1.
French literature
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This article is a general introduction to French literature. For detailed information on French literature in specific periods, see the separate historical articles in the template to the right. Literature written in French language, by citizens of nations such as Belgium, Switzerland, Canada, Senegal, Algeria, Morocco. As of 2006, French writers have been awarded more Nobel Prizes in Literature than novelists, poets and essayists of any other country, France itself ranks first in the list of Nobel Prizes in literature by country. French literature has been for French people an object of pride for centuries. The French language is a dialect derived from Latin and heavily influenced principally by Celtic. Today, French schools emphasize the study of novels, theater, the literary arts are heavily sponsored by the state and literary prizes are major news. The Académie française and the Institut de France are important linguistic and artistic institutions in France, Literature matters deeply to the people of France and plays an important role in their sense of identity. As of 2006, French literary people have been awarded more Nobel Prizes in Literature than novelists, poets and essayists of any other country, a writer must refuse to allow himself to be transformed into an institution, even if it takes place in the most honorable form. For most of the 20th century, French authors had more Literature Nobel Prizes than those of any other nation. M. G, le Clézio 2014 – Patrick Modiano Grand Prix de Littérature Policière – created in 1948, for crime and detective fiction. Grand Prix du roman de lAcadémie française – created 1918, Prix Décembre – created in 1989. Prix Femina – created 1904, decided each year by an exclusively female jury, Prix Goncourt – created 1903, given to the author of the best and most imaginative prose work of the year. Prix Goncourt des Lycéens – created in 1987, Prix Littéraire Valery Larbaud – created in 1957. Prix Médicis – created 1958, awarded to an author whose fame does not yet match their talent, Prix Renaudot – created in 1926. Prix Tour-Apollo Award – 1972–1990, given to the best science fiction published in French during the preceding year. Prix des Deux Magots – created in 1933, a short history of French literature Burgwinkle, William, Nicholas Hammond, and Emma Wilson, eds. The Cambridge history of French literature Cobb, Richard, Promenades, an appreciation of modern French literature Harvey, Paul. The Oxford companion to French literature Denis Hollier, ed, a New History of French Literature, Harvard University Press,1989,1150 pp. France, Peter
2.
Medieval French literature
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Medieval French literature is, for the purpose of this article, literature written in Oïl languages during the period from the eleventh century to the end of the fifteenth century. For historical background, see History of France, France in the Middle Ages or Middle Ages, for other national literary traditions, see Medieval literature. The language in southern France is known as langue doc or the Occitan language family, also known under the name of one of iys dialects, the Western peninsula of Brittany spoke Breton, a Celtic language. Catalan was spoken in the South, and Germanic languages and Franco-Provençal were spoken in the East, the various dialects of Old French developed into what are recognised as regional languages today. Languages which developed from dialects of Old French include Bourguignon, Champenois, Franc-Comtois, Francien, Gallo, Lorrain, Norman, Anglo-Norman, Picard, Poitevin, Saintongeais and Walloon. From 1340 to the beginning of the century, a generalized French language became clearly distinguished from the other competing Oïl languages. This is referred to as Middle French, the vast majority of literary production in Old French is in verse, the development of prose as a literary form was a late phenomenon. The French language does not have a significant stress accent or long and this means that the French metric line is not determined by the number of beats, but by the number of syllables. The most common lengths are the ten-syllable line, the eight-syllable line. Verses could be combined in a variety of ways, blocks of assonanced lines are called laisses, the choice of verse form was generally dictated by the genre. The Old French epics are written in ten-syllable assonanced laisses. The earliest extant French literary texts date from the ninth century, the first literary works written in Old French were saints lives. The Canticle of Saint Eulalie, written in the half of the ninth century, is generally accepted as the first such text. It is a poem that recounts the martyrdom of a young girl. The best known of the early Old French saints lives is the Vie de Saint Alexis, the life of Saint Alexis, a translation/rewriting of a Latin legend. Saint Alexis fled from his familys home in Rome on his wedding night and dwelled as a hermit in Syria until a mystical voice began telling people of his holiness. In order to avoid the earthly honor that came with such fame, he left Syria and was back to Rome. He was only identified later when the pope read his name in a letter held in the saints hand
3.
