[Buddha-l] Cross vs. parallel cousins

[Mitchell Ginsberg]

Date: Thu, 28 Aug 2008 12:34:07 -0600
hello Joanna, 
Thank you for explaining the 'preferential' part 
of the term. I understand and have seen that (as 
in some friends from Iran in which the husband
and the wife are parallel first cousins (whose
fathers are brothers) and for whom that seemed
to be the obvious choice from quite early in 
life .... 
I was using preferential in terms of Siddhattha
and Nanda (whose mothers were sisters and who 
had the same father), about S's mother being
the chief consort and N's mother taking that
role after S's death. (Following the description
on Malalasekera's large Dictionary of Pali
Proper Names.) I am not sure what "chief 
consort" meant in that society, and I wonder
about the description of the father as king, 
but that was my meaning toward the end of my 
own post (where I wrote in part 
"I take it that Siddhartha was born of the privileged
mother/sister in this story. Are there passages that explain that
either in the Tipitaka or Atthakatha or Tika (or elsewhere)?"

Thank you. 
Mitchell