Anyone who has grown up with a sibling knows how easily rivalries can develop. The desire of brothers and sisters to outperform each other is a nearly universal emotion, one that transcends social class, culture, and time period. In other words, everyone is prone to this rivalry, even US presidents.
History is chock-full of famous siblings with particularly juicy beefs. If humans are already naturally inclined toward competing with their sibs, adding power, wealth, or fame to the equation only inflames that tendency. In societies with hereditary governments, siblings have done all kinds of terrible things to each other to seize power for themselves. In more modern times, while dynastic political families do still exist, high-stakes sibling squabbling often plays out in corporate boardrooms or lawsuits. But throughout history, one thing is clear: Family is complicated.
Read on for some of the ugliest sibling rivalries across history.
1.Oda Nobunaga Faked An Illness To Get His Brother To Visit Him And Then Killed Him
According to written sources, the division between 16th-century Japanese warlord Oda Nobunaga and his younger brother, Oda Nobuyuki, originated in their childhood. Nobunaga was the second son of their father, Oda Nobuhide, but he was technically Nobuhide’s heir because his older brother, Nobuhiro, was illegitimate. Nobuhide apparently preferred Nobunaga’s illegitimate older brother; making matters worse, Nobuhide and Nobunaga disliked each other, and Nobunaga was openly disrespectful of tradition.
By the time Nobuhide passed in 1551, the Oda clan had split into factions. Some were loyal to Nobunaga, while others were loyal to Nobuyuki, who was considered more soft-spoken and respectful. In 1556, Nobuyuki led a rebellion against Nobunaga while his older brother was away assisting his father-in-law in a war. Nobunaga put down the rebellion and pardoned his brother.
But the next year, when Nobuyuki again tried to rebel, Nobunaga decided to get rid of him once and for all. He faked an illness, invited his brother to visit, and had him slain. This allowed Nobunaga to unite the Owari Province, which would eventually allow him to become daimyo (a powerful feudal lord) and go to be one of Japan’s most feared warlords.
2.Commodus Exiled His Sister After She Plotted Against Him, But Then Decided That Was Too Merciful
Before Commodus became Roman Emperor in 176 CE, the rulers had been chosen by merit (or political advantage). Commodus was the first chosen by birthright, inheriting the throne from his father Marcus Aurelius. This was a controversial decision, not least with Commodus’s own sister, Lucilla. She was married to Lucius Verus, Aurelius’s co-ruler and expected heir.
After Commodus’s ascencion, Lucilla plotted with some Roman senators to have her brother assassinated. The attempt failed, and Commodus exiled her and her daughter to the island of Capri. Later, however, the capricious ruler had a change of heart. He decided the punishment was too lenient (or that his sister was too dangerous), and had both Lucilla and her daughter slain.
During the Ptolemaic dynasty of Egypt (305 BCE to 30 BCE), members of the Macedonian Greek ruling family routinely married their own siblings for both political and symbolic purposes. Often, these siblings/spouses fought bloody conflicts over who would be ruler of Egypt.
When their father Ptolemy XII Auletes passed in 51 BCE, Cleopatra VII and her brother, Ptolemy XIII Philopator became co-rulers. Cleopatra, then 18, was eight years older than her brother, and led the partnership for the next four years. By then, Philopator had come of age, and with the loyalty of the military, took power for himself.
Cleopatra fled to Syria, where she met Julius Caesar, and the two worked together to overthrow Philopator. In a battle against the Romans led by Caesar and Cleopatra, Philopator drowned. Cleopatra’s sister Arsinoe also participated in the conflict, taking control of the army and proclaiming herself queen. She was captured and originally granted mercy until Cleopatra reportedly ordered her execution in 41 BCE.
After defeating Philopator, Cleopatra then became co-ruler of Egypt along with another younger brother, Ptolemy XIV Theos Philopator II. She later had him poisoned to make way for her own son to be co-ruler – and eventually the only ruler – Ptolemy XV Caesarion.
The Puma and Adidas shoe companies owe their origins to a pair of German brothers, Rudolf “Rudi” and Adolf “Adi” Dassler (pictured). While Rudi was drafted in WWI, Adi began creating shoes in their mother’s laundry room, and in the 1920s, the brothers formed the Dassler Brothers Sports Shoe Company. It soon reached success due to Adi’s innovative new shoes with spikes on the bottoms. At the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, American sprinter Jesse Owens won four gold medals wearing the shoes.
