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Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

theguardian.com

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Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#41

Post by mdeck_ »

cgsullivan wrote: post #33
WalterBright wrote: post #27

1302 to today, that's 36 generations. 2 to the 36th means his descendants today have 1 / 70,000,000,000 of his genetic contribution. I'd say they don't have legal standing.

A direct paternal-line descendent of Dante, which Sperello Alighieri might very well be, would essentially share a copy of Dante's Y-DNA, which is about 2% of the human genome. This is comparable to something between 2nd cousin (3.13%) and 3rd cousin (1.5%).

Dante has no living paternal-line descendants. The reason for the unusual (for Italy) double last name Serego Alighieri was to preserve the Alighieri name despite there being only female descendants left at the time (in the 1500s). Source: https://it.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alighieri#Storia_familiare (in Italian)

Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#43

Post by DanBC »

zabzonk wrote: post #21
barrucadu wrote: post #8

What's the point in pardoning dead people?

Lots of people seemed to appreciate Alan Turing (and lots of other people) being pardoned for something that should never have been a crime in the first place. Basically, it's a very concrete sign of how we want our society to be now.

Also, pardoning Turing makes it easier to get pardons for people who had similar convictions but who are still alive.

Pardon for Turing - 2013: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-25495315

Turing's law, pardon for thousands of gay men - 2016: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-37711518

Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#44

Post by albertgoeswoof »

clcuc wrote: post #40
cgsullivan wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A direct paternal-line descendent of Dante, which Sperello Alighieri might very well be, would essentially share a copy of Dante's Y-DNA, which is about 2% of the human genome. This is comparable to something between 2nd cousin (3.13%) and 3rd cousin (1.5%).

Would you care to elaborate? You're talking about the Y of the XY chromosomes?

If Dante’s son had a son who had a son x 36, the Y chromosome would not have changed much

Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#45

Post by belorn »

evanb wrote: post #30
ouid wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're forgetting to double count for "incest".

This was flagged, but I think mistakenly by people who think you're joking or taking a dig. The point is there weren't 70,000,000,000 people alive in Italy back then (or, you know, anywhere ever), so it is very likely that Dante shows up in multiple branches of this person's ancestry.

I am not sure that is a correct definition of incest, as it more commonly refer to breeding between family members or close relatives, with the definition of close being up to the legal system in place. Just two people with a common ancestry would be a too board definition to be useful.

But it is correct that 1 / 70,000,000,000 is the wrong numbers of the genetic contribution. In order to find the correct number one would have to determine the coefficient of relationship of the average couple. It is going to a much smaller number, but at the same time far from actually incest.

That said, incest law in Italy is a bit weird. It is legal, except if it causes a scandal.

Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#47

Post by WalterBright »

evanb wrote: post #30
ouid wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're forgetting to double count for "incest".

This was flagged, but I think mistakenly by people who think you're joking or taking a dig. The point is there weren't 70,000,000,000 people alive in Italy back then (or, you know, anywhere ever), so it is very likely that Dante shows up in multiple branches of this person's ancestry.

Which also implies everyone is a descendant of Dante.

Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#48

Post by Bayart »

dash2 wrote: post #7
spoonjim wrote: post #2

Can a government today even issue a pardon for crimes alleged by a government of 1302? It’s not even the same institution.

Are you sure? Italy has a lot of historical continuity. If you go to Rome, the manhole covers read SPQR (Senatus Populusque Romanus). IIRC the government of Florence still works from the buildings of the Uffizi.

>Italy has a lot of historical continuity.

It doesn't. Italy was one of the most ravaged parts of the Western Roman Empire, it has less historical continuity than Spain or France. Only Britain does worse.

>If you go to Rome, the manhole covers read SPQR (Senatus Populusque Romanus).

That's propaganda. The link between the Roman state and Italy was something pushed by the fascists and it stayed behind in the popular mindset (since it's a more pleasant to think of yourself as the True Descendants of the Romans than a playground for the French, Germans, Arabs and Greeks). But go a few centuries back and people made as much a connection between Roman ruins and Italians as they do now between the Pyramids and modern Egyptians.

Realistically continuity goes back to the Renaissance, which saw the birth of an indigenous Italian culture as well as its mass export (favoured by the fact that albeit constantly invaded, Italy wasn't torn apart by the religious wars that destroyed the rest of the continent).

Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#49

Post by saalweachter »

mongol wrote: post #36
labster wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was disappointed to learn the title of pontifex maximus wasn’t continuous from the Roman era. I mean, if we need an intercalary month, I can’t think of anyone better than Pope Francis to decide that.

What is an intercalary month and why might we need one?

It was a leap month, for the same function as leap days and seconds.

Re: Dante's descendant seeks to overturn poet's 1302 corruption conviction

#50

Post by pen2l »

delecti wrote: post #18

Is this necessary? This article from 2008 seems to indicate that his sentence had been rescinded. https://web.archive.org/web/20111230060902/http://www.telegr... Also, it looks like he was convicted under the Holy Roman Empire, which doesn't really exist anymore. I'm not sure who there is to overturn his conviction.

I think we do a lot of things in our society for their symbolic value to formalize moral values and to demonstrate that we recognize past wrongs. In that regard I don't see anything wrong with this undertaking.
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