English edit

Etymology edit

Compound of brother +‎ husband.

Noun edit

brother-husband (plural brother-husbands)

  1. A man who is simultaneously brother and husband to his wife.
    Coordinate term: sister-wife
    • 1996, Allen W. Johnson, Douglass Richard Price-Williams, Oedipus Ubiquitous: The Family Complex in World Folk Literature, →ISBN, page 188:
      Dala Kumara was seized by a deep passion; he carried his sister away to the forest and lived with her there, subsisting on wild foods. One day, when her brother-husband was away, Giri Devi ran away and hanged herself from some forest vines.
    • 2005, Gods, Goddesses, and Mythology - Volume 6, →ISBN, page 764:
      According to the Pyramid Texts — a collection of prayers, hymns, and spells for the dead — Isis foresaw the murder of her brother-husband and mourned for him before the event.
    • 2006, Shankar Mokashi-Punekar, Awadheswari, →ISBN, page 1:
      King Purukutsa could never forget that his queen was his younger sister, on of his own blood. They didn't beget any children. Purukutsani who was also an equally rightful claimant to the royal household ruled the kingdom like a real queen, all the reins of the state, which were formally with her elder brother-husband, securely in her hands.
    • 2011, Jim McPherson, The Death's Head Hellion: Sedonplay, 4824/25 Year of the Dome, →ISBN:
      Rufous Rudra Silvercloud, Bodiless Byron's firstborn son, his Beast Master, also his Storm Lord; - brother-husband to sister-wife Umashakti; - joint devic over-ruler of the former Weirdom of Kanin City when the ever-expanding Empire of Lathakra reached its walls; rather than either surrendering or fighting the Thanatoids and their allies, including the Unity of Chaos, he joined them.

Coordinate terms edit