# Extreme polygamy **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 13, 2023, 12:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020 "2023-09-13T00:35:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![msmith537](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d9b06d/32.png) [@msmith537](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/msmith537)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 9:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/21 "2023-09-13T09:05:01Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > Maybe the male body can handle more but I’d say that 2-3 ejaculations does seem like a limit to what a person can manage in their youth, and that drops with age to not much. Challenge accepted! ---
**Author:** ![Toxylon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f05b48/32.png) [@Toxylon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Toxylon)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/22 "2023-09-13T09:50:36Z")
Bragging aside, I think most adult men wouldn’t want to ejaculate more than once a day or so, averaged over a long period of time. But maybe extreme polygamists aren’t like most men. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 10:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/23 "2023-09-13T10:30:34Z")
> [@Toxylon](#): > > I think most adult men wouldn’t want to ejaculate more than once a day or so Why do you think that? It’s not like the stuff runs out like eggs do. And a[t least 21 times a month](https://www.menshealth.com/uk/health/sexual-health/a37167845/men-should-ejaculate-at-least-21-times-a-month-to-slash-their-prostate-cancer-risk/) is a good idea in any case. The other 9-10 days are for insurance 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 10:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/24 "2023-09-13T10:44:58Z")
> [@outlierrn](#): > > They hypothesized that these were tactics for maximum offspring, rather than sexual excess for its own sake. Yes, I can believe that, at least for the old-fashioned style “potentate,” the point of having many wives was to have lots of offspring, and maybe also as a status symbol, as much or more than it was a matter of sexual appetite. ---
**Author:** ![Mighty\_Mouse](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mighty_mouse/32/7776_2.png) [@Mighty\_Mouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mighty_Mouse)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 11:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/25 "2023-09-13T11:53:51Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > IIRC, according to Islamic law, a man can only have up to four wives. Also, he has to prove he can care for each extra wife financially and each must be treated equally to the others. As a result, it is not that common and only the very well off can manage it. I grew up in Pakistan and while it wasn’t commonplace, it wasn’t rare either. I knew two men with four wives and two with two. The ones with four were well off religious leaders (one a Member of Parliament during the fake democracy days, military government handpicking MPs). Their wives were serial, ~15 years apart in age, all teenagers at the time of marriage. So first marriage he was ~22 and she was ~17 and fourth one he was 65-70 and she was ~17. Almost identical pattern for both men. One with two wives married a teenager after his first wife had three girls in 6-7 years and then no children for 10 years. The second wife was a younger teen (yuck) and probably younger than her husband’s oldest daughters. He was a warehouse foreman and almost completely illiterate, but very numerate. The first wife became basically a domestic servant taking care of the household. At the time I had lost contact with them the second wife had produced another two daughters. The other one with two wives was the father of one of my classmates and (not particularly close) friend… First wife had a son then no children for ~15 years. Father remarried and my classmate, his brother and sister were soon born. After a few years and a dozens of visits to their house, I realized that the elderly (probably ~50, but I was a tween 🙂 ) woman in the library was my classmate’s stepmother (?). I can assure you that knowing the views of all four men that the equal treatment of multiple wives was of absolutely no consideration to them. And who is the judge of whether he can support them financially. The warehouse foreman lived in a three room mud brick house on “unauthorized” land. But compared with most people in his ancestral village, he was quite well off. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/26 "2023-09-13T12:09:48Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > > [@Toxylon](#): > > > > I think most adult men wouldn’t want to ejaculate more than once a day or so > > Why do you think that? It’s not like the stuff runs out like eggs do. > > And a[t least 21 times a month](https://www.menshealth.com/uk/health/sexual-health/a37167845/men-should-ejaculate-at-least-21-times-a-month-to-slash-their-prostate-cancer-risk/) is a good idea in any case. The other 9-10 days are for insurance 😉 Was going to reply to this post, but apparently I’m behind schedule. _Twenty-one_ times a month? I’d be dead… ---
**Author:** ![Tripler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripler/32/21807_2.png) [@Tripler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tripler)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/27 "2023-09-13T12:13:42Z")
> [@TokyoBayer](#): > > Having never been an autocratic ruler myself. . . This cracks me up. Tripler “_But there’s still time!!_” ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/28 "2023-09-13T12:21:25Z")
Something I read about harems way back when, said that - given there was not much else to do - the infighting in the harems could get nasty, and usually the older females were in charge. So absent preference expressed by the potentate, the older women picked the rotation, so it could be like fighting to be teacher’s pet or to not get noticed, depending on proclivities. For the lord, it was probably more along the lines of when we sit down at the TV and think “what shall I watch tonight?” Also, when daddy dies, his wives don’t just dissappear in a puff of smoke (except maybe in India). So the harem would have included all the older women still secluded from the previous ruler. The Harem in Istanbul (not Constantinople - that’s nobody’s business but the Turks) was a fairly large establishment. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/29 "2023-09-13T12:21:25Z")
