Forwarded from Thuletide
Reminder: Europeans overwhelmingly descend from the Medieval middle and upper classes, not the peasantry.
The former outbred the latter by a significant margin. As higher status positions were of limited availability, the excess children of more successful people faced downward social mobility. The lower classes, who had sub-replacement fertility levels, were constantly demographically replaced for hundreds of years.
This breeding pattern continued until the turn of the 19th century. From ~1800 to ~1880, there was little difference in net fertility by wealth/class, and after ~1880, higher wealth/class became negatively associated with fertility.
The vast majority of your ACTUAL ancestors were not peasants.
See: A Farewell to Alms by Gregory Clark
The former outbred the latter by a significant margin. As higher status positions were of limited availability, the excess children of more successful people faced downward social mobility. The lower classes, who had sub-replacement fertility levels, were constantly demographically replaced for hundreds of years.
This breeding pattern continued until the turn of the 19th century. From ~1800 to ~1880, there was little difference in net fertility by wealth/class, and after ~1880, higher wealth/class became negatively associated with fertility.
The vast majority of your ACTUAL ancestors were not peasants.
See: A Farewell to Alms by Gregory Clark
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