In contrast to the five poor daughters theme of Pride and Prejudice and Fiddler on the Roof, there's the five rich sons theme of the real-life Rothschilds. From the NYT:
Lance Morrow offered two explanations in Time in his review of Niall Ferguson's 1998 book on the Rothschilds:
Rothschilds Bring In an Outsider to Run the ShowSo, how did Rothschilds stay in control of the family firm for so long? What happened to regression toward the mean?By JULIA WERDIGIER
LONDON — More than 200 years ago a German banker, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, sent his five sons to different European cities to guarantee the survival of what became one of the most prominent banking dynasties.
This month, his great-great-great-grandson David de Rothschild, a baron, took an equally unusual step to ensure the future of the family-owned firm: For the first time, he passed some responsibilities of running Rothschild to someone outside the family.
Lance Morrow offered two explanations in Time in his review of Niall Ferguson's 1998 book on the Rothschilds:
What was the Rothschilds' secret? Commercial genius and intermarriage [he means inbreeding -- intermarriage is the opposite]. Rothschilds married Rothschilds; first cousins wed first cousins; and in one case an uncle took his niece as his bride. The 19th century was ignorant of the genetic risks--and in that respect, as in others, the Rothschilds were lucky. Close breeding kept the fortune cohesive. It ensured a unity of decision making and cooperation among the family's five great banking houses--the world's first multinational, with offices in London, Paris, Frankfurt, Vienna and Naples.
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23 comments:
"The 19th century was ignorant of the genetic risks"
Really?!
It's been a while since the Rothschilds were so inbred. Although their practice of cousin marriage persisted throughout the 19th century, by the end of that century they were beginning to engage in marriages with other wealthy Jewish families and with non-Jews.
See this list of descendants of Amschel Moses Rothschild (Meyer Amschel's father):
http://www.angelfire.com/in/heinbruins/Rothschild.html
"Why do Persians marry their cousins?
To keep the money in the family."
The 19th century was ignorant of the genetic risks--and in that respect, as in others, the Rothschilds were lucky.
Maybe they were lucky. Possibly they happened to have negative recessives that were lethal in utero. Maybe they just drowned the occassional infant with severe defects, better to try again instead of raising the flotsam of evolution.
Not only did inbreeding help them keep the money in the family, by kin selection they're more closely related. More related means less personal gain from screwing over family.
This discover article is kinda interesting, even talks about Rothschilds.
http://discovermagazine.com/2003/aug/featkiss
Wow... its so contradicting that such smart family can be so ignorant of the genetic risks?!
This only proves that great business strategies is never confined inside the office.., a more aggressive planning such as this... amazing!
And, of course, in Pride & Prejudice, Mrs. Bennet tried to get one of her daughters (Elizabeth) married off to their cousin so that the estate wouldn't be entailed away from them.
This is going to be fun. If mention of Fiddler on the Roof brings out dark murmerings I can't wait to see what mention of the Rothschilds brings!
As to the subject at hand, they actually engaged in quite a bit of intermarriage with other wealthy families, particularly non-Jewish ones. The whole bit about keeping it in the family is from musty old books, in fact many (the majority?) of the Rothschilds today aren't Jewish by the matrilineal definition. They've been taking shiksas for well over a century.
I happen to be friends with a coupld of Rothschilds who are Jewish, one of them is pretty well to do (though not astoundingly so) and the other is a shlub with no money at all.
I'm sure there's an accurate family tree of the Rothschilds somewhere and it'd be cool to see. I'm interested in tracing old money down to modern times but it seems like nobody else is similarly interested unless the moneyed ones are Jews. Nu nu, I'll take what I can get, but still it would be interesting to know what happened to all of the big moneyed guys from the gilded age. I'd guess most of their great great grandkids are still living the life.
mnuez
"More than 200 years ago a German banker, Mayer Amschel Rothschild, sent his five sons to different European cities to guarantee the survival of what became one of the most prominent banking dynasties."
Yeah, when I hear the name "Rothschild", german is the first adjective that pops into mind.
Ferguson's biography of the Rothschilds is impressive, but he only had access to the family archives up to the early 20th century. The family's history of the past 100 years is not well known. Most likely, the official story of the family outbreeding and losing power is true, but it really hasn't been verified. This has created fertile ground for wild speculation about their current power. Perhaps the family is weak and marginal but uses the mythology to their advantage? Perhaps...
This puts me in mind of Anne Rice and her creation of the Mayfair Witches, a family that works hard at preserving its fabulous wealth over hundreds of years through cousin-marriage and also out-and-out incest.
Perhaps the Rothschilds were a real-life inspiration.
