Note 214 — Chapter VII · ToC

Diodorus, bk. i. p. 27. The whole passage is: "Contrary to the received usage of other nations the laws permit the Egyptians to marry their sisters, after the example of Osiris and Isis. The latter, in fact, having cohabited with her brother Osiris, swore, after his death, never to suffer the approach of any man, pursued the murderer, governed according to the laws, and loaded men with benefits. All this explains why the queen receives more power and respect than the king, and why, among private individuals, the woman rules over the man, and that it is stipulated between married couples by the terms of the dowry-contract that the man shall obey the woman." The brother-sister marriages, referred to by Diodorus, which were common, especially in early Egyptian history, are further witness to the persistence among them of the customs of the mother-age.