Even if you follow the written primary sources to the letter and do everything right, you can still trace your family lines to the wrong family. Solely because of an affair that happened X number of years ago, all descendants will be left with incorrect information about their own origins. Infidelity happens today, and of course it also happened in previous centuries.
According to figures from the Swedish Public Health Agency, one in three women has been unfaithful. According to the Public Health Agency, men are even less trustworthy. Whether these figures are representative of those who lived in the 1700s, 1800s, and early 1900s is rather doubtful. The same study states that most cases occur in a work context. The working day today is quite different from what it used to be, so the statistics will probably vary accordingly.
However, there is little doubt that many family trees are built on illusions, at least when you see numbers like the statistics above. In that case, large parts of the family tree may well be built on «familial» illusions rather than genetic truths.
Like several older laws, the Norwegian Penal Code of August 20, 1842 has a separate chapter on adultery (promiscuity). This law states that adultery is punishable by imprisonment and/or penal labor, and in the worst cases, the death penalty. In fact, until July 1927, people in Norway could be sentenced to up to three months in prison for adultery.
It comes as no surprise that one of the harshest punishments comes from one of the oldest laws. In Christian V's Norwegian law of April 15, 1687, it states that upon a third offense of adultery, he shall be beheaded and she shall be stuffed into a sack and drowned.
Perhaps we should be glad that today's society doesn't judge us for such «looseness», but rather leaves it to the boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse to handle (within the law, of course).
But maybe you shouldn't be so sure that your great-grandfather is who you think he is? After all, not everyone was «taken»...
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