Royal incest and inclusive fitness
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 2465199 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Pierre L Van Den Berghe (University of Washington), Gene M Mesher (University of Washington) |
| Year | 1980 |
| Volume | 7 |
| Issue | 2 |
| Pages | 300-317 |
| Publication date | 1980-05-01 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | American Ethnologist (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0094-0496 • E-ISSN: 1548-1425 |
| Publisher | Wiley (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1525/ae.1980.7.2.02a00050 |
| OpenAlex | W2144957776 |
| Language | EN |
| Citations received | 17 |
| References cited | 25 |
Royal incest (mostly brother-sister; less commonly father-daughter) represents the logical extreme of hypergyny. Women in stratified societies maximize fitness by marrying up; the higher the status of a woman, the narrower her range of prospective husbands. This leads to a direct association between high status and inbreeding. Royal incest is a fitness maximizing strategy if the following conditions are met: polygyny, patrilineal succession, and parental control of royal succession. Under those conditions, the genetic risks of close inbreeding are more than accounted for by the production of a highly related male heir who has, himself, access to a large harem. Data from Ancient Egypt, Inca Peru, Hawaii, Thailand, Monomotapa, Bunyoro, Ankole, Buganda, Shilluk, Zande, Nyanga and Dahomey confirm hypotheses derived from the sociobiological paradigm of inclusive fitness. [hypergyny, inbreeding, incest, inclusive fitness, polygyny, royalty, sociobiology
Biology · Daughter · Evolutionary biology · Genealogy · Harem · Inbreeding · Inclusive fitness · Polygyny · Population · Sociobiology · Sociology · Cultural Differences and Values · Demography · Evolutionary Game Theory and Cooperation · Evolutionary Psychology and Human Behavior · History
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Sibling incest in the royal families of Egypt, Peru, and Hawaii
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Sensual Attachment and Incest Avoidance in Human Evolution and Child Development
Toward a Unified Stratification Theory
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Sociobiology and behavior
The genetics of human populations
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The genetical evolution of social behaviour. I
Handbook of South American Indians
Kinship and marriage among the Nuer
Dahomey, An Ancient West African Kingdom
A Black Byzantium
Hypergamy, Hypergenation, and Miscegenation
Mate selection among second generation kibbutz adolescents and adults
Essais sur le symbolisme de l'inceste royal en Afrique. Par Luc de Heusch. Université Libre de Bruxelles
Brother-Sister and Father-Daughter Marriage in Ancient Egypt
African Systems of Kinship and Marriage
Human Family Systems
Inclusive Fitness and Human Family Structure
The Precultural Basis of the Incest Taboo
Childhood Association, Sexual Attraction, and the Incest Taboo
Father's Brother's Daughter Marriage in Kurdistan
| Unique citing works | 17 |
|---|---|
| Citations per year | 0,38 |
| Citation span | 1981 - 2021 (41) |
| Citation velocity | historical |
| Highly cited | No |
| Citation types | Neutral: 14 |