But success led to tension between the brothers, and WWII brought them into a full-blown feud. After Rudi refused to employ his sister Marie’s two sons, hoping to deny other family members control of the company, both sons were drafted into the military and killed. Rudi was himself drafted in 1943, for which he blamed his brother. Adi managed to avoid the draft, as he was deemed essential to running the business. Rudi tried to desert his post, fearing his brother was planning to take over, but the Gestapo caught and imprisoned him for the rest of the war.
Like many Germans at the time, Rudi and Adi were both members of the Nazi party, joining in the 1930s. After WWII, each attempted to paint the other as the bigger Nazi, although Rudi was reportedly the more loyal party member. The denazification panel agreed, and Rudi was again briefly imprisoned.
In 1948, the Dassler brothers finally decided to go their separate ways, splitting their assets and forming competing companies. Adi formed “Adidas” using a shortened combination of his first and last name. Rudi called his company “Ruda,” which eventually became “Puma.”
At the height of the shoe feud, their German town itself (Herzogenaurach) became divided. Workers for either company didn’t dare cross the village river to the side of the other. For the remainder of their lives, the siblings rarely saw each other, but on his deathbed in 1974, Rudi invited Adi to speak to him one last time. His brother declined.
Henry VIII and his volatile reign spurred sibling rivalry even after his demise. He spent his entire adult life and six marriages trying to produce male heirs. When he passed in 1547 at age 55, his only legitimate son, Edward, whose mother was Henry’s third wife Jane Seymour, became Edward VI. Edward succumbed to tuberculosis six years into his rule, and because Henry had no male heirs or brothers, the line of succession continued through his daughters.
His oldest daughter was Mary Tudor, whose mother was Henry’s first wife, the Spanish princess Catherine of Aragon. Like her mother, Mary was a devout Roman Catholic, which was a problem, as Henry had formally severed relations with Rome and established the Church of England in 1534. Mary succeeded Edward and became Mary I.
Meanwhile, Henry’s second-oldest daughter was Elizabeth, by his second wife Anne Boleyn. Henry’s marriage to Catherine had been legally annulled, so Elizabeth arguably had a stronger claim to the throne than Mary. She also represented a powerful Protestant rival to Mary’s interests.
While the two supposedly got along as children (after the demise of their rivaling mothers), they became increasingly aware of their opposing religions and supporters. Shortly after Mary’s coronation, she had Parliament declare the marriage between her mother and King Henry valid once more.
In 1554, among many Protestant plots against Mary, the queen accused her half-sister of trying to overthrow the government. Mary nearly executed Elizabeth at the Tower of London before deciding to imprison her for a year at Woodstock Palace.
By 1558, Mary passed without an heir, and Elizabeth became Queen Elizabeth I.
Old Hollywood actresses (and sisters) Olivia de Havilland and Joan Fontaine (pictured) were born 15 months apart, and their feud began in childhood. Joan considered her older sister Olivia to be their mother’s favorite, and the arguments often became physical. According to a piece in Life, Joan plotted to kill her sister in self-defense at age 9. When Olivia became editor of a school magazine, she published a mock will that stated, “I bequeath to my sister the ability to win boys’ hearts, which she does not have at present.” Joan recalled another particular incident when she was 15:
Olivia threw me down on the poolside flagstone border, jumped on top of me, and fractured my collarbone… I regret I remember not one act of kindness all through my childhood.
When it came to their acting careers, it was Olivia who first set out to make a name for herself in Hollywood. Like many younger siblings, Joan insisted she wanted to do the same thing. Olivia discouraged Joan from using the de Havilland family name, and after consulting with a fortune-teller, Joan decided to go with her stepfather’s surname.
The sisters worked at different studios, but despite her initial reluctance, Olivia gave her sister a place to stay in Los Angeles, and both sisters reportedly suggested the other for roles they weren’t right for. But their rivalry came to a public stage in 1942. Olivia was up for an Academy Award for her performance in Hold Back the Dawn, while Joan was nominated for her role alongside Cary Grant in the Alfred Hitchcock thriller Suspicion.
Joan, the underdog, won, and was perceived to snub her older sister’s congratulations as she went to receive her award. When Olivia won her own Academy Award in 1947 for To Each His Own, she snubbed her sister in return, although it’s possible she had different motivations. Joan had been publicly talking smack about Olivia’s new husband, novelist Marcus Goodrich, saying, “All I know about him is that he’s had four wives and written one book. Too bad it’s not the other way around.”
