Stop worrying about cousin marriage

Stop worrying about cousin marriage

In 1870, Charles Darwin, tormented by the idea that his marriage to his first cousin might be the cause of his children’s ill health, asked his friend Sir John Lubbock to take the matter to Parliament. Lubbock was to propose that the national census include a question on cousin marriage. As Darwin wrote, cousin marriage was often objected to for fear of its “supposed injurious consequences”, though this belief rested “on no direct evidence”. Darw