If you lived in ancient Greece, you would frequently witness the weddings of cousins.
An international team of researchers analyzing the genomes of ancient human remains has discovered that, unlike other European societies of this period, first cousins in Minoan Crete and Mycenaean Greece often married each other.
Experts from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig (Germany) collaborated with an international group to analyze over 100 genomes of Bronze Age individuals from the Aegean region.
The research findings, published on January 16 in the scientific journal Nature Ecology & Evolution, indicate that their discoveries provide “fascinating insights” into the social structure of Aegean Bronze Age societies.
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By analyzing the DNA of individuals buried in a tomb beneath a house in a Mycenaean village, researchers were able to reconstruct the family tree of the inhabitants dating back to the 16th century BCE.
Professor archaeologist Philipp Stockhammer, one of the lead authors of the study, told CNN: “We wanted to understand how the individuals buried together were genetically related and what this reveals about the kinship relationships relevant to the structure of society.”
“We aimed to establish the first family tree for the Mediterranean. We can determine who lived together in this house by examining the individuals buried in the yard.
For instance, we can see that three adult sons lived in this house. One of the daughters-in-law brought her sister and a child to live with them. It was a very complex group of people living together.”
Even more surprising was the finding that about half of the individuals living on the island married their cousins, while the rate on the mainland was approximately one-third.
Stockhammer noted: “Researchers have studied thousands of genomes of ancient individuals and found virtually no evidence that past societies engaged in cousin marriages. From a historical perspective, this is truly remarkable.”
Stockhammer and his colleagues believe that such marriages were economically motivated, aimed at preventing the division of family land. He explained: “All the motivation was to accumulate land within the family. If you look at what people were cultivating, it was grapes and olives. To grow both grapes and olives, one might need to remain settled in one place for many decades. And if you marry someone from your own family, it means you choose to stay concentrated in the same area.”
He also suggested that, conversely, in other parts of Europe during the Bronze Age, women married men from hundreds of miles away. He explained that those regions were often more prosperous.
He analyzed: “In Greece, there isn’t much space for farming, and what you cultivate takes decades to develop. We can clearly see cousin marriages from the evidence in the genomes.”
Stockhammer highlighted the significance of this discovery: “With this knowledge, we essentially have to rethink social structures during this period and the societies behind these magnificent works of art and architecture. It is a society we have written a lot about in terms of elite architecture, but now we can add something about the common people.”