Their relationship seemed to improve until their mother became ill with terminal cancer and Olivia took care of her. When she passed in 1975, Joan said Olivia didn’t invite her to the memorial service (though she attended anyway). Their relationship never recovered, as Joan made clear in an interview with People while promoting her memoir in 1978:
You can divorce your sister as well as your husbands. I don’t see her at all and I don’t intend to… Olivia has always said I was first at everything – I got married first, got an Academy Award first, had a child first. If I die, she’ll be furious, because again I’ll have got there first!
Joan wasn’t exactly correct on that front, though. While she did pass before her sister, in 2013, Olivia expressed her sadness over her sister’s passing. For her part, she stated, “A feud implies continuing hostile conduct between two parties. I cannot think of a single instance wherein I initiated hostile behavior.”
The band Oasis might be known for hits like “Wonderwall” and “Champagne Supernova,” but the infamous feud between bandmates and brothers Noel and Liam Gallagher might overshadow their musical success.
Like many sibling rivalries, this one dates back to petty squabbles in childhood. Liam described his take on the feud’s beginning, saying, “One night I come in pissed and I couldn’t find the light switch so I pissed all over [Noel’s] new stereo. I think it basically boils down to that.”
In 1994, Oasis was starting to pick up steam and embarked on its American tour. At a gig at the Whisky a Go Go in Los Angeles, the band performed a famously horrific set while high on crystal meth, which ended with Liam hitting Noel on the head with a tambourine. Noel quit the band the following day. It wasn’t the last time the brothers’ rivalry would escalate to a physical level, nor the last time one of them would quit.
Released in 1995, “Wibbling Rivalry” was a 14-minute audio recording of the brothers fighting with each other during an interview. Liam’s insults included telling his brother, “You can stick your thousand pounds right up your f*ckin’ arse ’til it comes out your f*ckin’ big toe.” Meanwhile, Noel summed up his younger brother’s central issue as, “You think it’s rock and roll to get thrown off a ferry, and it’s not,” referencing the time when Liam did, in fact, get thrown off a ferry.
The continued altercations and walk-offs threatened the brothers’ success. Liam skipped an MTV Unplugged performance due to laryngitis, but instead stayed in the crowd to chain smoke and berate his brother. He skipped an American tour to house hunt with his fiancée, and a few weeks later, Noel followed suit and also ditched the tour.
One of their worst fights occurred in 2000, after Liam questioned whether his older brother was actually the biological father of his child. Noel quit again. In 2005, Noel claimed he’d learned how to psychologically terrify his younger brother; for instance, by secretly moving furniture around his home knowing he was afraid of ghosts.
Noel finally quit Oasis for good in 2009, but the public feud continued, particularly after Liam got a Twitter account. In 2016, Liam went on an anti-Noel tweeting campaign, repeatedly referring to his brother as a potato.
The man who assassinated Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth (pictured), was also a working actor who came from an acting family. According to historian Nora Titone, who wrote My Thoughts Be Bloody: The Bitter Rivalry Between Edwin and John Wilkes Booth That Led to an American Tragedy, the brothers were rivals at an early age.
Their father, Junius Brutus Booth, was one of the most famous Shakespearean actors of his day. By the time John graduated and began pursuing acting, Edwin was already successful. Edwin decided that he, John, and their brother Junius Jr. would divide the country and perform separately. Edwin reserved the more populous northern cities for himself and left the south to John, which limited the latter’s opportunities. Making matters worse, John was considered an unskilled actor and theater critics often wrote scathing reviews of his performances.
John and his brother often vehemently disagreed about politics as well. Edwin was a staunch supporter of Abraham Lincoln, while John was a secessionist. During his time in the South, John’s views became more radicalized. Meanwhile, in an ironic historical twist, Edwin actually saved the life of Lincoln’s son on a train platform the year before the assassination.
In many ways, John’s assassination of Lincoln was meant to be a theatrical performance as well as a political statement. When he jumped off the 15-foot balcony onto the stage of Ford’s Theatre after shooting the president, it mirrored a move he’d previously done in a performance of Macbeth. He also wore some of his father’s costume pieces.
While Edwin’s acting career had eclipsed John’s, John’s notoriety ended up eclipsing Edwin and overtaking the Booth name. Edwin took a break from acting and disowned his brother, refusing to have his name spoken in his house.
The columnists behind the two long-running and competing advice columns “Ask Ann Landers” and “Dear Abby” were actually, at one point, close sisters. Born in Sioux City, IA on July 4, 1918, Esther “Eppie” and Pauline Friedman were identical twins who attended Morningside College together.
