10 Historical Figures Who Had Incestuous Marriages

we tend to associate the act of marrying a family member with either the poorest of the poor more particularly decadent Royals after all we've long known that the tendency for a shallow gene pool means recessive genes that will bring a severe condition like hemophilia with them and are more likely to become dominant in an inbred family so of course the best and brightest of us would never do such a thing right yeah well there was a time that we totally thought that to number 10 HG Wells one of the Titans of modern science fiction bringing us titles like The Time Machine and War of the Worlds back in 1891 Herbert George Wells was only another science teacher that age 25 he was beset by health and financial troubles the state of affairs was only exacerbated when he married his cousin Isabel Mary Wells sources vary on whether it was a mutual decision or just age G's but in 1894 they separated in that same year Welles married Amy Robbins one of his former students while Robbins would be married him during his greatest period of success it wasn't necessarily a happier marriage than his relationship with his Abal Mary at least not as far as Robbins was concerned throughout his married years Welles wasn't Millie a believer in the free love movement he was a practitioner other esteemed writers from his day such as violet hunts were among his longtime mistress this got him in no small amount of trouble his colleague Hubert Bland's beat him up for having an affair with his daughter Rosa Muntz meant for a time Pemba reeves talked him intending to shoot the writer of classic after classic Welles do not to die any of this according to the Telegraph saying of himself I am a very immoral person I've preyed on people who loved me perhaps it's not surprising that someone in that frame of minds would resort to cousin marriage number 9 Claudius any fan of BBC's 1976 production I Claudius will tell you Claudius was one of ancient rooms wiser or at least more scholarly Emperor's in his time the Roman Empire completely conquered Britain and expanded Rome's reign in North Africa while still finding time to write nearly 28 history books in Greek particularly on Etruscan history no one could have seen it coming considering that he only became emperor after being installed by the praetorian guard after Caligula was assassinated and with numerous senators and soldiers attempting to kill him in the early yes it would be his third marriage to his niece Agra Pina the younger sister of Caligula that actually brought his reign to an end from the beginning Agra Pina was ambitious convincing the Emperor to name her son as his successor despite him being young enough that when she poisoned her uncle / husband with mushrooms the new emperor Nero was only 16 years old the fact that she was regent until Nero was old enough to take the throne was likely a motivator here really though Claudius should have seen this assassination coming considering that Agra Pina was also suspected of poisoning her previous husband Pasi Anna's Christmas number 8 Albert Einstein we generally remember this scientist for his work later in life his work that included great things like the general theory of relativity after all we've all seen images of him with unkempt white hair in his early days while he was working on his landmark papers he did something that even like the standards of a video about incestuous marriages is quite surprising in 1903 Einstein married fellow physics professor Mileva Maric at a time when female physics students were rare enough that she was the only one in a class that had a daughter out of wedlock the year before after a long romantic correspondence which began in 1897 still by 1912 Einstein strayed into a rather unusual direction that would be towards his cousin Elsa even though he'd only recently learned of her existence in 1999 Stein belatedly divorced his first wife even though it moved in with our sir in 1917 while Elsa was still living with her two daughters from a marriage that had ended in divorce to add yet another scandalous layer to this in 1918 Einstein considered ending his relationship with Elsa in favor of Elsa's daughter Elsa as if to complete some sort of twisted extramarital affair themed game of bingo Elsa was at the time working as Einsteins secretary it's something to bear in mind next time you see one of his inspirational quotes posted online somewhere number 7 Cleopatra few people throughout history have been considered as romantic a figure as Cleopatra even a fewer of those people led quite so unromantic lives haven't we all heard about her torrid affairs with Julius Caesar and Mark Antony which resulted in four children between them and threatens the future of the Roman Empire not to mention her relationship with Ptolemy of the 13th well maybe that second one is actually not that well known it was also a relationship that no one would want to romanticize in 51 BC Cleopatra took the throne after the passing of her father Ptolemy the 12th at the time Cleopatra was eighteen and married to her brother Ptolemy himself only ten years old this arrangement would not have been so unusual at the time Cleopatra's own father had been married to his sister in keeping with tradition the timing of their ascension was not good for either of the newly married sibling monarchs as Egypt was then undergoing famine and other economic troubles this contributed to the fact that Cleopatra and her husband would eventually wage Civil War and when Julius Caesar intervened on Cleopatra's behalf they left her little brother dead in 47 BC thus ending one of the worst marriages in recorded history number six Edgar Allan Poe if you've been feeling that this list has been shamefully short on representatives from the good ol USA well here comes the gothic horror author and poet who also started the detective mystery genre to set that right if it's not uncomfortable enough that here in Virginia were first cousins when they tied the knot in 1836 there was the fact that he was 27 years old while she was only 13 it also lived with her since she was seven so large was the age gap between the two that edgar allen served as his wife's private tutor for years there have been a few attempts to defend this action some have claimed that the couple waited a few years before consummating the relationship and that they only married because otherwise Edgar would not have had any legal claim to keep Virginia with him after it heard she was going to be sent to a