1 Mark 6.17–20; see also Matthew 14.3–12. Translations of this and all following Biblical passages are taken from The new English Bible (Oxford and Cambridge, 1970).Google Scholar

2 Willrich, Hugo, Das Haus des Herodes zwischen Jerusalem und Rom (Heidelberg, 1929), 141ff.Google Scholar; Schalit, Abraham, König Herodes (Berlin, 1969),Google Scholar esp. the genealogical tree in the appendix; Hoehner, Harold W., Herod Antipas (Cambridge, 1972), 137ff.Google Scholar

3 For the contradictions within the respective Gospels and Josephus Flavius's information about Herodius's first husband cf. Hoehner, Herod' Antipas, 137ff.

4 For the group of relations which must not be married within modern societies, see under ‘incest’ in Encyclopedia universalis 8 (1968), 788. According to B. P. Murdock's atlas, of 250 societies in question, four do not forbid marrying brother's daughters, and eight do not forbid marrying sister's daughters.

5 Although the Gospels do not report on it, the fact that Herod Antipas and Herodias were related by blood must have been passed on. An Islamic record states that Jesus and John forbade marrying one's niece. This can only refer to John's accusation against Herod. In contrast to Mosaic law, with which the marriage prohibitions of the Koran often correspond (Sura 4.20–24), Islam allowed marriage between brothers and sisters-in-law but forbade marrying nieces. This would account for the changing pattern in the interpretation of the marriage of Herod.

6 Kraub, Samuel, ‘Die Ehe zwischen Onkel und Nichte’, in Studies in Jewish literature, issued in honor of Professor Kaufman Kohler (Berlin, 1913), 165ff.Google Scholar; Büchler, Adolph, review of S. Schechter, Documents of Jewish Sectaries, in The Jewish Quarterly Review III (1912/1913), 437ff.;Google Scholar S. Schechter's reply to Dr Büchler's review, ibid. IV (1913/1914), 449ff.; Epstein, L. M., Marriage laws in the Bible and the Talmud (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1942), 251;Google ScholarJoachim, Jeremias, Jerusalem zur Zeit Jesu (2nd edition, Göttingen, 1958), 239;Google ScholarMayer, Günter, Die jūdische Frau in der hellenistisch-römischen Antike (Stuttgart, 1987), 55.Google Scholar

7 Jeremias, Jerusalem, 239.

8 Jeremias, Jerusalem, 131, 239. The Karaites joined this sect later on (see below). The Samaritans and the Jewish group of the Falascha in Ethiopia did not permit marriage with nieces, either: Krauß, Die Ehe zwischen Onkel und Nichte, 167ff.

9 See the genealogical table in Schalit, König Herodes, as well as the summary in Jeremias, Jerusalem, 240.

10 On the subject of the clan of the Makkabaean-Hasmonaean, see Maier, Johann, Grundzüge der Geschichte des Judentums im Altertum (Darmstadt, 1981), 34ff.Google Scholar Maier points out (64) that Herod tried to use the Hasmonaeic prestige for himself by means of his marriage with Mariamme. This can also be proved by the fact that he made his oldest son of his first marriage, Antipater, marry the daughter of the last king of the Hasmonaean, Antigonus. Schalit's opinion (König Herodes, 66) that his marriage had‘no political dimension... but only the simple and natural motive of his love for Mariamme’ cannot convince.

11 Jeremias, Jerusalem, 204.

12 Hoehner, Herod Antipas, says:‘It is very possible that the political differences between the Boethusians/Herodians and the Sadducees had become less clearcut at the time of Jesus's ministry owing to the marriage of Antipas to Herodias, a Hasmonaean on her mother's side. That Agrippa I, Herodias's brother, was considered by the Jews to be the best of kings, was due perhaps to the influence of the Sadducees. It is even possible that Antipas married Herodias to gain the support of the Sadducees. In addition to Hasmonaean descent on his grandmother's side, Agrippa's wife was also a granddaughter of Mariamme.’

