History

At least of the early period. It seems like very few emperors had any luck siring biological children, even though they very much did try. Pregnancies seem to have been few and far between, even though many emperors were married to multiple women in succession, with a great number of stillbirths and miscarriages.

One professor of mine believed that it was because of the large amount of lead that the wealthy Roman unwittingly had in their diet, particularly from the consumption of wine, as wine was sweetened with grapes boiled in a lead pot. The toxic element contributed to a plethora of health problems, infertility being only one of many.

I am very curious, what do others think of this subject?