Greek
In Greek mythology, Zeus and Hera were brother and sister as well as husband and wife. They were the children of Cronus and Rhea (also married siblings). Cronus and Rhea, in turn, were children of Uranus and Gaia (a son who took his mother as consort, in some versions of the myth). Cronus and Rhea's siblings, the other Titans, were all also married siblings like Nyx and Erebus. Sea god Phorcys fathered the Phorcydes (most notably Medusa and Scylla) by his sister Ceto. Myrrha committed incest with her father, Theias, as bore Adonis.
Sophocles' tragic play Oedipus the King features the ancient Greek king inadvertently consummating an incestuous relationship with his mother.
Read more about this topic: Incest In Folklore
Famous quotes containing the word greek:
“Indeed, there is hardly the professor in our colleges, who, if he has mastered the difficulties of the language, has proportionally mastered the difficulties of the language, has proportionally mastered the difficulties of the wit and poetry of a Greek poet, and has any sympathy to impart to the alert and heroic reader.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The poets were not alone in sanctioning myths, for long before the poets the states and the lawmakers had sanctioned them as a useful expedient.... They needed to control the people by superstitious fears, and these cannot be aroused without myths and marvels.”
—Strabo (c. 58 B.C.–c. 24 A.D., Greek geographer. Geographia, bk. 1, sct. 2, subsct. 8.
“Can it be, that the Greek grammarians invented their dual number for the particular benefit of twins?”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)