Odyssey 10.5 · Book 10, lines 5–7
The twelve children
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τοῦ καὶ δώδεκα παῖδες ἐνὶ μεγάροις γεγάασιν, ἓξ μὲν θυγατέρες, ἓξ δʼ υἱέες ἡβώοντες· ἔνθʼ ὅ γε θυγατέρας πόρεν υἱάσιν εἶναι ἀκοίτις.
And his twelve children were born in the halls, six daughters and six sons in their prime; and there he gave his daughters to his sons to be their wives.
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The setting
Homer fills in Aeolus's household before the gift: twelve grown children living at home in the halls of the floating island.
A note on this passage
The house is filled in with a family: twelve children, six sons and six daughters, all grown, all at home. Then the startling line — the six sons take the six daughters to wife. The clan marries only itself.
Homer states it without comment, but the detail completes the picture the wall began. Aeolus's world turns entirely on its own axis: sealed island, sealed household, feasting forever among its own. It is a vision of untroubled sufficiency — the very thing Odysseus, a man defined by exile, cannot have and is about to be denied again.
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