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Show World's Oldest Families Families which trace their ancestry through eight or ten generations are counted old, yet they are mere fledglings fledg-lings compared with some of the realiy ancient families of the world. The oldest family in the British isles is the Mar family, in Scotland, which traces its pedigree back to 1093. The Campbells of Argyll began in 1190, Talleyrand Tal-leyrand dates from 1199, and Bismarck from 1270. The Grosvenor family (that of the Duke of Westminster), 1006; the Austrian house of Hapsburg goes back to 952, and the house of Bourbon to 864. The descendants of Mohammed, born 570, are all registered carefully and authoritatively au-thoritatively in a book kept in Mecca by a chief of the family. Little or no doubt exists of he absolute authenticity authentici-ty of the long line of Mohammed's descendants. de-scendants. In China there are many old families, also among the Jews. But in point of pedigrees the mikado of Japan has a unique record. His place has been filled by members of his family fam-ily for more than twenty-five hundred years. The present mikado is the one hundred and twenty-second In the line. The. first one was contemporary with Nebuchadnezzar, 660 years before Christ. |