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Keeping the bloodline pure


swarmsea

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I'm almost finished with the first book (yay!).

I thought about this the other day, in our world, which is outside Westeros (uh-ahm!), people who practice close bloodline relationships, meaning - giving birth to their children, will face the fact that their children probably will be sick because of the incest / genes thing, I do believe that sometimes they turn out just fine and without any problems. But can we say that the same thing works in the story?... I sometimes think of Joffrey being either too uptight or rather mentally ill.

Any thoughts :)?

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This is my first post and I´m german-speaking. Please don´t be disturbed by my wording.

I don´t want to spoiler you. But I think in the first book the Targaryen practise of marrying was mentioned? And you read about King Aerys Targaryen? I think, the incest thing isn´t overrided in ASoiaF. It is cemented.

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The probability of having "sick" children due to incestous relationships is usually overstated. There is a somewhat greater chance, but it's far from being the norm.

A good example is the famous Egyptian queen Cleopatra, who not only wasn't malformed, but was reputedly one of the most beutiful and clever women of the time. But her parents were brother and sister, and hence she had only one set of grandparents. Those grandparents were uncle and niece, again limiting the number of ancestors.

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I sometimes think of Joffrey being either too uptight or rather mentally ill.

Any thoughts ?

If "evil-little-prick" is a side effect of incest, then you may be on to something...

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I heard that waaaaay back it was normal for brother and sister to marry each other. Even though the thought sickens me. When I first saw all the incest in AGOT the series, I was shocked hahha. With Cercei and Jaime! I was like, wait a min... eren't they brother and sister? what the.... the more I saw, the more normal it seemed IN FICTION ofcourse.

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Based on the family tree of House Targaryen, you can see that there have been almost as many non-Targaryen/Valyrian marriages as there have been Valyrian marriages. About 9 Valyrian marriages and 8 Non-Valyrian marriages. It hasn't been constant incest.

This was something I didn't know.

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When I first read the books I thought that it had always been brother to sister, but then when I studied the family tree I saw that there were many non-Targaryen marriages, for example Viserys I married a Hightower and Arryn, and Daeron II married into Dorne

Yes, I thought the same thing. I didn't think of looking at the tree, but in the book they make it seem like only brother and sister, to keep this bloodline pure

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GRRM always quotes inbreeding as producing two effects: it increases and exaggerates characteristics. Leading to his Great/Mad dichotomy.

I think he has limited the damage done by inbreeding.

Joff is the way he is because of his Mother, and lack of a caring father figure. Tommen and Myrcella seem to be perfectly sane and healthy.

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Yes, I thought the same thing. I didn't think of looking at the tree, but in the book they make it seem like only brother and sister, to keep this bloodline pure

Well, earlier on it was mainly brother-sister, but later on they kind of married more politically. All of Daeron II's sons, except for Aerys probably married non-Targs

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