In India among certain Hindu sects and some muslims, marrying their cousin is the norm. This was mostly practiced to keep the family wealth within the family itself , instead of sharing it with an outsider who will marry into your clan…
Though this practice is no longer in favor with the younger generation.
indian
If they can show it, I’m squicked out. THERE AIN’T NO GRAY AREA IN THIS FOR ME.
Quick back-of-the-envelope calculation: Third cousins share a set of great-great-grandparents, first cousins share a set of grandparents. That gives a first-cousin couple six genetic grandparents between them, hence twelve great-grandparents, hence 24 great-great-grandparents. Your marrying third cousins have 30 out of the customary 32 great-great-grandparents between them - so ISTM that they need to be third cousins a total of four different ways to be as short on ancestors as the first cousins.
First cousins both ways, of course, have only as many grandparents as a pair of siblings.
Sampiro, at first I thought we might be distant relatives. But then I saw Autauga Co. was southern central AL and my mom is from northern central AL. Besides, your history is swiss/germanic sounding whereas we’re gaelic folk (Cochranes, Raglands and such).
Oh well.
Sampiro, that was an amazing and quite interesting story, and I’m pretty sure that my family could not match that on either side with the records available.
If I were single, I wouldn’t have to worry as much about incest. The majority of my relatives (and there are many) still live in Iceland.* I have a handful of distant cousins on the other side, and the vast majority of them have one of three surnames, none of which are common. Luckily enough, I’m almost absolutely sure that there aren’t any relations between myself and my fiancé, as we’re of quite distinctively different ethnic backgrounds that haven’t commonly intermarried for at least a millennium. However, we’re not planning on having kids, so it’s a doubly moot point.
*[sub]Now, if I were in Iceland dating Icelanders, that might make things trickier. My great-grandfather had 21 children, but not all were blood-related. (Farm families in the middle of nowhere tend to take care of orphaned neighbor kids in addition to having lots of children.) Thing is, it wouldn’t be as difficult to trace whether we had related ancestors up through the early 1800s, as there are actually published books noting all the descendants from particular people that we could reference.[/sub]
Although that’s not as bad as it sounds, since siblings will average 50% shared genes while double-cousins on average will share 25%. Still, compare that to regular first cousins who only share an average of 12 1/2%.
Could you do the math in front of me? The way I see it, given two pairs of people who are descended from the same four grandparents, Pair A have exactly the same genetic diversity as Pair B, even if Pair A are siblings and Pair B are double-cousins.
The rules for these things tend to go on a state-by-state basis (as opposed to being set at a national level, barring countries with a unitary system like the UK).
Further, the rules for marriage may be different from the rules for criminal purposes.
And neither of those rules may completely address the ick factor.
Having said that, here is the criminal rule for my state’s jurisdiction (non-US) which might serve as a first approximation against which to measure general feeling:
Incest
(1) Any person who—
(a) has carnal knowledge with or of the person’s offspring
or other lineal descendant, or sibling, parent,
grandparent, uncle, aunt, nephew or niece; and
(b) knows that the other person bears that relationship to
him or her, or some relationship of that type to him or
her;
commits a crime.
Maximum penalty—imprisonment for life.
(2) Any person who attempts to commit the crime of incest is
liable to imprisonment for 10 years.
(3) It is immaterial that the act or attempted act of carnal
knowledge happened with the consent of either person.
(4) It is a defence to a charge under this section to prove that the
accused person was, at the time when the act or attempted act
of carnal knowledge happened, acting under the coercion of
the other person.
(5) A reference in this section to an offspring or other lineal
descendant, or a sibling or a parent includes a relationship of
that type that is a half, adoptive or step relationship.
(6) For subsection (5), a reference to a step relationship includes a
relationship corresponding to a step relationship arising
because of cohabitation in a de facto relationship or because
of a foster relationship or a legal arrangement.
(7) Also, for subsection (5), a reference to a step relationship does
not include a step relationship that first arose after the relevant
persons became adults.
(8) This section does not apply to carnal knowledge between
persons who are lawfully married or entitled to be lawfully
married.