In 1956, Esther took a job writing “Ask Ann Landers,” an advice column started by Ruth Crowley at the Chicago Sun-Times in 1943. That same year, Pauline, who had recently moved to San Francisco, called the San Francisco Chronicle‘s editor and claimed she could write a better advice column than their current columnist. After a brief tryout, and despite not having work experience, Pauline took the pen name Abigail Van Buren and began writing the “Dear Abby” column.
The column competition led to conflict. The same year she began writing “Dear Abby,” Pauline offered her column to the twins’ hometown newspaper, as long as they didn’t print her sister’s column. This led to an eight-year rift. The twins briefly reconciled in 1964, but then continued feuding until shortly before Esther’s passing in 2002. (Pauline lived until 2013).
The animosity carried over into the next generation. Esther’s daughter, Margo Howard, publicly criticized Pauline’s daughter, Jeanne Phillips. Jeanne had taken over “Dear Abby” and published a farewell letter to her aunt, Margo’s mother. Margo described the letter as “self-serving and loopy,” saying Esther and Jeanne hadn’t even had a relationship.
Many modern breakfast cereals originated with the Kellogg’s line of boxed products. But a battle of who was the true “Kellogg” went down between two brothers. John Harvey Kellogg (pictured) and Will Keith Kellogg were raised as Seventh-day Adventists. John became a staunch believer in what he called “biological living,” which involved a strict diet of vegetarianism; no alcohol, tobacco, coffee, tea, or condiments; and minimal dairy.
In his mid-20s, John became president of a sanitarium in Battle Creek, MI. The patients grew so tired of his enforced diet that he, his wife, and his brother Will began experimenting with plant-based breakfasts in 1877. Eventually, they stumbled upon corn flakes.
Although regarded as the corn flakes inventor, John was less interested in growing a business. He was more interested in changing America’s eating habits as well as their “sinful” lifestyles (he believed eating corn flakes would stop masturbation). Meanwhile, shrewd businessman Will bought the rights from his brother to manufacture the corn cereal, and put it on the market in 1906 to instant success.
However, John was still using the Kellogg name to sell corn flakes to former patients, and this prompted a legal battle between the brothers over who should control the rights to the family name. Will ended up winning. By the 1930s, he had amassed a fortune of around $50 million, making him one of the wealthiest people in the US. After the lawsuits, the brothers reportedly rarely spoke.
As of 2019, Leo Gallagher (pictured) was 73 and still performing his watermelon-smashing stage show. But in the 1990s, there were actually two people destroying fruit with sledgehammers under the name “Gallagher”: Leo and his younger brother Ron.
When Leo’s unique career as a prop comic took off, Ron, who was reportedly unemployed, asked his brother for permission to tour the country’s smaller venues doing his brother’s routine under the same name. Leo agreed, under the condition that all promotional material would make it clear that Ron’s shows were Gallagher’s brother, not Gallagher himself.
Ron agreed, but eventually Leo felt Ron’s promotional material wasn’t creating enough of a distinction between the two performers. Ron, who looks awfully similar to his older brother, wore nearly identical clothing in his act, performed a very similar food-centric show, and never once referred to his brother. By Ron’s own estimation to The Baltimore Sun in 1998, “I’d say 70 to 80% of the people will leave here saying they saw Gallagher, which is the greatest compliment you can give.”
Leo eventually sued his brother for trademark infringement, and Ron had to stop his copycat act. According to Leo, the brothers have gone more than 20 years without speaking.
Dynastic politics have a way of making sibling rivalries even worse than they otherwise might have been. When Philippe I, eventual Duke of Orleans, was born in 1640, he was the second son of King Louis XIII and thus second in line to inherit the throne after his older brother, also named Louis (pictured). The problem was, Philippe had many attributes that would have made him a good ruler: He was highly intelligent, outgoing, attractive, and charismatic.
Under normal circumstances, the second-in-line to the throne would serve various roles in the military and government – but his insecure older brother barred him from participating in France’s governance. Known as “The Sun King,” Louis XIV kept his brother in the shadows. Phillipe gained the admiration of the French government after he won the Battle of Cassel as lieutenant general. But Louis essentially removed his brother from the position and prevented him from participating in further military conflicts where he might show his capabilities.
Also contributing to the tension between the brothers was Phillipe’s personal style; he was known for his love of wigs and jewelry, and for cross-dressing at a time when it was quite scandalous. Louis disapproved of this, as well as of his brother’s relationships with men.
