The average Contribution of each several Ancestor to the total heritage of the Offspring. Received and Read June 3, 1897.

London, Harrison and Sons, 1897. No wrappers. Extracted from ""Proceedings of the Royal Society"", Vol. 61. Pp. 401-413.

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First printing of Galton's ""Law of ancestral Heredity""Galton's ancestral law states that the two parent contribute between them on average one-half of the total heritage of the offspring, the four grandparents one-quarter, and so on. He interpreted this law both as a representation of the separate contributions of each ancestor to the heritage of the offspring and as a multiple regression formula for predicting the value of a trait from ancestral values.Garrison & Morton: 239.