17th-century French literature
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In reality, 17th-century French literature encompasses far more than just the classicist masterpieces of Jean Racine and Madame de La Fayette. In Renaissance France, literature was largely the product of encyclopaedic humanism, a new conception of nobility, modelled on the Italian Renaissance courts and their concept of the perfect courtier, was beginning to evolve through French literature. In the mid-17th century, there were an estimated 2,200 authors in France, under Cardinal Richelieu, patronage of the arts and literary academies increasingly came under the control of the monarchy. Henry IVs court was considered by contemporaries a rude one, lacking the Italianate sophistication of the court of the Valois kings, the court also lacked a queen, who traditionally served as a focus of a nations authors and poets. Henrys literary tastes were largely limited to the chivalric novel Amadis of Gaul, in the 1620s, the most famous salon was held at the Hôtel de Rambouillet by Madame de Rambouillet, a rival gathering was organized by Madeleine de Scudéry. The word salon first appeared in French in 1664 from the Italian word sala, before 1664, literary gatherings were often called by the name of the room in which they occurred -- cabinet, réduit, alcôve, and ruelle. For instance, the term derives from literary gatherings held in the bedroom. Nobles, lying on their beds, would receive close friends, ruelle refers to the space between a bed and the wall in a bedroom, it became a name for these gatherings, often under the wing of educated women in the first half of the 17th century. In the context of French scholastica, academies were scholarly societies which monitored, fostered, academies first appeared in France during the Renaissance, when Jean-Antoine de Baïf created one devoted to poetry and music, inspired by the academy of Italian Marsilio Ficino. The first half of the 17th century was marked by a growth in private academies. Academies were generally more formal and more focused on criticism and analysis than salons, however, certain salons were closer to the academic spirit. In the mid-17th century, academies gradually came under government control and sponsorship, the first private academy to fall under governmental control was LAcadémie française, which remains the most prestigious governmental academy in France. Founded in 1634 by Cardinal Richelieu, LAcadémie française focuses on the French language, in certain instances, the values of 17th-century nobility played a major part in the literature of the era. Most notable of these values are the aristocratic obsession with glory, the spectacle of power, prestige and luxury found in 17th-century literature may be distasteful or even offensive. The château of Versailles, court ballets, noble portraits, triumphal arches – all of these were representations of glory, the notion of glory was not vanity or boastfulness or hubris, but rather a moral imperative for the aristocracy. Nobles were required to be generous, magnanimous and to great deeds disinterestedly. Ones status in the world demanded appropriate externalisation, nobles indebted themselves to build prestigious urban mansions and to buy clothes, paintings, silverware, dishes and other furnishings befitting their rank. They were also required to show generosity by hosting sumptuous parties, conversely, social parvenus who took on the external trappings of the noble classes were severely criticised, sometimes by legal action
4.
18th-century French literature
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In common with a similar movement in England at the same time, the writers of 18th century France were critical, skeptical and innovative. Their lasting contributions were the ideas of liberty, toleration, humanitarianism, equality, and progress, the 18th century saw the gradual weakening of the absolute monarchy constructed by Louis XIV. France was forced to recognize the power of England and Prussia. The Monarchy finally ended with King Louis XVI, who was unable to understand or control the forces of the French Revolution. The new class began to challenge the cultural and social monopoly of the aristocracy, French cities began to have their own theaters, coffee houses and salons, the Rise of the Third Estate culminated in their political victory in the French Revolution. Faith in science and progress was the force behind the first French Encyclopedia of Denis Diderot. The Protestants achieved legal status in France in 1787, the exchange of ideas with other countries also increased. British ideas were important, particularly such ideas as constitutional monarchy and romanticism. Toward the end of the century, a sober style appeared, aimed at illustrating scenery, work. These writers, and others such as the Abbé Sieyès, one of the authors of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. They came from the upper class or Third Estate, sought a society founded upon talent and merit. Their ideas were influenced by those of John Locke in England. They introduced the values of liberty and equality which became the ideals of the French Republic founded at the end of the century and they defended the freedom of conscience and challenged the role of religious institutions in society. For them, tolerance was a value of society. When the Convention placed the ashes of Voltaire in the Pantheon in Paris, while the philosophes had widely different approaches, they all had as a common objective, both for mankind and for individuals, the ideal of happiness. Some, like Rousseau, dreamed of the happiness of the savage, rapidly disappearing, others, like Voltaire. The philosophes were optimists, and they saw their mission clearly, they did not simply observe, the comedies of Marivaux and of Beaumarchais also played a part in this debate about and diffusion of great ideas. The relaxing of morals under the French Regency brought the return in 1716 of the Comédie-Italienne and his major works include Les Fausses Confidences, le Jeu de lamour et du hasard, and lÎle des esclaves
5.