Here’s one way to look at it: imagine the “ultimate” double-cousins: two identical twins marry two identical twins. Their children are genetically full siblings, because each has a father with the same genes and a mother with the same genes. Now imagine “regular” double-cousins: the pair have fathers who can be expected to have about 50% genes in common (since the fathers inherited paired chromosomes/genes at random from their parents), and ditto for the mothers. So with two sets of parents with 50% identical genes, you could expect the result to average 25% identical genes. Even though you start out with the same four grandparents, you don’t go through as narrow a bottleneck, so there’s a greater chance of preserving what genetic diversity is there.
In Victorian times, although marrying a cousin was permissible (as seosamh indicated it still is) and even common, marrying a brother-in-law/sister-in-law was not allowed. If a man’s wife died, he could not remarry her sister as it would legally be incest, even though there was no blood relationship. I don’t know when this law began or ended, but I did find it very strange.
In Norway up to the late 1800s it was tricky to get out of your river valley to find a spouse. As a result my father’s parents, who were born in the US but whose parents were all from the same area in Norway, had a number of common ancestors. They were something like fifth, sixth, eighth, etc. cousins multiple times removed. I don’t recall any first cousins marrying, but second cousins did often enough in my ancestry chart.
Hmm…I had 2 Norwegian roomates who only realised they were 3rd cousins after they got engaged. They’re married now, with a normal, healthy (non-mutant) baby.
I think we could all learn something from the Icelandic people.
A plague decimates the land and the gene pool is made a hell of a lot smaller. Several hundred years on, everyone is known by their first name, can trace their family back 10 generations and they’re generally healthy and not at all weirdly mutated, thanks for asking. Although they are asked to participate in an awful lot of genetic studies…
Cool, thanks for the answer. I must assume that the trigger for you is being able to positively ID the lineages and the person; as opposed to generally having a notion that due to ethnogeographic origin at some point the lines must have crossed paths before.
Got it! Or, if Bob and Ted are both Gramps’s sons, Bob and Ted’s kids are each genetically one-quarter Gramps, but Ted’s kids can have some of Gramps’s genes that are forever lost to Bob’s kids. My, but I had to think hard about that.
You’re a redneck if: Your favorite place to score chicks is the annual family reunion.
Ok, somebody needed to add a little fun in here.
My personal feeling is 1st cousins and closer=no-no, second cousin and beyond =no problem. Consenting adults should be able to do as they please, as long as their conduct doesn’t harm others.
intresting tred… i,am not put of by incest but it should be consensial adults and they should not have children. I think the yeww evect is more of a morral or etical question and i believe most people have this evect cause sosiety has brain washed us since childhood. the same as when fasion tels young kids that only thin long legged girls are hot. Plane brainwash that 
Ps i don,t have any relatives that i conssider having incest with i,am just not botherd by it if they are adults it there choice who am i to juge :smack:
I wouldn’t want to marry anyone with more than eight spelling errors per square foot.
Me too. Back in the old country. They were my grandparents. They even had the same last name (before they were married).
Maybe they were just second cousins – I never figured it out. But they definitely had the same last name.
Should have included this in my post above.
On the other side of the family from the cousins mentioned above, we had a brother and a sister marry a brother and a sister (grandparents again). So all the cousins are cousins twice.
So my family tree is peculiar, to say the least.
To me it depends on how - let’s say - familiar with each other you are. I had a lot more contact with my mother’s side of the family when I was growing up, so the idea of getting together with any of my cousins on her side gives me the creeps. OTOH, I don’t remember meeting any of the cousins on my father’s side until I was 30, so I don’t really feel “related” to any of them.
First cousin marriages are quite common both in Pakistan and in India. My ethnic group is one of the worst for this, average relatedness of the typical pair of siblings was 0.52 instead of 0.50 in a study I saw (some decades old, so take it with a grain of salt, things may have gotten better).
It has both serious medical consequences, and potentially serious consequences on weakening social trust and community ties as well. So no, legality aside, it isn’t ‘hunky dory’.