13 See the genealogical table in Schalit, König Herodes; Jeremias, Jerusalem, 240.

14 Kornemann, Ernst, ‘Die Geschwisterehe im Altertum’, Mitteilungen der schlesischen Gesellschaft für Volkskunde 24(1923), 26ff.;Google Scholaridem, ‘Mutterrecht’, Wissowa, Pauly, RealEnzyklopädie der klassischen Altertumswissenschaft, Supplement-Band VI (Stuttgart, 1935)Google Scholar, col. 567; Seibert, Jakob, Historische Beiträge zu den dynastischen Verbindungen in hellenistischer Zeit (Wiesbaden, 1967).Google Scholar An example of a marriage between brothers and sisters is Tigranes III and his sister Erato, who ruled Armenia shortly before Herod's grandson Tigranes IV: Ferdinand Justi, Iranisches Namenbuch (Marburg, 1895), 414.

15 For this concept see in particular Sidler, Nikolaus, Zur Universalität des Inzesllabus (Stuttgart, 1971), 8;Google Scholar see also Bischof, Norbert, Das Rätsel Ödipus (München-Zürich, 1985), 29ff.Google Scholar In societies in which the concept of lineage holds an important position, rulers undoubtedly have a strong interest in endogamous relations and are also more likely to form these. The general assumption of a principal exceptional situation by means of which marriages of rulers are excluded from the discussion about banning incest, however, seems questionable.

16 Willrich, Das Haus der Herodes, 140; Hoehner, Herod Antipas,138.

17 Deuteronomy 25.5–10; Butterweck, G. Johannes and Helmer, Ringgren, eds., Theologisches Wörterburch zum Alten Testament (3rd edition, Stuttgart, 1977)Google Scholar, cols 393ff.; Rengstorf, Karl Heinrich, ‘Jebamot’ (Von der Schwagerehe), Die Mischna III, I (GieBen 1929), 6ff.Google Scholar

18 Leviticus 18.16 and 20.21.

19 Maier, Grundzüge, 75f.

20 Willrich, Das Haus des Herodes,140.

21 Hoehner, Herod Antipas, 138f.

22 E.g. by Pope Gregory the Great: see Goody, Jack, The development of the family and marriage in Europe (Cambridge, 1983)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; German translation,Die Enlwicklung von Ehe und Familie in Europa (Berlin, 1983), 49, 73, 75.Google Scholar

23 Matthew 22.23–29.

24 Matthew 22.30.

25 Braun, Herbert, Spätjüdisch-häretischer und christlicher Radikalismus 2 (1957), 110.Google Scholar

26 Weiß, Egon, ‘Endogamie und Exogamie im römischen Kaiserreich’, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte, Romanistische Abteilung 29 (1908), 366CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Jos. Zhishman, Das Eherecht der orientalischen Kirche (Wien, 1864), 232, Goody, Entwkklung, 69.

27 Joseph Freisen, Geschichte des canonischen Eherechts bis zum Verfall der Glossenliteratur (Tübingen, 1888), 441; Zhishman, Eherecht, 314; Carl J. Hefele, Conciliengeschichte 1 (Freiburg, 1873), 183f.

28 Freisen, Geschichte; Zhishman, Eherecht, ibid.; Goody, Entwicklung, 74.

29 Zhishman, Eherecht, 312ff.

30 Ibid., 314.

31 Joyce, G. H., Die christliche Ehe. Eine geschichtliche und dogmatische Studie (Leipzig, 1932), 624.Google Scholar

32 Gaudement, Jean, ‘Le Legs du droit Romain en matière matrimoniale’, II matrimonio nella società altomedievale 1 (Settimane di studio del centro Italiano di studi sull'alto medioevo 24, Spoleto, 1977), 158.Google Scholar

33 Zhishaman, Eherecht, 232, 311f.

34 For the different opinions about endogamy among Eastern and Western Christians, see Michael Mitterauer, ‘Verwandtenheiraten im östlichen Mittelmeerraum in ihrer Bedeutung für Europa’, in German Rupierez, ed., Interdisziplināre deutsche Familienforschung (forthcoming). However, because of the additional material studied, some additions and modifications of these assumptions are necessary.