19th-century French literature
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19th-century French literature concerns the developments in French literature during a dynamic period in French history that saw the rise of Democracy and the fitful end of Monarchy and Empire. French literature enjoyed enormous prestige and success in the 19th century. The first part of the century was dominated by Romanticism, until around the mid-century Realism emerged, in the last half of the century, naturalism, parnassian poetry, and symbolism, among other styles, were often competing tendencies at the same time. Some writers did form into literary groups defined by a name, in other cases, these expressions were merely pejorative terms given by critics to certain writers or have been used by modern literary historians to group writers of divergent projects or methods. Nevertheless, these labels can be useful in describing broad historical developments in the arts and their influence was felt in theatre, poetry, prose fiction. Foreign influences played a big part in this, especially those of Shakespeare, Sir Walter Scott, Byron, Goethe, Le mal du siècle, a sense of loss, disillusion, and aporia, typified by melancholy and lassitude. Romanticism in England and Germany largely predate French romanticism, although there was a kind of pre-romanticism in the works of Senancour and Jean-Jacques Rousseau at the end of the 18th century. French Romanticism took definite form in the works of François-René de Chateaubriand and Benjamin Constant and it found early expression also in the sentimental poetry of Alphonse de Lamartine. The major battles of romanticism in France was in the theater, the dramatic unities of time and place were abolished, tragic and comic elements appeared together and metrical freedom was won. Marked by the plays of Friedrich Schiller, the romantics often chose subjects from historic periods, victor Hugo was the outstanding genius of the Romantic School and its recognized leader. He was prolific alike in poetry, drama, and fiction, all three also wrote novels and short stories, and Musset won a belated success with his plays. Alexandre Dumas, père wrote The Three Musketeers and other novels in an historical setting. Prosper Mérimée and Charles Nodier were masters of shorter fiction, Romanticism is associated with a number of literary salons and groups, the Arsenal, the Cénacle, the salon of Louis Charles Delescluze, the salon of Antoine Deschamps, the salon of Madame de Staël. Romanticism in France defied political affiliation, one finds both liberal, conservative and socialist strains, the expression Realism, when applied to literature of the 19th century, implies the attempt to depict contemporary life and society. The growth of realism is linked to the development of science, history, honoré de Balzac is the most prominent representative of 19th century realism in fiction. His La Comédie humaine, a vast collection of nearly 100 novels, was the most ambitious scheme ever devised by a writer of fiction—nothing less than a contemporary history of his countrymen. Realism also appears in the works of Alexandre Dumas, fils, similar tendencies appeared in the theatrical melodramas of the period and, in an even more lurid and gruesome light, in the Grand Guignol at the end of the century. In addition to melodramas, popular and bourgeois theater in the mid-century turned to realism in the well-made bourgeois farces of Eugène Marin Labiche, from the 1860s on, critics increasingly speak of literary Naturalism
6.
