GEN-MEDIEVAL-L Archives

From: "Richard Smyth" <>
Subject: The "Charlemagne Lines" Argument
Date: Mon, 2 Oct 2000 08:08:48 -0400

This "argument from mathematics" keeps getting repeated on this mailing
list, but, to make the argument work, one needs to add a large number of
factual hypotheses about breeding pools, fertility differentials, etc.
These hypotheses could be true, but, if so, they are truths of historical
fact, not of mathematics.

Do the defenders of the argument on this list reason about other primates in
the same way? Does the "mathematical argument" prove that my late lamented
mastiff was a descendant of Maeve of Connaught's favorite Irish wolfhound?
The a priori part of the argument is even more impressive with dogs, horses
and the like, because there are so many more generations.

Can any of the many defenders of the argument on this list point me in the
direction of an article that sets out and attempts to verify any or all of
the facts of the matter? If so, does the argument deal, for example, with
the consequences for genealogy of a cultural-biological fact that Darlington
described many years ago? Namely, if you have a culture in which males are
given preference in the inheritance rules and in which the sons of the
nobility have a tendency to marry outside their social class for money, you
have a culture in which the nobility tends to select for infertility in the
male line.

An additional word to Holger:
> The mathematic is clear, but mostly the descendents of Charlemagne
> married members of the high nobility and very often their cousins or
> other near relatives. So most of us must be bastards of Charlemagne.
> Did they really make so many bastards?
>
> Holger

In fairness, Holger, the "mathematical argument" only requires a few
bastards early on. (The exact number depends on how many generations it
take for bastards to lose class.) Also, the "mathematical argument" has been
around long enough for that number to have become moot.---But, as you can
see, I think you're showing a proper scepticism.

Richard Smyth

This thread:

• The "Charlemagne Lines" Argument by "Richard Smyth" <>