35 Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 449.

36 De civitate del XV, c. 16.

37 He concludes, from the obviously wrong assumption that marriage between the children of brothers and sisters would be forbidden by a lex divina, that marriage between uncles and nieces, being even more closely related, would also be forbidden (Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 449).

38 Marriage between the children of brothers and sisters was forbidden by law in the Roman Empire in 384–385 (Goody, Development, 55ff). Again, an ecclesiastical decision preceded this law. In a group of statements of a Roman synod for the bishops of Gaul, marriage between cousins had already been forbidden prior to 374 (Gaudemet, Le legs, 149).

39 Goody, , Development, 48. In his new book, The oriental, the ancient and the primitive (Cambridge, 1990)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, Goody repeats this point of view more cautiously, but without any correction or additional explanation: 18, 323, 342.

40 Guichard, Pierre, Structures sociales ‘orientates’ et ‘occidental’ dans l'Espagne musulmane (Paris, 1977), 10f.CrossRefGoogle Scholar For this aspect of Good's hypothesis see Mitterauer, ‘Verwandtenheirat’.

41 Goody, Development, 220f.

42 Ibid., 95, 221.

43 Ibid., 102.

44 Herlihy, David, Medieval households (Cambridge, Mass, and London, 1985), 11ff.Google Scholar

45 Ibid., 61–2. Incest is regulated by neither Mosaic nor Roman law. Among the legal historians who ‘have found the Church's preoccupation with incest in the early Middle Ages surprising’, Herlihy mentions Adhémar Esmein, Le mariage en droit canonique (Paris, 1929–1935), 1, 335.Google Scholar He states his assumption that the ban on incest in the early Middle Ages was merely an analogy and extreme deduction which developed into a logique outrée. Herlihy, however, does not adopt this argument as his own.

46 Flandrin, Jean-LouisFamilies: parenté, maison, sexualité dans l'ancienne société (Paris, 1976), 31Google Scholar; this quotation is taken from the English translation by Southern, Richard, Families in former times: kinship, household and sexuality in early-modern France (Cambridge, 1979), 25–6.Google Scholar

47 Duby, Georges, Medieval marriage (Baltimore and London, 1978), 17ff.Google Scholar; and Duby, G., ‘Le marriage dans la société du Haut Moyen âge’, IImatrimonio 1 (Settimane 24), 28.Google Scholar

48 For the contradiction between these two concepts, see Goody, Development, 229f.

49 Schröter, Michael, ‘Wo zwei zusammenkommen in rechter Ehe’ Sozio- und psychogenetische Studien über EheschlieBungsvorgänge vom 12. bis 15. Jahrhundert (Frankfurt, 1985), 351.Google Scholar

50 Lynch, Joseph H., Godparents and kinship in early medieval Europe (Princeton, 1886), 260f.Google Scholar

51 Ibid., 260.

52 Ibid., 261.

53 A survey is given in Dauvillier, Jean and De Clercq, Carlo, Le mariage en droit canonique oriental (Paris, 1936).Google Scholar

54 Migne, J. P., ed., Patrologia Latina 140 (Paris, 1980).Google Scholar

55 Duby, Georges, Ehe, Frau und Priester (Frankfurt, 1988), 71f.Google Scholar

56 Ibid., 73.

57 Migne, Patrologia, cols. 779ff.

58 Schadt, Hermann, Die Darstellungen der Arbores Consanguinitatis und der Arbores Affinitatis (Tübingen, 1986), 110ff.Google Scholar

59 Selb, Walter, ‘Abdīśō Bar Bahrfz Ordnung der Ehe und Erbschaften sowie Entscheidungen von Rechtsfällen (Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, phil.-hist. Kiasse, Sitzungsberichte 268, 1. Abh. Wien, 1970).Google Scholar

60 Ibid., 31ff.

61 Genesis 2.24.

62 Ibid., 27.

63 Ibid., 37.

64 Sachau, Eduard, Syrische Rechtsbücher 2 (Berlin, 1907), 73ff.Google Scholar See also Mitterauer, ‘ Verwandtenheiraten’.