Gascony
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Gascony is an area of southwest France that was part of the Province of Guyenne and Gascony prior to the French Revolution. The region is defined, and the distinction between Guyenne and Gascony is unclear, by some they are seen to overlap, while others consider Gascony a part of Guyenne. Most definitions put Gascony east and south of Bordeaux and it is currently divided between the region of Aquitaine and the region of Midi-Pyrénées. Gascony was historically inhabited by Basque-related people who appear to have spoken a language similar to Basque, the name Gascony comes from the same root as the word Basque. From medieval times until today, the Gascon language has been spoken, Gascony is the land of dArtagnan, who inspired Alexandre Dumass character dArtagnan in The Three Musketeers. It is also home to Henry III of Navarre, who became king of France as Henry IV. In pre-Roman times, the inhabitants of Gascony were the Aquitanians, the Aquitanians inhabited a territory limited to the north and east by the Garonne River, to the south by the Pyrenees mountain range, and to the west by the Atlantic Ocean. In the 50s BC, Aquitania was conquered by lieutenants of Julius Caesar, later, in 27 BC, during the reign of Emperor Augustus, the province of Gallia Aquitania was created. In 297, as Emperor Diocletian reformed the administrative structures of the Roman Empire, the territory of Novempopulania corresponded quite well to what we call now Gascony. The Aquitania Novempopulana or Novempopulania suffered like the rest of the Western Roman Empire from the invasions of Germanic tribes, the Visigoths were defeated by the Franks in 507, and fled into Spain and Septimania, as well as Albania. Novempopulania then became part of the Frankish Kingdom like the rest of southern France, however, Novempopulania was far away from the home base of the Franks in northern France, and was only very loosely controlled by the Franks. Modern historians reject this hypothesis, which is sustained by no archeological evidence, for Juan José Larrea, and Pierre Bonnassie, a Vascon expansionism in Aquitany is not proved and is not necessary to understand the historical evolution of this region. This Basque-related culture and race is, whatever the origin, attested in Medieval documents, the word Vasconia evolved into Wasconia, and then into Gasconia. The gradual abandonment of the Basque-related Aquitanian language in favor of a local vulgar Latin, was not reversed, the replacing local vulgar Latin evolved into Gascon. It was heavily influenced by the original Aquitanian language, quite paradoxically the Basques from the French side of the Basque Country traditionally call anyone who does not speak Basque a Gascon. Meanwhile, Viking raiders conquered several Gascon towns, among them Bayonne in 842–844 and their attacks in Gascony may have helped the political disintegration of the Duchy until their defeat against William II Sánchez of Gascony in 982. In turn, the weakened ethnic polity known as Duchy of Wasconia/Wascones, unable to get round the general spread of feudalization and his 1152 marriage to Eleanor of Aquitaine allowed the future Henry II to gain control of his new wifes possessions of Aquitaine and Gascony. This addition to his already plentiful holdings made Henry the most powerful vassal in France, in 1248, Simon de Montfort was appointed Governor in the unsettled Duchy of Gascony
7.
Huguenots
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Huguenots are the ethnoreligious group of French Protestants who follow the Reformed tradition. It was used frequently to members of the French Reformed Church until the beginning of the 19th century. The term has its origin in 16th-century France, Huguenot numbers peaked near an estimated two million by 1562, concentrated mainly in the southern and western parts of France. As Huguenots gained influence and more openly displayed their faith, Catholic hostility grew, in spite of political concessions, a series of religious conflicts followed, known as the French Wars of Religion, fought intermittently from 1562 to 1598. The Huguenots were led by Jeanne dAlbret, her son, the future Henry IV, the wars ended with the Edict of Nantes, which granted the Huguenots substantial religious, political, and military autonomy. Huguenot rebellions in the 1620s prompted the abolishment of their political and they retained religious provisions of the Edict of Nantes until the rule of Louis XIV. Nevertheless, a minority of Huguenots remained and faced continued persecution under Louis XV. By the death of Louis XV in 1774, French Calvinism was almost completely wiped out, persecution of Protestants officially ended with the Edict of Versailles, signed by Louis XVI in 1787. Two years later, with the Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen of 1789 and they also spread to the Dutch Cape Colony in South Africa, the Dutch East Indies, the Caribbean, New Netherland, and several of the English colonies in North America. Small contingents of families went to Orthodox Russia and Catholic Quebec, a term used originally in derision, Huguenot has unclear origins. Geneva was John Calvins adopted home and the centre of the Calvinist movement, the label Huguenot was purportedly first applied in France to those conspirators involved in the Amboise plot of 1560, a foiled attempt to wrest power in France from the influential House of Guise. The move would have had the effect of fostering relations with the Swiss. Thus, Hugues plus Eidgenosse by way of Huisgenoten supposedly became Huguenot, a version of this complex hypothesis is promoted by O. I. A. Roche, who writes in his book, The Days of the Upright, A History of the Huguenots, that Huguenot is, a combination of a Dutch and a German word. Gallicised into Huguenot, often used deprecatingly, the word became, Some disagree with such double or triple non-French linguistic origins, arguing that for the word to have spread into common use in France, it must have originated in the French language. The Hugues hypothesis argues that the name was derived by association with Hugues Capet, king of France and he was regarded by the Gallicans and Protestants as a noble man who respected peoples dignity and lives. Janet Gray and other supporters of the hypothesis suggest that the name huguenote would be equivalent to little Hugos. It was in place in Tours that the prétendus réformés habitually gathered at night
8.
