Wives, mistresses, Italian style
And the murderous rivalries between half-siblings
Cousin marriage, which I spoke about in a previous post, is something of a Mafia thing, which holds together the clan structure of most organised crime groups. The various clans in the ‘Ndrangheta are all closely bound together in this way, and the Corleonesi, associated with Salvatore Riina, were as well. But there is another side of the coin to this: marrying in is vital, but staying married to the same woman for life is equally important.
You may remember that Mario Puzo’s don Corleone was very strict when it came to sex, and disapproved of Fredo’s shenanigans in Las Vegas, and would have disapproved of Sonny’s philandering, had he known about it. Why? Because a man who is a womaniser is not a serious man, he is chasing transient advantage, rather than building up the power of his family. Michael Corleone, by contrast, is a not a philanderer. Michael is serious, unlike his brothers Sonny and Fredo.
Goodness knows what don Corleone would have thought of divorce, but my guess is he would have been completely opposed. As man of the 1950’s, he would have thought women should keep to their sphere, namely kitchen, church and children. Cut forward some decades and cross the Hudson River into northern New Jersey, and Tony Soprano is totally different, a sexually incontinent man surrounded by other men just like himself. This sexual incontinence leads to multiple problems, and it draws the wives and girlfriends into the maelstrom of murder. Poor Adriana. When you consider what happens to her, being a 1950’s housewife does not look such a bad option. But the more men show their dependence on women, the more women will be drawn into Mafia life, and the more they will pay the price. Don Corleone lived in a world where no one hurt women and children, now not so much.
If cousin marriage is something that strengthens the Mafia, polygamy is something that kills it. Polygamy is one of the root causes of the destruction of many societies, because it produces families that are not proper families, not united by common purpose, and it produces half-siblings that experience rivalry untempered by fraternal bonds.
Consider the case of King David, where one son kills another because he has raped his sister; and that son, though forgiven, then goes on to raise a revolt. Moreover, the succession is soaked in blood and half-brother murder.
Consider the Ottoman Empire, where the half-brothers of the new Sultan were, for centuries, all murdered. In 1595 the new Sultan, Mehmed III, had 19 half-brothers strangled as a precaution. The first bloodless accession was in 1603.
Consider the case of president Mwai Kibaki of Kenya, whose time in office was greatly enlivened by the quarrel between his official wife, and his customary wife, and the rivalry between the first family and the second wife’s daughter.
Polygamy is a recipe for internal family strife, which is the very last thing a Mafia boss wants. It causes rivalry, sometimes murderous, amidst the half-siblings. So, don Corleone was right. A man needs a wife whom he sticks with. The idea of having rival families of children, who will fight it out for the succession, is a bad thing. And those rival families will fight, no doubt about it, because they are not bound by ties of fraternity. First of all they may not have been brought up together; and secondly they do not share a mother; the only thing they share is the desire for the family wealth, untempered by the bonds of civility.
Traditionally, polygamy has been practiced by pastoralists. It is still widely practiced, in places like Kenya and Saudi Arabia, though in the former it is losing ground, as it is thought of as old-fashioned. But let’s not sniff at the Saudis, or indeed the fundamentalist Mormons, because the practice is not unknown in Europe. Until fairly recently, in Italy, before the legalisation of divorce in 1970, later confirmed by referendum in 1974, it was not uncommon for men to have wives and compagne storiche (stable partners) and two sets of children; in addition the man might have a mistress on the side, if he could afford it. When divorce came, even though second families began to enjoy legal status, nevertheless, the first wife always enjoyed her pre-eminence in many cases. Pavarotti’s second wife always referred to his first wife as ‘la signora Pavarotti’, for which she was much commended. Berlusconi had many adventures, but the person who counted for a great deal, and who kept a very low profile in the press, was his first wife. This is hinted at in his Wikipedia entry: ‘In 1965, Berlusconi married Carla Elvira Dall'Oglio, and they had two children: Maria Elvira, better known as Marina (born 1966), and Pier Silvio (born 1969). By 1980, Berlusconi had established a relationship with the actress Veronica Lario (born Miriam Bartolini), with whom he subsequently had three children: Barbara (born 1984), Eleonora (born 1986), and Luigi (born 1988). He was divorced from Dall'Oglio in 1985, and married Lario in 1990.’ Berlusconi then went on to have a string of mistresses and girlfriends, as is well known. But the point of all this is not to condemn Berlusconi (one can leave that to others) but to commend him for handling all the ladies in his life with such skill. The most important of them is the eldest, Marina, and for all I know she has not fallen out with any of her half-siblings. The family has stayed united. Italians are good at that. But, when they are not successful at staying united, what then?
In The Chemist of Catania, the young Calogero wonders if his father’s absences are connected to another wife and another family. He himself is destined to have children by different women. And the children will be different because their mothers are different characters. And some children will be favoured more than others, just as their mothers were favoured or not. It’s complicated and difficult, and it could lead to murderous rivalry in the next generation, but that is what happens when you are a polygamist, or, as we old-fashioned Catholics call it, an adulterer.
To go back to what we started with: most people are amazed that first cousin marriage in the UK was not banned years ago. Bigamy has long been illegal here, but polygamy flies under the radar, and there are lots of de facto polygamous families in Britain, it is believed. Moreover, multiple wives of the same man, disguised as ‘dependants’, may well be collecting various state benefits. But how you stamp that out, I have no idea.