> [@Smapti](#): > > More on the topic of the OP, I have a vague memory of watching a video in high school about one of the final Empresses Dowager of China, which stated that it was three years between when she became one of the Emperor’s wives and when he bedded her for the first time. Apparently the Chinese Emperors with lots and lots of wives/concubines didn’t actually choose who they had sex with on a particular day/night. A schedule was drawn up by palace staff and the assigned woman/women were readied for the emperor, intercourse occurred, and meticulous notes were kept. Thus, it was the usual thing for women to go _years_ between sexual encounters. The whole thing was a lot more ridged for all involved than I think most fantasies of the situation assume. Sounds like it was all duty and zero romance. ---
**Author:** ![solost](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/solost/32/11776_2.png) [@solost](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/solost)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/30 "2023-09-13T12:21:39Z")
> [@TokyoBayer](#): > > Having never been an autocratic ruler myself, but ISTM that part of having power is needing to exercise it at times. It doesn’t seem like anybody with multiple wives is going to have any extra energy to ‘exercise their autocratic powers’ on the side. ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/31 "2023-09-13T12:24:47Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > > [@Toxylon](#): > > > > I think most adult men wouldn’t want to ejaculate more than once a day or so > > Why do you think that? It’s not like the stuff runs out like eggs do. > > And a[t least 21 times a month](https://www.menshealth.com/uk/health/sexual-health/a37167845/men-should-ejaculate-at-least-21-times-a-month-to-slash-their-prostate-cancer-risk/) is a good idea in any case. The othe As we get older… They say the mind is the second thing to go… ---
**Author:** ![hogarth](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hogarth/32/1773_2.png) [@hogarth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hogarth)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/32 "2023-09-13T12:25:32Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > The whole thing was a lot more ridged for all involved than I think most fantasies of the situation assume. Ridged for her pleasure? ---
**Author:** ![md-2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9d8465/32.png) [@md-2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md-2000)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/33 "2023-09-13T12:42:19Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > Apparently the Chinese Emperors with lots and lots of wives/concubines didn’t actually choose who they had sex with on a particular day/night. A schedule was drawn up by palace staff and the assigned woman/women were readied for the emperor, intercourse occurred, and meticulous notes were kept. Presumably, as mentioned, the goal was reproduction - number of offspring - so that figured into the rotation schedule too, For example, Osama bin Laden had about 100 (half-) siblings. Number of offspring wa a key prestige point right up there with “how rich are you?”. They don’t call them “Potentate” for nothin’. ---
**Author:** ![outlierrn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/outlierrn/32/3005_2.png) [@outlierrn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/outlierrn)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/34 "2023-09-13T12:52:55Z")
I would expect it’s also useful for concentrating wealth and power. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 12:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/35 "2023-09-13T12:56:09Z")
Is extreme polygamy like getting married to multiple people while snowboarding and slamming Mountain Dew? ---
**Author:** ![FlikTheBlue](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fliktheblue/32/10972_2.png) [@FlikTheBlue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FlikTheBlue)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/36 "2023-09-13T13:01:12Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > IIRC, according to Islamic law, a man can only have up to four wives. Also, he has to prove he can care for each extra wife financially and each must be treated equally to the others. As a result, it is not that common and only the very well off can manage it. > > Hugh Hefner was not married to the women at his place. He just built the ultimate bachelor pad that women wanted to stay at. > > ETA: I was travelling in the Caribbean and met a man from Saudi Arabia (along with his gorgeous wife and kids). I was a teenager at the time so maybe more brazen than I should be and I asked him about multiple wives. He told me that you either need one wife or four wives. If you have two they will gang up against the man making him miserable and if you have three wives, two of them will gang up against the third woman and make her life miserable (and by extension the man’s life miserable). But with four the dynamics workout again and it is a happier household. Was he telling a teenager a story or did he mean it? I do not know. It might be a good strategy in theory. But we have the infamous example of Kody Brown from the FLDS Church here in the US that shows it doesn’t work. > **[Sister Wives](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sister_Wives)** > > Sister Wives is an American reality television series broadcast on TLC that premiered on September 26, 2010. The show documents the life of a polygamist family, which includes Kody Brown, his wife Robyn (née Sullivan), ex-wives Meri (née Barber), Janelle (née Schriever), and Christine (née Allred), and their 18 children (1 by Meri, both 6 by Janelle and Christine, 5 by Robyn although 3 were between she and her ex-husband David Preston Jessop). The family began the series living in Lehi, Utah, ... Of course in his case he wasn’t supporting his wives. In fact it was the opposite, and they were supporting him. It also, from what I gather, ended up with the first three ganging up on the fourth. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 1:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/37 "2023-09-13T13:04:30Z")
> [@md-2000](#): > > > [@Broomstick](#): > > > > Apparently the Chinese Emperors with lots and lots of wives/concubines didn’t actually choose who they had sex with on a particular day/night. A schedule was drawn up by palace staff and the assigned woman/women were readied for the emperor, intercourse occurred, and meticulous notes were kept. > > Presumably, as mentioned, the goal was reproduction - number of offspring - so that figured into the rotation schedule too, For example, Osama bin Laden had about 100 (half-) siblings. Number of offspring wa a key prestige point right up there with “how rich are you?”. They don’t call them “Potentate” for nothin’ There’s an Arabic naming practice that seem germane to this; it’s not uncommon for a man or woman to be called “Abu” or “Umm” plus their child’s name: “Abu Bakr” means “father of Bakr”, and “Umm Faisal” means “mother of Faisal”. > [@outlierrn](#): > > I would expect it’s also useful for concentrating wealth and power. Just the opposite, in Ottoman Türkiye, where half-brothers with competing claims to the throne were often a source of instability. Some sultans solved the problem by executing their siblings; Mehmed III had [19 of his brothers and 20 of his sisters strangled by royal executioners](https://www.history.co.uk/articles/seven-sadistic-sultans-from-the-ottoman-empire#:~:text=The%20Sibling%20Slayer%20%2D%20Mehmed%20III,could%20neither%20hear%20nor%20speak.) on his accession to the throne. Later sultans (after 1603) shifted to merely locking away inconvenient brothers, _a la_ The Man in the Iron Mask. ---
**Author:** ![phs3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/8491ac/32.png) [@phs3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/phs3)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/38 "2023-09-13T13:10:04Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > IIRC, according to Islamic law, a man can only have up to four wives. Gotta wonder how they came up with THAT number: “Two? No, boring. Three? Naw, that’s still not enough. Maybe five? Naw, that’s too many. Four! Yeah, four. That’s it, that’s the right number…” ---
**Author:** ![DPRK](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/4491bb/32.png) [@DPRK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DPRK)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/39 "2023-09-13T13:12:43Z")
Depends what you mean by “concentrating”. The description of Fatḥ-ʿAli Shah’s harem in the link posted sounds like a huge complex housing thousands of people, which required a precise internal administration (with all the ensuing tensions and power struggles) and the whole thing a huge crown expense. Unless I am mistaken in my interpretation, the harem was not _making_ money. As for power, > Women could not leave the harem precinct on their own; inside the harem they had daily entertainments such as music, dance, theatrical performances, and games. However, their struggles to gain precedence and influence, which were once carried on mostly behind the closed doors of the palace, now reached the outside, and the _andarun_ was transformed into a center of political power struggle. The harem played a decisive role in some crucial moments of Nāṣer-al-Din Shah’s reign, beginning with his own accession to the throne in 1848, which was favored by a coalition led by the Queen Mother, Jahān Ḵānom Mahd-e ʿOlyā (Amanat, pp. 96-98). The queen mother’s intrigues were also crucial in the dismissal and subsequent assassination in 1857 of the Prime Minister Mirzā Taqi Khan Amir Kabir (q.v.; Amanat, pp. 134-36, and passim; Ādamiyat, pp. 666 ff.). Later, Anis-al-Dawla (q.v.), Nāṣer-al-Din Shah’s favorite wife, brought about the dismissal of the Premier Mirzā Ḥosayn Khan Mošir-al-Dawla (1873). These evident political successes obtained by the leading ladies of the harem reinforced the power of this institution: consequently, both Persian policymakers and foreign diplomats sought support within the royal harem. ---
**Author:** ![TokyoBayer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tokyobayer/32/13989_2.png) [@TokyoBayer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TokyoBayer)\ **Post date:** [September 13, 2023, 1:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020/40 "2023-09-13T13:16:39Z")
> [@Whack-a-Mole](#): > > I am not sure about the laws of the land when the others you mentioned had “wives” but, I feel safe in saying, Warren Jeffs only had one wife and lots of women living with him. Is any confusion about this? Of course, the law only recognizes one legal wife, but there are millions of pages which discuss Mormon polygamy using “wives” because believers of Mormonism or fundamental Mormonism see the women as wives despite a lack of legal recognition. You can see this everywhere from the [Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/acts-of-faith/wp/2016/08/30/where-is-fugitive-polygamist-lyle-jeffs-possibly-swept-away-in-the-rapture-his-lawyer-says/): > [@](#): > > The church is not affiliated with the Mormon church — they separated decades ago. FLDS members practice polygamy and have been accused of taking wives who are too young to give consent, The Washington Post wrote in February. [to wiki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warren_Jeffs) (for all that is worth). > [@](#): > > Rulon Jeffs became the President of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS Church) in 1986 and had nineteen or twenty wives and approximately 60 children.[17] Former church members claim that Warren himself has 87 wives. And no, polygamy was not legal back when Joseph Smith and other early Mormon leaders practiced it, and there are books and books written about that, all of which use “wives.” > [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#): > > _Twenty-one_ times a month? I’d be dead… great post / username combination [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/extreme-polygamy/990020.md?page=3)