The Royal Incest
The union of like with like, read as a symbol.
The Royal Incest: what does it mean in analytical psychology?
The royal pair of the alchemists are often brother and sister, and their union is an incest. It was over the reading of the incest motif that Jung parted from Freud: where Freud read it as literal desire, Jung read it in Symbols of Transformation as the libido’s turn back toward its source, in search of renewal, and in his essay on the transference as the union with one’s own kind, the joining of the psyche with itself.
The Royal Incest: where does it appear in myth and tradition?
Isis and Osiris, sister and brother, the sibling marriages of the pharaohs, Zeus and Hera, and the brother and sister of the Rosarium philosophorum.
From the Sources
Of Osiris' unions with his sisters, Jung writes that the sister is simply substituted for the mother as a legal, uncensured symbol, since marriage with a sister in early antiquity was not merely tolerated but commended.
“Both times with a sister who is simply substituted for the mother as a legal, uncensured symbol, since the marriage with a sister in early antiquity was not merely tolerated, but was really commended.”
Dr. C. G. Jung, Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido, Part II, ch. V, "Symbolism of the Mother and of Rebirth" (on Osiris). Authorized translation, with introduction, by Beatrice M. Hinkle, M.D.; New York: Moffat, Yard and Company, 1916. The text, read in part
Jung argues from the sun myths that the 'incestuous' desire aims not at cohabitation but at becoming a child again: at coming into the mother once more in order to be born again.
“…the fundamental basis of the "incestuous" desire does not aim at cohabitation, but at the special thought of becoming a child again, of turning back to the parent's protection, of coming into the mother once more in order to be born again.”
Dr. C. G. Jung, Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido, Part II, ch. V, "Symbolism of the Mother and of Rebirth". Authorized translation, with introduction, by Beatrice M. Hinkle, M.D.; New York: Moffat, Yard and Company, 1916. The text, read in part
In the alchemical parable Silberer analyses, the bridegroom and bride are brother and sister, so bound by love that they cannot be separated, and so, 'as it were', wish to be punished for incest.
“Now I do not know what sin these two must have committed except that although they were brother and sister, they were in such wise bound by ties of love, that they could not be separated, and so, as it were, wished to be punished for incest.”
Dr. Herbert Silberer, Hidden Symbolism of Alchemy and the Occult Arts (originally published as Problems of Mysticism and its Symbolism), Part I, Section I, "The Parable", §14. Translated by Smith Ely Jelliffe, M.D., Ph.D.; Dover Publications, Inc., New York, 1971, an unabridged republication of the work published by Moffat, Yard and Company, New York, in 1917 (Project Gutenberg eBook #27755). The text, read in part
Each passage is quoted from the text named, which the press fetched and read, and was checked word for word against a fresh copy of it; the link opens that copy. Passages are given as printed, without the editors’ footnote numbers, and with words broken across lines joined.
Where to Read
- “The Psychology of the Transference,” CW 16
- Symbols of Transformation, CW 5
Jung’s writings are cited by the volume of the Collected Works (CW), Bollingen Series / Princeton, 1953–79.
Related Symbols
Also among Unions, Spells, and Changes
“Learn as much as you can about symbolism; then forget it all when you are analysing a dream.”
Cite This Entry
“The Royal Incest.” In Symbols of the Psyche, the Symbolarium. The Thinking Press, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/symbolarium/psyche/royal-incest.
Nearby in the alphabet: The River: The flow of life and time, and the border to be crossed. The Rose: The flower of love, and of the centre. Sacrifice: Giving something up, so that something new may live.