65 Patai, Raphael, ‘Cousin-right in Middle Eastern marriage’, in Abdullah, M. Luftiyya and Charles, E. Churchill, eds., Readings in Arab Middle Eastern societies and cultures (Paris, 1970), 535ff.Google Scholar; Goody, Development, 31ff. Additional references in Mitterauer, ‘Verwandtenheiraten’.

66 Dauvillier and de Clercq, Le mariage, 127ff.

67 Selb,‘Abdīšō, 131f.

68 Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 451.

69 Flandrin, Familien, 36.

70 Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 459.

71 Dauvillier and Clercq, De, Le mariage, 146ff.Google Scholar; Lynch, Godparents, 219.

72 Dauvillier and de Clercq, Le mariage, 153ff.; Karl Eduard Zachariae von Lingenthal, Geschichte des griechisch-römischen Rechts (Berlin, 1892), 69.

73 Ibid., 157f.

74 Ibid., 156.

75 A survey for all Middle Eastern churches appears in Dauvillier and de Clercq, Le mariage. For Byzantium, see Zachariae von Lingenthal, Geschichte, 63ff., and Zhishman, Eherecht, 212ff. For the Armenian Church, see Klidschian, Arsen, ‘Das armenische Eherecht und die Grundzüge der armenischen Familienorganisation’, Zeitschrift für vergleichende Rechtswissenschaft 25 (1911), 332ff.Google Scholar; and Luzbetak, Louis J., Marriage and the family in Caucasus (Wien, 1951).Google Scholar

76 About this see Szyszman, Simon, Das Karäertum. Lehre und Geschichte (Wien, 1986)Google Scholar; Ankori, Zvi, Karaites in Byzantium (New York, 1959)Google Scholar; Nemroy, Leon, Karaite anthology: excerpts from the early literature (New Haven and London, 1986).Google Scholar I am indebted to Professor Güuther Stemberger for these references.

77 Szyszman, Karäertum, 44.

78 Nemoy, Anthology, 126.

79 Ibid., 125ff.

80 Ibid., 131.

81 Ibid., 125; Ankori, Karaites, 82; The Jewish encyclopedia, 574, see under ‘incest’, and 447, see under ‘Karaites’.

82 Ankori, Karaites, 81ff.

83 Nemoy, Anthology, 125. In the twelfth century, the situation of Christians in Egypt shows quite clearly that an extreme extension of the ban on incest meant the threat of a religious minority's becoming extinct. As the ban on incest was extended to sixth cousins in Byzantium, the Melchitic patriarch Markos of Alexandria pointed out that it was difficult to avoid such marriages, because the Christian community of his town had shrunk very much. The reply from Byzantium showed hardly any understanding: the reduced members would not justify sinning (Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 490).

84 Ibid., 123ff.

85 Aptowitzer, Viktor, Die syrischen Rechtsbücher und das mosaisch-talmudische Recht (Wien, 1909), 58ff.Google Scholar

86 Cf., e.g., Patai, Raphael, The Jewish mind (New York, 1977), 483.Google Scholar Cf. also Patai, R., Sitte und Sippe in Bibel und Orient (Frankfurt, 1962).Google Scholar Following this, I also characterized the Jewish religion as ‘friendly towards endogamy’: Mitterauer, ‘Verwandtenheiraten’.

87 Leviticus 18.3, 24–5. See also Goody, The oriental, 342ff.

88 The fact that first among sexual offences was sexual intercourse with the wife of the father and with the daughter-in-law can be regarded as evidence for this fact (Leviticus 20. 11–12). In this context see Mayer, Günther, ‘Zur Sozialisation Des Kindes Und Jugendlichen Im Antiken Judentum’, in Jochen, Martin and August, Nitschke, eds., Zur Sozialgeschichte der Kindheit (München, 1986), 374.Google Scholar The Jewish philosopher Moses Maimonides (†1204) associated the specific structure of Leviticus' bans with the group living in one household (Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 469).