Three points. We don't know if this Higgins isn't actually a bastard Rothschild. That's a real possibility.
Secondly, popular conspiracy theory has it the Rothschilds are too preoccupied ruling the planet to concern themselves with a mere business firm. This conspiracy theory seems more and more plausible these days.
Thirdly, if you've got good genes, nience/cousin marriage greatly increases the probability of fixation and spread. Any lethal combo is more than exceeded by the upside - e.g. suppose of 10 children two make 'tards but 8 geniuses, what happens is the bad genes will wash out, leaving behind only the purified super-genes.
Cousin marriage only doesn't make sense for commoners with no outstanding genes, though usual amount of bad.
- HCL
I wonder how smart Wernher von Braun's kids are. On the one hand, their parents are cousins. On the other hand ... greatest rocket scientist of all time for a father!
'the world's first multinational, ...'
This is hyperbole. The Medici, the Fuggers, the Hanseatic League and probably a hundred other organizations of various types preceded them as international bankers and powerbrokers.
Yeah, when I hear the name "Rothschild", german is the first adjective that pops into mind.
hater
whenever I hear the name "Rotschild", "scots-irish is the adjective that pops into mind
Perhaps this outsider got the job because the Rothschilds progeny are too busy saving the planet. If you read the below article, you'll notice his sizable carbon footprint created via globetrotting. Lucky for him, purchasing Carbon Offsets after racking up mileage magically wipes away his carbon emissions.
http://outside.away.com/outside/features/200606/david-de-rothschild.html
George Washington Hunt has audio recordings on his blog site of David de Rothschilds father and Maurice Strong openly discussing the need to create and sell the public on a great climactic calamity (global warming) caused as a byproduct of Western lifestyles. This occured during the late 1980's, when they still called it the Greenhouse Affect. This was discussed as the means to bring first world nations living standards at parity with emerging nations via rapid deindustrialization. The son is very much working in the family business, just not the banking side.
The whole bit about keeping it in the family is from musty old books, in fact many (the majority?) of the Rothschilds today aren't Jewish by the matrilineal definition.
Does anybody, even Jews, pay any attention to that matrilineal business? I've noticed that when they want to claim some notable historical figure as one of their own, Jews regard a Jewish grandfather as sufficient. And the same holds true for the "Law of Return".
"So the question becomes, when will American government, media and educators stop hitting America over the head with a hammer about a problem that is not really a problem anymore?"
Are you kidding? When those in the government, those in the media, and those in education no longer receive job promotions that result from their using that hammer.
And that can only happen when the Elites who placed them in those positions in the first place acknowledge the truth.
The problem is that Elites are the group least likely to acknowledge that people are limited by biological factors. Oh, of course they know it, but acknowledging it, publicly acknowledging it, talking about it, is another thing altogether.
It's a pretend game. They know it. We know it. But they don't want us to know they know it, to know they think it.
A liberal Elite sees himself as superior and is frightened that admitting some biological truths might reveal them as the snots they are.
Sally Quinn jumps quickly to mind.
Such idiocy extends even to their inability to speak of things like deafness or autism or homosexuality as not "normal" so they invent words which dance around such conditions because, after all, speaking of them as "conditions" suggests a pathology of sorts, they argue, and that wouldn't be nice, not nice at all.
"I've noticed that when they want to claim some notable historical figure as one of their own, Jews regard a Jewish grandfather as sufficient. And the same holds true for the "Law of Return"."
Sarkozy is 1/4 Jewish and clearly toes the Zionist line to the disapproval of most Frenchmen.
Margrit Von Braun is a professor at the University of Idaho. I knew a guy who went to high school with her. Reputedly she could speak German with an Alabama accent, to the point of making one ROFL.
"I've noticed that when they want to claim some notable historical figure as one of their own, Jews regard a Jewish grandfather as sufficient. And the same holds true for the 'Law of Return'."
The "law of return" policy of accepting people with one Jewish grandparent stems from the Nazis' practice of persecuting people with one Jewish grandparent.
mnuez,
Not all Jews surnamed "Rothschild" are related to the German-Jewish banking family because Jewish families took surnames independently and relatively late (i.e. one cannot presume a distant common ancestor). For instance, the Abraham & Straus department store Rothschilds were not related to the Frankfurt bankers.
Inbreeding creates idiots, but also geniuses. Just look at dog breeding--- you take risks, and if you only care about the Max, you do OK. Maybe we just don't hear about the Rothschilds who were feeble-minded or insane...
Given the conspiracy theories about them it would be ironic if they'd all turned into drooling idiots and needed assistance.
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