Henry IV of France
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Henry IV, also known by the epithet Good King Henry, was King of Navarre from 1572 to 1610 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first French monarch of the House of Bourbon, baptised as a Catholic but raised in the Protestant faith by his mother Jeanne dAlbret, Queen of Navarre, he inherited the throne of Navarre in 1572 on the death of his mother. As a Huguenot, Henry was involved in the French Wars of Religion, barely escaping assassination in the St. Bartholomews Day massacre, and later led Protestant forces against the royal army. Henry, as Head of the House of Bourbon, was a direct descendant of Louis IX of France. Upon the death of his brother-in-law and distant cousin Henry III of France in 1589 and he initially kept the Protestant faith and had to fight against the Catholic League, which denied that he could wear Frances crown as a Protestant. To obtain mastery over his kingdom, after four years of stalemate, as a pragmatic politician, he displayed an unusual religious tolerance for the era. Notably, he promulgated the Edict of Nantes, which guaranteed religious liberties to Protestants and he was assassinated in 1610 by François Ravaillac, a fanatical Catholic, and was succeeded by his son Louis XIII. Considered a usurper by some Catholics and a traitor by some Protestants, an unpopular king immediately after his accession, Henrys popularity greatly improved after his death, in light of repeated victories over his enemies and his conversion to Catholicism. The Good King Henry was remembered for his geniality and his concern about the welfare of his subjects. He was celebrated in the popular song Vive le roi Henri, Henry was born in Pau, the capital of the joint Kingdom of Navarre with the sovereign principality of Béarn. His parents were Queen Joan III of Navarre and her consort, Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme, although baptised as a Roman Catholic, Henry was raised as a Protestant by his mother, who had declared Calvinism the religion of Navarre. As a teenager, Henry joined the Huguenot forces in the French Wars of Religion, on 9 June 1572, upon his mothers death, he became King of Navarre. At Queen Joans death, it was arranged for Henry to marry Margaret of Valois, daughter of Henry II, the wedding took place in Paris on 18 August 1572 on the parvis of Notre Dame Cathedral. On 24 August, the Saint Bartholomews Day Massacre began in Paris, several thousand Protestants who had come to Paris for Henrys wedding were killed, as well as thousands more throughout the country in the days that followed. Henry narrowly escaped death thanks to the help of his wife and he was made to live at the court of France, but he escaped in early 1576. On 5 February of that year, he formally abjured Catholicism at Tours and he named his 16-year-old sister, Catherine de Bourbon, regent of Béarn. Catherine held the regency for nearly thirty years, Henry became heir presumptive to the French throne in 1584 upon the death of Francis, Duke of Anjou, brother and heir to the Catholic Henry III, who had succeeded Charles IX in 1574. Because Henry of Navarre was the senior agnatic descendant of King Louis IX, King Henry III had no choice
9.
