The intermarriage of relations / by Nathan Allen.

  • Allen, Nathan, 1813-1889.
Date:
1869
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The intermarriage of relations / by Nathan Allen. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    tlie Presbyterian, tlie Dutch Reformed, etc., have con- sidered it generally a fundamental part of their creed. But of late years there has been more and more of a growing laxness as to the observance of these laws, as well as of discipline on the part of the churches belong- ing to these various religious bodies. The term “ Incest ” has been applied to the violation of this Levit- ical law, and seems to have been pretty well under- stood by many of the nations of antiquity. Not only the Levites and Jews generally understood it, but the Canaanites and Egyptians, as well as the Greeks and the Romans. Socrates said of incestuous marriages at Sparta and Athens that they were “ prejudicial to the healthy propagation of the species ; ” and Plutarch, re- ferring to the laws of the Romans on this subject, says, “They abstain from marrying their kinswomen in every degree of blood.” In an elaborate article upon “ Ancient Marriages of Consanguinity,” found in the Medical Journal of Nash- ville, Tenn., for 1859, Dr. J. Casselberry, in an exami- nation of the early history -of Syria and Egypt, brings out some remarkable facts. Pie shows that, among the rulers, generals, and leading characters in the history of these two great nations, there was an unusual amount of such intermarrying, and that almost invari- ably it turned out badly. In the history of the royal founders of different nations there has been at times a great number of such intermarriages, and it is well known that very many of these have proved decidedly unfavorable as far as offspring is concerned. So marked was the effect that a peculiar disease, called the “ kind’s evil,” was said to originate from this source, and°to become very common and troublesome. The power and influence which these families had endeavored in