89 Theologisches Wörterbuch zum Alten Testament 3 (Stuttgart, 1977)Google Scholar, cols. 397ff.; Patai, Sitte, 102.

90 In Sura 4.20, Mohammed only forbade marrying wives by inheritance against their own free will.

91 Leviticus 18.6.

92 Deuteronomy 25.5–6.

93 Numbers 36.6–8.

94 Tobias 6.11–12.

95 Patai, Sitte, 25ff. See also the table in Pitt-Rivers, Julian, The fate of Shechem or the politics of sex: essays in the anthropology of the Mediterranean (Cambridge, 1977), 153.Google Scholar

96 Jeremias, Jerusalem, 239; Mayer, Zur Sozialisation, 373.

97 Ibid., esp. 141ff.

98 Ibid., 169ff.

99 Ibid., 173ff.

100 Ibid., 174.

101 Ibid., 77ff.

102 Ibid., 81.

103 Ibid., 83f., 238f.

104 Ibid., 131; Mayer, Die jüdische Frau, 56; see also above, p. 302.

105 Patai, Sitte, 98.

106 Jeremias, Jerusalem, 174; Lexikon für Antike und Christentum, under ‘Genealogie’, col. 1212.

107 Augustine's view in De civitate dei, c. 16, that marriage between kin must be avoided in order that man does not isolate himself but tries to get new relations, goes back to Philo of Alexandria (Freisen, Eherecht, 372).

108 Jeremias, Jerusalem, 174; Lexikon für Antike und Christentum, under ‘Genealogie’, cols. 1214ff.

109 Lacey, W. K., Die Familie im antiken Griechenland (Mainz, 1968), 131ff.Google Scholar: Broadbent, Moly, Studies in Greek genealogies (Leiden, 1968), 103ff.Google Scholar, about connections between aspects of civil and religious law, 214ff.; Zoepffel, Renate, ‘Geschlechtsreife und Legitimation zur Zeugung im antiken Griechenland’, in Ernst, Wilhelm Müller, ed., Geschlechtsreife und Legitimation zur Zeugung (München, 1985), 397f.Google Scholar

110 Sachau, Syrische Rechtsbücher 3, 309; Eddy, Samuel K., ‘Oriental religions' resistance to Hellenenism’ (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan, 1958), 82ff.Google Scholar Eddy emphasizes the parallels between Zoroastrianism and Judaism and between ‘Magii’ and Levites respectively with regard to the significance of the purity of blood relations.

111 Goody, Development, 10ff., 48ff.

112 Weiß, Egon, ‘Endogamie und Exogamie im römischen Kaiserreich’, Zeitschrift der Savigny-Stiftung für Rechtsgeschichte, Romanistische Abteilung 29 (1908), 340ff.CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Eyben, Emil, ‘Geschlechtsreife und Ehe im griechisch-römischen Altertum und im frühen Christentum’, in Müller, , ed., Geschlechtsreife, 452.Google Scholar

113 Hopkins, Keith, ‘Brother-sister marriage in Roman Egypt’, Comparative Studies in Society and History 22 (1980), 353CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Goody, The oriental, 319ff.

114 Weiß, ‘Endogamie’, 361ff.

115 Marriage between brothers and sisters-in-law was not explicitly forbidden but unusual in Roman tradition. For the evaluation of second marriage in Rome, see Kötting, Bernhard, ‘Die Beurteilung der zweiten Ehe in der Spätantike und im frühen Mittelalter’, in Tradition als historische Kraft (Berlin, 1982), 43ff.Google Scholar For particular condemnation of the second marriage of a wife, see under ‘Digamus’, Lexikon für Antike und Christentum, col. 1018.

116 The difference is mentioned in the principle semper in coniunctionibus non solum quid liceat considerandum est, sed quid honestum sit: Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 48.

117 Bishop Calixtus' apocryphal letter to the bishops of Gaul, regarded as the oldest evidence of ecclesiastical bans on incest in the Middle Ages, states: Coniunctiones autem consanguineorum fieri prohibete, quia eas et divinae leges et saeculi prohibent … Eos autum consanguineos dicimus, quos divinae et saeculi leges consanguineos appellant et in haereditatem suscipiunt…: Migne, Patrologia Latina 140 (Paris, 1880), col. 779.