Armagnac (province)
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The county of Armagnac, situated between the Adour and Garonne rivers in the lower foothills of the Pyrenées, is a historic county of the Duchy of Gascony, established in 601 in Aquitaine. It is a region in southwestern France that includes parts of the Departments of Gers, Landes, the region is predominantly agricultural and is noted for its Armagnac brandy, the oldest French brandy. Once an important county, it reached its greatest power and extent during the 14th and 15th centuries, under Roman rule, Armagnac was included in the Civitas Ausciorum, or district of Auch, of Aquitania. Under the Merovingians it was part of the duchy of Aquitania, near the end of the ninth century the part now known as Fezensac became a hereditary county. About 1140 Bernards grandson, Géraud III, briefly reunited the comté of Fezensac, when Gascogne was linked once more to Aquitaine by the Treaty of Meaux in 1229, the county of Armagnac was the most powerful of the fiefs of Gascony. The chance of dynastic succession continued repeatedly to separate Fezensac, the three great territorial lords in the south were the Count of Armagnac, the Count of Foix, and the Lord of Albret. The counts of Armagnac increased their territory through marriage and purchase, Jean I, comte dArmagnac and his successors joined to Armagnac the comté of Rodez and that of Carlat, and the vicomtés of Lomagne and Auvillars, Comminges and briefly Charolais. During the Hundred Years War the southern part of France, including Armagnac, was ceded to England by the Treaty of Brétigny, Edward, the Black Prince, administered the region for his father, King Edward III of England. He soon alienated the nobles by giving privileges to the towns, by submitting themselves to King Charles V of France, noble families like the Armagnacs were able to retain much of their former power and assure themselves of protection. In 1410 the daughter of Count Bernard VII of Armagnac was married to Duke Charles I of Orleans, Charles father had been killed by supporters of the duke of Burgundy, who resented Orleans influence on the king. After the marriage, the Armagnac family became associated with the part of King Charles VI against Burgundy, until his death in 1418, Count Bernard remained a bitter enemy of Burgundy. When Burgundy allied itself with England during the stages of the Hundred Years War. The two factions engaged in a civil war that ended in 1435. After peace was established, many veterans originally recruited by Count Bernard VII formed mercenary bands that became known as the Armagnacs. Although they were in the service of King Charles VII, the Armagnacs became notorious for their rapacious plundering in the north of France. In 1444 they were sent to Switzerland on a known as the Armagnac War. Although the Swiss were badly defeated, their determined resistance persuaded the Armagnacs to withdraw from Switzerland, soon after, the Armagnacs were incorporated into Charles VIIs regular army. After the death of Bernard VII in 1418, the counts of Armagnac gradually lost their position in southern France
10.
Sallust
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Gaius Sallustius Crispus, usually anglicised as Sallust, was a Roman historian, politician, and novus homo from an Italian plebeian family. Sallust was born at Amiternum in the country of the Sabines and was a popularis, an opponent of the old Roman aristocracy, throughout his career, and later a partisan of Julius Caesar. Sallust is the earliest known Roman historian with surviving works to his name, of which Catilines War, The Jugurthine War, Sallust was primarily influenced by the Greek historian Thucydides and amassed great wealth from his governorship of Africa. Sallust was probably born in Amiternum in Central Italy, though Eduard Schwartz takes the view that Sallusts birthplace was Rome and his birth date is calculated from the report of Jeromes Chronicon. But the New Zealander Ronald Syme suggests that Jeromes date has to be adjusted because of his carelessness, however, Sallusts birth is widely dated at 86 BC, and the Kleine Pauly Encyclopedia takes 1 October 86 BC as the birthdate. Michael Grant cautiously offers 80s BC, there is no information about Sallusts parents or family, except for Tacitus mention of his sister. The Sallustii were a noble family of Sabine origin. They belonged to the order and had full Roman citizenship. During the Social War Gaius parents hid in Rome, because Amiternum was under threat of siege by rebelling Italic tribes, because of this Sallust could have been raised in Rome He received a very good education. After an ill-spent youth, Sallust entered public life and may have won election as quaestor in 55 BC and he became a Tribune of the Plebs in 52 BC, the year in which the followers of Milo killed Clodius in a street brawl. Sallust then supported the prosecution of Milo, Sallust, Titus Munatius Plancus and Quintus Pompeius Rufus also tried to blame Cicero, one of the leaders of the Senators opposition to the triumvirate, for his support of Milo. Syme suggests that Sallust, because of his position in Milos trial, T. Mommsen states that Sallust acted in Pompeys interests. According to one inscription, some Sallustius was a proquaestor in Syria in 50 BC under Marcus Calpurnius Bibulus. Mommsen identified this Sallustius with Sallust the historian, though T. R. S. Broughton argued that Sallust the historian could not have been an assistant to Julius Caesars adversary. From the beginning of his career, Sallust operated as a decided partisan of Julius Caesar. In 50 BC, the censor Appius Claudius Pulcher removed him from the Senate on the grounds of gross immorality, in the following year, perhaps through Caesars influence, he was reinstated. During the Civil War of 49–45 BC Sallust acted as Caesars partisan and it was reported that Sallust dined with Caesar, Hirtius, Oppius, Balbus and Sulpicius Rufus on the night after Caesars famous crossing of the Rubicon river into Italy on 10 January. In 49 BC Sallust was moved to Illyricum and probably commanded at least one legion there after the failure of Publius Cornelius Dolabella, in 48 BC he was probably made quaestor by Caesar to re-enter the Senate
11.
