Question about Adelphopoiesis

In ancient Greece there are very many examples of close friendship
which could result to the self-sacrifice of one of the friends for the
sake of the other. First Herodotus informs us about real ceremonies of
fraternization which were performed by the peoples of Asia, Lydes and
Scyths. Lydes used to nick their arms with a sharp object and when they
would start bleeding they would lick the blood of the one who was to
become their blood-brother. Scyths also used to nick their arms but they
would let the blood of the ones to be fraternized run down together into a
glass where it was mixed with wine. They used to wet the tip of their arms
with this mixture and they would afterwards drink it. Under analogous
forms this custom of fraternization was found in Rome, Byzantium and in
all the later peoples of the West. It is especially found though, more
than anywhere else, in the Balkan Peninsula where - especially during the
Ottoman era - the oppressed people used to be fraternized in order to
fight the enemy with greater unity. In Western Europe as well as in the
Balkans the Church started from very early to recognize and even bless
fraternization with a special celebration. This kind of solemnization had
as a result on the one hand the extension of the relation to all the other
members of the family of the blood-brothers and on the other the creation
of social and legal questions such as e.g. even hereditary demands. That
is why provisions were issued which decreed that fraternization was not
banned as a custom but it could not create any legal consequence. Despite
these provisions the peoples continued and still continue in many parts of
the world to attribute a lot of importance in fraternization, much more
than the importanee which the Church and the State wanted to recognize. In
Serbia, Albania, Bulgaria and not less in Greece the custom of
fraternization was so well rooted that it was considered by the other
members of the family as well as a bond equal to blood relation. Marriages
between members of the families of the blood-brothers were blocked and,
because the blood-brothers were called "crossbrothers", after some time it
became a habit to address all the other relatives with the prefix "cross"
e.g. "cross- mother", "crossfather", "crossbrother-in-law" etc. Among the
many ritual customs with which fraternization was made official in Ottoman
Greece is the following. When the blood-brothers were more than two, they
would surround the Priest and they would bind a handkerchief from the belt
of his cassock. They would hold the other end of the handkerchief.

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