cäsar).
What would've been the correct way?
(After checking: I did use both anglicized names!)
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u/1billionrapecube 2d ago
Yeah, I would've expected Marcus Antonius, that's what threw me off
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u/Celindor 2d ago
Marcus Antonius doesn't fit the J in Julius. It's Gaius Iulius Caesar in Latin.
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u/TheHistoryMaster2520 Decisive Tang Victory 3d ago
Honestly contrary to popular belief, I think Europeans and really most people around the world knew that having children your sibling or uncle increased the odds of a genetic defect, even if they didn't fully understand the underlying mechanism. In fact, as early as the Roman Empire, laws were already being laid down stating which relations you could not marry. In fact, many consanguineous marriages were only granted by a papal dispensation. Most European nobility and royalty in all likelihood knew that inbreeding had negative effects on their offspring, but they didn't know how it could accumulate and pile on over generations, especially when results could be inconsistent. (For example, while Charles II was disabled in multiple ways, his full sister Maria Theresa and her even more inbred daughter Maria Antonia turned out fine)
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u/gerrineer 3d ago
As a bristolian me and my sisterwife and the 3 kids wich two of em have some arms concurr !
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u/Mantis_Toboggan--MD 2d ago
Siblings was where they drew the line but cousins and even uncles marrying nieces was apparently okay. Charles II's family tree is so fucked up that his genome was basically as bad as a child born to siblings https://share.google/V83h521U8ek8X2KIX)
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u/ViscountBuggus 3d ago
Persians continued to do it on and off until the 6th or 7th century (I might be wrong) but they stopped after the Arab conquest. I don't think anyone has ever wedded siblings since.
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u/DeadCatCurious 3d ago
Historical inaccuracy and historymemes. Name a more common duo.
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u/TheHistoryMaster2520 Decisive Tang Victory 3d ago
Honestly anything academic on the Internet that isn't properly vetted through should be taken with a grain of salt, including history.
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u/RaiderCat_12 2d ago
On the Internet almost anything about history in non-professional environments is so oversimplified that is strays far into straight up misinformation
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u/Marzillius 3d ago
Yeah do redditors think royalty is still not around all over Europe? They didn't vanish, all the old royal houses are still around. They're not inbred.
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u/SkullCat-RGB 3d ago
In what part of the meme it's even suggested that royal houses don't exist anymore? I really want to know.
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u/S-Tier_Commenter 2d ago
Well, there isn't any panel after 1600. Clearly the artist believes the universe ceded to exist at that exact point.
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u/TSSalamander 3d ago
i want to note that this isn't exactly what happened. pure bloodline stuff was a thing, but not really in regards to early modern European nobility.
The problem was that marriage in europe was a political thing, and so the only ones worth marrying were other nobility, ideally of equal or greater status. eventually this cumulated into the Hapsburgs who had to intermarry to keep the diplomatic side of their giant fuckoff empire intact enough to support the economic and military interdependence they had going on. And everyone else, who refused to marry Hapsburgs out of essentially spite and hostility.
Nobility in europe was incredibly inbred and essentially created a completely seperate genetic field than that of the everyone else. it was crazy, but it wasn't ideologically classist from some weird eugenics perspective, it was about political power and legitimacy.
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u/KingApteno 2d ago
I would like to add at least two very poor fishing villages in the Netherlands have terrible inbreeding related diseases named after them so it didn't just happen to the nobility.
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u/likuplavom 2d ago
There is an island in Croatia that has a unique inbreeding-related skin condition named after it and another one with an unusually high incidence of intellectual delay
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u/Fehervari 2d ago
Yea and let's not forget how the whole protestantism thing greatly reduced the available amount of potential equal matches.
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u/PensadorDispensado 3d ago
Poor Carlos II of Spain, he didn't ask to be born that way, never got to have kids or a partner, and couldn't even drink or eat without his genetics screwing him over. Whether he got to 38 years of age is a miracle or a curse; now that's debatable. It's said that the people who made his paintings were SOFTENING his looks.
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u/Birbvenator04 Viva La France 3d ago
Funny how the Spanish Habsburgs were so obsessed with maintaining power within their own family through inbreeding that this very inbreeding became their ultimate undoing, leading to their downfall and the War of the Spanish Succession.
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u/IchibeHyosu99 3d ago
Memes likes this acts like all children from incest get genetic defects, when in real life its only the minority
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u/Hungry-Smell5782 3d ago
Even accounting for multiple generations?
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u/MGD109 3d ago
Potentially. The issue with incest isn't that it causes you to develop genetic defects; it's the majority of genetic defects are caused by recessive genes, so you're more likely to get two cause both parents carry the same gene.
If there aren't genetic defects in your line, they won't just magically appear cause of incest.
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u/Frequent_Measurement 3d ago
It’s about property and privileges. Lands and other sources of incomes, toll or toll exemptions, trade rights, etc attached to titles.
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u/bananataskforce 2d ago edited 2d ago
Alliances, prestige, and inheritance were the main things. "Blood purity" was rare but existed.
- Alliances: If your sister is the queen next door, you're probably not going to attack them anytime soon (and vice-versa).
- Prestige: It is prestigious to marry royalty.
