An 80-year-old man has been accused of locking up his daughters and raping them over a period of more than 40 years, in the latest incest allegations to shock Austria.

In echoes of the Josef Fritzl case, police are investigating allegations that the man's two daughters had been imprisoned in their home near the town of Braunau am Inn, by the German border, since 1970.

He allegedly sexually and physically abused the sisters, now aged 45 and 53, for almost all of their lives, until they escaped earlier this year.

The women were taken in by social services in May, but their story only became public on Thursday when an Austrian newspaper printed a report about the alleged abuse.

The suspect, from the village of St Peter am Hart, has been named by the Austrian media as Gottfried W, according to the Austro-German tradition of not fully identifying criminal suspects. He was arrested on Thursday afternoon and taken into custody, said Alois Lissl, a senior state police official.

The suspect faces charges of rape and other sexual offences, abusing or neglecting minors and defenceless people, threatening behaviour, coercion, and causing bodily harm, police said.

According to the Oberösterreichische Nachrichten newspaper, the sisters managed to flee during a rape attempt by the father. The older woman fought back and knocked him over, leaving him unable to get up. He was discovered on the floor several days later by a social worker. The paper also claimed the suspect used to threaten them with a pitchfork and a stick.

"Both women have mental deficiencies and suffered permanent beatings and violence," Hermann Feldbacher, a spokesman for the police department of the province of Upper Austria told Reuters.

"They became dependent on their father and were so withdrawn and mentally disabled that they couldn't cope on their own and were unable to leave the house unless he wanted this."

Police said in a statement that the women have accused the 80-year-old of repeatedly raping them between 1970 and May 2011. "In addition, he allegedly forbade [his daughters] from forging any contact with the outside world and lived with them in one room of their house," said the statement.

The alleged victims also claim they were forced to sleep on a wooden bench in the kitchen.

Lissl said that during questioning the women claimed their father repeatedly warned he would kill them if they resisted him, occasionally threatening them with firearms, and said that their mother, who died two years ago, was also repeatedly abused by the suspect. None of the family have been named by police.

The allegations evoke the case of Austrian Josef Fritzl, who imprisoned his daughter in a windowless cellar for 24 years and repeatedly raped her, fathering her seven children. Fritzl was sentenced to life imprisonment two years ago for that crime and for responsibility in the death of one of the children.

It was also reminiscent of the kidnapping of Austrian schoolgirl Natascha Kampusch, who escaped from her captor in 2006 after being held for eight years in a basement. Her abuser killed himself shortly after her escape.

Police said they were still investigating whether the women in the latest case had learning disabilities or whether their condition could be a result of what they lived through.

"It seems possible that after 40 years of abuse they suffered psychological effects, but it could also be that someone who is already mentally disabled is the ideal victim for abuse," Feldbacher added.

The women are currently being housed in a care shelter and receiving psychiatric treatment.

Local police commander Martin Pumberger said the suspect denies the accusations, adding it was up to the regional state prosecutor's office to now decide whether to formally charge him.