The Deadliest Dinner Parties In History

Salomé was a princess of the Herodian Dynasty, the daughter of Herod II and Herodias. Herodias had separated from Herod II and married his brother Herod Antipas. According to the Christian Gospels of Mark and Matthew and the works of Josephus, Herod Antipas, her uncle and step-father and the then-ruler of the Judean state that was a part of the Roman Empire, was having a large birthday banquet for himself at a his hilltop palace on the East Bank of the Jordan River with political officials, military leaders, and other prominent individuals in attendance. 

Salomé mesmerized guests with a sultry dance. Her uncle, transfixed, told her, "Ask me for whatever you want, and I will give it to you." Salomé asked her mother for advice and relayed it back, "I want you to give me right away on a platter the head of John the Baptist." John the Baptist was previously living in the wilderness wearing camel hair coats and living on locusts and wild honey. He baptized Jesus of Nazereth, which is where he got the epithet “The Baptist.”.John the Baptist had a growing following in the wilderness and publicly criticized Herodias marrying her brother-in-law. 

Herod Antipas was allegedly “deeply grieved” but felt duty-bound “because of his oaths and his guests” so he indeed “executed” her request. One of his guards went to the prison cell where John the Baptist was being held, and brought his head back on a platter. It was presented to Salomé who in turn presented it to Herodias, her mother. 

This story is depicted in many great paintings of the Renaissance including several by Caravaggio, while John's head is allegedly in a box in the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus, Syria. The story is retold in Irish poet Oscar Wilde’s French language play Salomé which was turned into a German-language opera in 1905 by Richard Strauss. The opera’s scandalous subject matter and erotic 'Dance of the Seven Veils' caused it to be initially banned in London and Vienna, and it was chased out of New York after only one performance.