de Vries, C., Baye, M.(. and Kovenock, D.(. (2012). The Herodotus paradox Games and Economic Behavior, 74(1):399--406.

Affiliated author

Casper de Vries
Publication year

2012

Journal

Games and Economic Behavior

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The Babylonian bridal auction, described by Herodotus, is regarded as one of the earliest uses of an auction in history. Yet, to our knowledge, the literature lacks a formal equilibrium analysis of this auction. We provide such an analysis for the two-player case with complete and incomplete information, and in so doing identify what we call the “Herodotus paradox.”