wealthy relative after the death of her mother some have gone so far as to say that they didn't consummate the relationship at all because Edgar Allen didn't have a conventional sex drive whatever the truth of the situation the fact it could very well have been consummated in the fact that at best he seemed to be motivated to use legal loopholes to possessor just goes to show what an unacceptably unhealthy situation it was to begin with number 5 James Watt the Scottish instrument maker in Sevilla is usually credited with inventing the steam engine but that's not an accurate assessment what he actually did was take the new common engine itself more than 50 years old when what had a good look inside one in 1764 and improved on the design mainly he added condensers to more effectively the heat converted to energy of the steam engine effectively modernizing it and giving the Industrial Revolution a significant push what is an accurate assessment of his married life is that in 1764 he also joined his cousin Margaret Miller in holy matrimony there's not much that's recorded about how well their marriage went what is known is that the marriage lasted nine years before she passed away and that she gave birth to six children what was not present when she died as it took some time for the full benefits of his new design to pour in and he was desperately looking for work around Britain in 1776 he married Anne MacGregor and had an additional two children number four at a Wolper before the conquistadors invaded cultural attitudes towards incestuous marriage in Central and South America varied wildly in the Aztec empire it was considered essentially a capital offense even though one of their founding myths featured their name God drunkenly engaging in it however in the Inca Empire it was practically a required for the Emperor to marry a family member there were two rival legends that was supposed to be the origin of the Inca Empire that manco capac married his mother or all that it was founded by four sisters marrying four brothers this was only sure of the ruling class the commander could expect to have their eyes gouged out or be executed as if they tried it so it was that atahuallpa was married to his sister while ruling as the Inca empires last emperor he had been engaged in a civil war with his brother Hawass kur for five years when Francisco Pizarro arrived hearing that the Spanish might free his brother and place him on the throne at a koala ordered his brother executed it was both the execution and at a Harper's incestuous marriage that would be used by the Spanish as their excuse for putting at a quarter to death number three Emperor Sui Ninh the Tang Dynasty in the 8th century AD was one of China's golden ages and a period where Chinese culture had its most significant influence on Japan one of the results was a change in Japanese taboos while in China incestuous marriages had been unacceptable since the beginning of their recorded history in Japan there had been centuries where marriages within royal families were common the 11th Emperor Sui Ninh was especially notable among them having married his cousin shahe ba in the 3rd century AD this was notable because that's one of the very few things that's known about him since the lack of other reliable information has - being dubbed as legendary number - Charles Darwin the fact that Charles Darwin someone who revolutionized her understanding of evolution was willing to marry his cousin is deliciously ironic to some people author of the ascent of man and Zhaan the origin of species wedding his first cousin Emma Wedgwood in 1838 was a source of great torment seemingly the only one on this list who is recorded as expressing regret for his incest over the course of the marriage the Darwin sent ten children and Charles is well aware that such marriages would produce health problems three of his children died of contagious diseases in childhood the most infamous death was Charles Waring in 1858 as Darwin had been forced to miss the first public presentation of his theory of evolution to attend the funeral even among those that survived to adulthood Darwin described their health as not robust Darwin went so far as to petition the British government to perform a study of married cousins and the health of their offspring but the request was denied number one philip ii of spain in the 16th century philip ii ruled Spain of the height of its power this is long before the British Empire could claim the same and the son may never set on the Spanish Empire in those days in addition to Spain the Netherlands and southern Italy in Europe he controlled nearly a half of South America and more than half of what is today the United States still he was part of the famous Habsburg dynasty which brought with it certain expectations of incestuous marriage however philip ii went even further than most who engaged in such arrangements since he married relatives four times first he married Manuel and their cousin with whom he shared all four grandparents three years later she died giving birth to Prince Carlos who had health problems that would have seemed all too familiar to Charles Darwin next he married Mary the first his cousin and daughter of Henry the eighth after she died of illness philip ii sent a marriage proposal to elizabeth the Virgin Queen herself and got no answer this actually caused him to back a Scottish rebellion against out then philip ii drifted a little further out of the family tree to marry his third cousin Elizabeth of France which lasted nine years then finally he had been in the marrying game long enough that his final marriage was to his niece Anna of Austria that final marriage lasted ten years and apparently was enough for Philip ii as he spent the last eight years of his life single so I really hope you found that video interesting if you did these do give us a thumbs up below and do not forget to subscribe brand new videos just like this every day of the week also if you want something else to watch right now why not check out one of my other channels called bio graphics linking to that on the screen now and as always thank you for watching

Channel: TopTenz

Views: 638,618

Keywords: top 10, toptenz, top10, top ten, top 10 list, H. G. Wells, Claudius, Albert Einstein, Cleopatra, Edgar Allen Poe, James Watt, Atahualpa, Emperor Suinin, Charles Darwin, Philip II of Spain, Historical Figures Who Had Incestuous Marriages

Id: xFMmJMlyqnY

Length: 11min 24sec (684 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 23 2018