Hello, In my novel a boy and his sister have sex by mistake, not knowing each other's identities, and realise who they are the morning after. They then live (and were living) separately for five years, and then meet again. Unbeknownst to the (now) man, his sister gave birth to the child, who was then kidnapped by her aunt and renamed so that she never finds her son again. I can't portray a realistic aftermath for both characters after these events. When he's having sex with his wife, images of his sister keep popping back up so he eventually marries his sister off to 'get rid' of her. This is all set in the 5th century in Britain.
Interesting plot! Have you heard of genetic sexual attraction? It sometimes occurs when relatives meet for the first time as adults. One of my close friends experienced it when she met her half-brother for the first time aged 30 or so. They had a short sexual relationship and the aftermath was... nothing, really. They broke it off and both went on to have happy relationships with non-relatives. In fact, she recently got married and had a baby (not her brother's!) Obviously this is just one example, and it probably affects other people really badly. But I wanted to give this perspective to show there doesn't have to be an aftermath from the sex itself.
They knew each other for six years as children (which is enough to deter any sexual attraction according to the "Westermarck Effect.") And thanks, but I'll readily admit it wasn't made up by me (I'm retelling the story of King Arthur in a historical and 'realistic' context). I have invented the details of the accidental union, though. Them having a son together is important, since the child born of the incest is mad.
Don't have a brother so I don't even get why incest is such a taboo subject to begin with. However, wanted to say, maybe you could check out real life accounts of incest and see if you can't get an idea of what feelings might arise in such a pair? I seem to think it's the Indians who have a tradition of betrothing daughters to their future husbands even as babies (I could be wrong about that being Indians - but definitely this happens). What happens is, once the girl is engaged as an infant or toddler, she is shipped off to her future husband's family to be raised there - this means, while she is not related to her future husband at all, she does grow up with the little boy like regular siblings. By having grown up together from a certain age, the idea of marrying each other and having any kind of sexual relationship is repulsive to both parties - it is like incest to them. I have no idea how these individuals might have resolved - or not resolved - such matters, but it might help you if you looked it up!
I think @Tenderiser might have the best opinion considering the matter. I don't think too many of us really have any applicable knowledge to your topic, just theories and conceptual ideas. Hell Edgar Allen Poe married his teenage cousin, though to be fair he was a Mad Genius.
Well, (sorry) Hitler had sex with his niece and she committed suicide. This was before he even joined the Nationalist Socialists as far as I know.
Don't be sorry, we are not saying that your plot is bad nor wrong. Just sharing other historical figures that have had incestuous relations. I apologize if I have offended in any way. Please don't hit me.
No, I was apologising for having to bring Hitler into this. Sorry you misunderstood. I was just trying to think of an example of incest leading to great trauma and even incentive to suicide.
Oh ok. We cool then. Don't apologize for mentioning a dead man. Unless you plan on following in his evil maniacal footsteps and teachings, I don't think an apology is necessary. He was evil, but his evil did contribute a lot to modern medicine. So in a backhanded way he was sorta good.
I don't think equating cousins to brothers and sisters is relevant. Hell, marrying your first cousin is legal in some states. Not to mention the exponential difference of birth defects that come from a brother/sister birth than a cousin's reproduction. I think the best way to learn about this is to simply study the "blue bloods," royalty relationships of European countries, that was highly incestuous, and the many birth defects that took place because of it. http://io9.gizmodo.com/the-11-most-depraved-things-the-roman-emperors-ever-di-1479671517
Some thoughts (find your plot idea interesting from your post on villains in another thread). Celtic Britons were thoroughly Romanized, and would have had the Roman aversion to incest. So the two would have been severely guilt-ridden about it when they learned what they had done (Think "Oedipus"). Caligula notwithstanding: he was assassinated. And his incest was used by contemporaries to justify it. Don't know where the Germans of the era stood on incest, but I would imagine that they had a pretty strong taboo also, and for the same reason: two many cousins, brothers and sisters in your family tree, and your village winds up with a lot of peculiar people. Small isolated communities have ways to deal with incest: sometimes all marriages within the local tribal unit are forbidden, and mates have to be taken from another village, others give their women to any visiting stranger, to get an injection hopefully of fresh bloodline. So even though they didn't know genetics, they understood that certain things had consequences best avoided.
My novel is set from 470-530AD, when it's thought Arthur lived. By then (in fact, by 430 a mere twenty years after the Romans left) Canterbury lay in ruins and most of the country had gone back to the old Celtic ways. By 470 they had abandoned most of Rome now, and had gone back to wattle and daub houses and celtic festivals. The fact the Romans had respected their culture so much didn't help. There were very few christians, and the Romans had let the Celts keep their Gods as well as leaders (though subject to Rome). Many of those Britonnic leaders became Kings. There was severe racism and anti-romanism in certain parts, to the point of genocide.