118 Gaudemet, ‘Le legs’, 149.

119 Zhishman, Eherecht, 312ff.

120 Basilius' argument that one would not know how to address the children produced by a marriage with two sisters - ‘brothers’ with reference to their father, or ‘cousins’ because they were borne by two sisters - has no Biblical foundation (Zhishman, Eherecht, 313). The principle that a ‘mingling of names’ was to be avoided played an important role in the extension of incest prohibition in Byzantium (Zhishman, Eherecht, 306ff.; Evelyne Patlagean, XX).

137 Ibid., 473f.

138 Ibid., 487.

139 See above, pp. 305–6.

140 Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 470.

141 See above, p. 310.

142 For this topic see Lynch, Godparents.

143 To distinguish incest avoidance on the one hand and incest prohibitions on the other hand, as opposed to an undifferentiated concept of ‘incest taboo’, see Mitterauer, ‘Die “Sitten der Magier”’.

144 Extracts from the canons of the Nestorian bishop ‘Abdīšō bar Brīkā from the thirteenth century, in which the schematic presentation of prohibitions is an important element (Scriptorum veterum nova collectio e Vaticanis codicibus edita ab A. Mai 10 (Rome, 1838), 40f.).

145 Joyce, Die christliche Ehe, 490.

146 See above, p. 306.

147 Goody, Development, 55; cf. Mitterauer, ‘Verwandtenheiraten’.

148 Dauvillier and de Clercq, Le mariage, 156f.

149 The idea of a relationship constituted by breast-feeding can most particularly be found among pastoral nomadic peoples: Ebert, , Reallexikon der Vorgeschichte 8 (Berlin, 1927)Google Scholar, col. 190.

150 Lynch, Godparents, 260.

151 Ibid., 261.

152 Ibid., 275.

153 Ibid., 262; Eiben, Geschtechtsreife und Ehe, 434f. For the attitude of Gnosis towards sexuality: Rudolph, Kurt, Die Gnosis. Wesen und Geschichte einer spätantiken Religion (Leipzig, 1977), 259ff.Google Scholar

154 Ariès, Philippe, ‘Paulus und das Fleisch’, in Ariès, et al., eds., Die Masken des Begehrens und die Metamorphosen der Sinnlichkeit. Zur Geschichte der Sexualität im Abendland (Frankfurt, 1984), 51ff.Google Scholar

155 I Corinthians 5.1ff. Because Paul spoke of ‘immorality such as even pagans do not tolerate’, one can hardly conclude that he did not refer to the Old Testament but to ‘heathen popular morality’ (see under ‘Ehehindernisse’, in Lexikon für Antike und Christentum, col. 687).

156 Patai, The Jewish mind, 497ff.

157 It was not by accident that the first bans on marriage between kin were passed during the very synods which also formally ordered the obligation of celibacy on the part of the clergy, i.e. Elvira in 307 and Neocaesarea in 314–325 (Lexikon für Antike und Christentum, under ‘Ehe I’, col. 663).

158 He deals briefly with the anthropological approach towards historical questions in Goody, Development, especially 3ff. An historian employing anthropological methods, who regards the questions of endogamy and exogamy as the main criteria for family typology, is Todd, Emmanuel, La troisième planète. Structures familiales et systèmes idéologiques (Paris, 1983), especially 152ff.Google Scholar

159 Esp. Goody, Development, 31ff.

160 Goitein, Shlomo D., A Mediterranean society 3 (Berkeley, 1978), 28.Google Scholar

161 Possible approaches in Mitterauer, Michael, ‘Europäische Familienformen im interkulturellen Vergleich’, Ehe und Familie in ‘alten Hochkulturen’, Beiträge zur historischen Sozialkunde 14, 4 (1984), 152ff.Google Scholar, reprinted in Mitterauer, , Historisch-anthropologische Familienforschung (Vienna, 1990), 25–40.CrossRefGoogle Scholar