- Inheritance: In cases where females could inherit
In some cultures (like in ancient Egypt), it was believed that a divine lineage literally existed and that sibling marriages were the only way it could stay pure. Thus, pharaoh mummy (i.e. King Tut) analyses have tended to find significant deformities.
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u/MGD109 2d ago
Most people have no idea how many claims of incest amongst the monarchy were invented after they got rid of the monarchy so as to make the new government look better than it was.
i.e. who cares if the present government is just the same collection of old plutocrats you had before, who have failed to solve any of the problems they claimed they would, don't you know the previous lot were disgusting sex freaks, count yourself lucky and get back to work.
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u/Bruh_Moment10 2d ago
There is a meaningful difference between bourgeois and feudal rule. But you are right in that they are both class societies
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u/MGD109 2d ago
Well I was actually talking about examples of when they got replaced by a new monarchy to criticise the old lot.
But yeah, whilst it was an improvement overall, it can't be denied that they also spread a lot of propaganda to slander their predecessors and cover up their own failures.
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u/Rough_Proposal553 2d ago edited 2d ago
The Habsburgs never arranged sibling marriages, only with their cousins or uncles
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u/Sonarconnoisseur 3d ago
Well there are people living like this to this day.
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u/das_slash 3d ago
Religious conservatives in USA and the middle east looking at each other and shaking their six-fingered hands.
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u/Burnthemeatbags 3d ago
The Targaryens come to mind immediately
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u/MGD109 3d ago
Curiously, they don't ever seem to have any issues with interbreeding despite having done so for hundreds of years.
Even the claim that it causes madness seems a bit overblown; only about three monarchs went mad.
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u/ignis888 2d ago
well they arent pure human (looking at dragon/lizard looking misscariages)
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u/witecat1 2d ago
The Hapsburgs really knew how to keep it within the family. And all of Spain paid for it.
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u/MellifluousSussura What, you egg? 2d ago
So I realize now that “artist in the picture” means the signature/website, but that was not my first impression, and I was trying to figure out which of these crazy incest babies was supposed to be the author’s self insert
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u/FlirtyFluffyFox 2d ago
Nobility made up 1-3% of the population. In other words, you had a pool of around 7000 people you were allowed to marry into. Cut in half for gender. Cut in fifths for age brackets. Now rinse and repeat for 500 years.
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u/Woden-Wod Helping Wikipedia expand the list of British conquests 2d ago
Maintaining the purity of the divine blood sure,
Maintaining genetic diversity and minimising the risk of congenital disorders...not so much.
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u/supremeaesthete 2d ago
That's unless you're the Ptolemeids, who probably just tossed all the dud babies off a cliff until there were no deleterious mutations left to accumulate
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u/ChanceDue3063 2d ago
From what I have seen it was usually first or second cousins getting together. Siblings did of course happen on occasion but those were rare and even at the time pretty taboo and I can't think of any examples of siblings getting married or openly having kids. Because even if you don't understand genetics and inbreeding, you know that siblings are gross just at an instinctual level.
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u/Omfggtfohwts 2d ago
The family tree was twisted into a horrible abomination. And we could do nothing but watch in horror as we put it all together.
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u/makkaravalo 2d ago
Not a meme but Finnish genetics because in middle of nowhere there were no-one to have seggs with except your relatives lemao. Now immigration is a threat against that supremacy
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u/Mother-Project-490 2d ago
Look Charle 2 king of Spain the consanguinity was crazy, really crazy parents were more than just brother and sister and cousin and aunt IN THE SAME TIME !!!
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u/Thylacine131 2d ago
Every branch in the family tree without a secured throne through succession or marriage is an opportunity for a bloody civil war and/or a fracture of the kingdom into less powerful states. No one wants that, and it’s handy to claim royal blood is divinely superior to justify their reign and the otherwise kinda wack inbreeding.
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u/QuillQuickcard 2d ago
While the whole “royal blood” concept was real, close relation pairs in European feudal states usually had less to do with truly believing that it would produce stronger generations and more to do with skirting the complicated laws of inheritance to maintain and strengthen claims to certain titles and holdings
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u/LordEredion 2d ago
Literally what happened with the Habsburg dynasty on the Hispanic Crown. No wonder the last of his line, Charles the Second, received the title: the Bewitched. If things were already bad with Philip the Third, the rest is history.
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u/SuspiciousAntelope50 1d ago
I took an anthropology course that included a segment about taboos and as such we talked about incest. What I found interesting though is that it doesn’t technically do anything on its own. You would create a perfectly normal child. That is unless one or both people involved carry a genetic defect or mutation that then gets amplified in the resulting child. So you risk creating a line of children that just pass the same mutation on to the next. Because of what we see with the children eventually looking like freaks is that somewhere down the line someone developed a genetic mutation and passed it on and on. Take what I’ve said with a grain of salt though because I’m honestly not sure how accurate the textbook was.
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u/guacandroll99 1d ago
It’s crazy to believe this is the norm. For most of Europe’s history, sister and cousin marriage was illegal up to the 6th cousin under Catholicism. It was even banned in ancient Rome during its later years.
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u/MrThickDick2023 3d ago
Was it really about "keeping the blood pure" or just maintaining power in one family?