The right to be a nation’s ruler has turned siblings against each other countless times throughout history, and Richard and John, sons of King Henry II, were no exception. Richard, born in 1157 CE, was the eldest son of Henry, ruler of England and its overseas territories in France and Ireland. John, born in 1166, was Henry’s fourth son, who was originally passed over for a role in the family dynasty. As the youngest, John wasn’t in a great position, and his father didn’t seem to rate him as a future ruler, giving him the not-very-nice nickname “Lackland.”
But after their middle brothers Geoffrey and Henry the Younger died prematurely, and Henry’s relationship with Richard declined, John became important in Henry’s plans for succession. He played his sons against each other and kept Richard on his toes about his place in line for the throne.
This backfired, as Richard and Henry ended up allying against their father before his passing. Richard became king in 1189. Before he left to join the Third Crusade, he decided to ban his trouble-making brother from England for three years, but his mother convinced him not to. Richard should have listened to his gut, because once he left, his younger brother promptly conspired against Richard’s regent. During Richard’s three-year absence, John effectively controlled the kingdom.
To add salt to the wound, while Richard was gone, John tried multiple times to conspire with the king of France, Philip Augustus, to take the throne for himself, without success. When Richard eventually returned to the kingdom, John fled to France. But Richard forgave his brother and even named John as his heir instead of Geoffrey’s oldest son.
The historical narrative of this rivalry has definitely taken sides. Richard is known as the brave “Lionheart,” while “Prince John” is best known as the evil plotter in the legend of Robin Hood.
During Henry VIII’s reign (1509-1547), it was common for European political leaders to use relationships and marriage for political gain. In 1522, 17-year-old Mary Boleyn had already been married and given birth to a child when she met Henry VIII. By this time, Henry’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon had become strained due to their lack of a male heir. Henry was actively pursuing relationships with various members of the queen’s entourage, and in 1525, Mary became his mistress. She gave birth to a son one year later, whom many suspect was Henry’s illegitimate child.
Meanwhile, Henry was also actively pursuing Mary’s older sister Anne Boleyn. It’s likely Henry met Anne in 1522 and was courting her by 1526. The king then spent several years bargaining with the pope for a divorce before finally leaving Catherine in 1531 and marrying Anne in 1533.
Things fell apart for Mary shortly after Henry’s marriage to Anne. In 1534, the widowed Mary wed a man named William Stafford in secret. Stafford was a commoner, and this was not a good look for the Boleyn family, nor for the sister of the queen. Mary and her husband were banished from court to the English countryside, where a destitute Mary was left begging for assistance from either her former lover or her sister. She didn’t get it. Meanwhile, Mary’s son (who was probably Henry’s son) was living under the care of his Aunt Anne.
Three years later, although Anne had given Henry a child, it was female – Elizabeth. Anne fell out of favor. She was accused of adultery and incest (widely believed by historians to be false charges created to oust her) and imprisoned in the Tower of London. Mary did not visit her sister, or her brother George (also imprisoned), and there’s no evidence that she ever wrote to them or contacted them. Anne was executed in 1536.
While their relationship has often been described as a rivalry, the lack of primary evidence makes it difficult to know for certain
15.The Dorsey Brothers Made Amends Shortly Before Tommy Dorsey’s Passing
Brothers Tommy and Jimmy Dorsey were major musicians during both the jazz and swing eras – Jimmy played clarinet and saxophone, while Tommy played trumpet and trombone. In 1933, the pair had achieved enough success to form their own band, the Dorsey Brothers. They were also known in the music industry for violent arguments. As trumpeter Max Kaminsky wrote in his book Jazz Band: My Life in Jazz:
They had been brought up in a feisty Irish family where love was expressed with fists as much as kisses. Both Tommy and his brother Jimmy were natural born scrappers… When they had their own Dorsey Brothers orchestra they fought around the clock. Tommy would kick off the beat. Jimmy would growl, “Always the same corny tempo!” Tommy would snarl, “Oh yeah! And you always play those same corny notes!” Jimmy would leap up, snatch Tommy’s trombone and bend it in two. Tommy would seize Jimmy’s sax and smash it on the floor, and the fight was on.
After one particularly heated argument in 1935, Tommy walked off and the band broke up. Both brothers went on to have successful solo careers, with each of their orchestras producing major hits throughout the 1940s. They finally reunited in 1953 as the in-house band for Jackie Gleason’s bandstand variety act, Stage Show, and regained their national exposure. Tommy passed in 1956, after which Jimmy took over the band. Unfortunately, Jimmy passed the following year.
