epic marriage

[DEVARAKONDA VENKATA NARAYANA SARMA]

At 06:43 AM 9/1/98 +0200, you wrote:
>Dear Indologists,
>        I have a request about a marriage in the MBh, between arjuna and
>subhadrA, the kRSNa's sister. A very important one: by it the continuity of
>the lineage will be assured with abhimanyu.
>        But vasudeva, the subhadra's father was the brother of kuntI, the
>arjuna's mother, and hence the wife and husband were very close relatives.
>        Is such a marriage (between first crossed cousins) a legal one?
>        If not, the fact that zUra (biological father of subhadrA and
>kRSNa) gave his just born daughter to kuntibhoja, son of his paternal aunt,
>making him the legal father of kuntI, could make the marriage to be legal
>(between third cousins)?
>
>        I summarize:
>(biological)
>zUra > kuntI > arjuna
>zUra > vasudeva > subhadrA
>(official)
>X > a woman > kuntibhoja > kuntI > arjuna
>X > citraratha > zUra > vasudeva > subhadrA
>        Thanks in advance,
>Dominique
>
>Dominique THILLAUD
>Universite' de Nice Sophia-Antipolis, France
>
>

Men marrying daughters of paternal aunts or maternal uncles are not only
very common in South India but are preffered (atleast till recently). They
are slightly on the decline now because of the spread of the knowledge
of the bad effects of inbreading.

regards,

sarma.