Michel de Montaigne
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Michel Eyquem de Montaigne, Lord of Montaigne was one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance, known for popularizing the essay as a literary genre. His work is noted for its merging of casual anecdotes and autobiography with serious intellectual insight, in his own lifetime, Montaigne was admired more as a statesman than as an author. In time, however, Montaigne would come to be recognized as embodying, perhaps better than any other author of his time and he is most famously known for his skeptical remark, Que sçay-je. Much of modern literary non-fiction has found inspiration in Montaigne and writers of all kinds continue to read him for his balance of intellectual knowledge. Montaigne was born in the Aquitaine region of France, on the family estate Château de Montaigne, in a town now called Saint-Michel-de-Montaigne, close to Bordeaux. The family was wealthy, his great-grandfather, Ramon Felipe Eyquem, had made a fortune as a herring merchant and had bought the estate in 1477. His father, Pierre Eyquem, Seigneur of Montaigne, was a French Catholic soldier in Italy for a time and had also been the mayor of Bordeaux. Although there were several families bearing the patronym Eyquem in Guyenne and his mother, Antoinette López de Villanueva, was a convert to Protestantism. His maternal grandfather, Pedro Lopez, from Zaragoza, was from a wealthy Marrano family who had converted to Catholicism and his maternal grandmother, Honorette Dupuy, was from a Catholic family in Gascony, France. His mother lived a part of Montaignes life near him, and even survived him. Montaignes relationship with his father, however, is reflected upon. Montaignes education began in childhood and followed a pedagogical plan that his father had developed, refined by the advice of the latters humanist friends. After these first spartan years, Montaigne was brought back to the château, the objective was for Latin to become his first language. The intellectual education of Montaigne was assigned to a German tutor and his father hired only servants who could speak Latin, and they also were given strict orders always to speak to the boy in Latin. The same rule applied to his mother, father, and servants, who were obliged to use only Latin words he himself employed, Montaignes Latin education was accompanied by constant intellectual and spiritual stimulation. He was familiarized with Greek by a method that employed games, conversation. The atmosphere of the upbringing, although designed by highly refined rules taken under advisement by his father, created in the boys life the spirit of liberty. Duty by an unforced will, and of my own voluntary motion. without any severity or constraint and he then began his study of law at the University of Toulouse in 1546 and entered a career in the local legal system
12.
Jacques Cujas
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Jacques Cujas was a French legal expert. He was born at Toulouse, where his father, surnamed Cujaus, was a fuller, having taught himself Latin and Greek, he studied law under Arnaud du Ferrièr, then professor at Toulouse, and rapidly gained a great reputation as a lecturer on Justinian. In 1554 he was appointed professor of law at Cahors, françois Douaren, who also held a professorship at Bourges, stirred up the students against the new professor, and Cujas was glad to accept an invitation he had received to the University of Valence. Recalled to Bourges at the death of Duaren in 1559, he remained there till 1567, there he gained a European reputation, and collected students from all parts of the continent, among whom were Joseph Scaliger and Jacques Auguste de Thou. In 1573 King Charles IX of France appointed Cujas counsellor to the parlement of Grenoble, margaret of Savoy persuaded him to move to Turin, but after a few months he returned to his old place at Bourges. The religious wars drove him out and he was called by the king to Paris, and permission was granted him by the parlement to lecture on civil law in the university there. A year later, he took up residence at Bourges. The life of Cujas was altogether that of a scholar and teacher, in the religious wars which filled all the thoughts of his contemporaries he steadily refused to take any part. Nihil hoc ad edictum praetoris, this has nothing to do with the edict of the praetor, was his answer to those who spoke to him on the subject. His surpassing merit as a jurisconsult consisted in the fact that he turned from the ignorant commentators on Roman law to the Roman law itself. His emendations, of which a number were published under the title of Observationes et emendationes, were not confined to lawbooks. He also composed a commentary on the Consuetudines Feudorum, and on books of the Decretals. His lessons, which he never, dictated, were continuous discourses and he was impatient of interruptions and upon the least noise he would instantly quit the chair and retire. He was strongly attached to his pupils, and Joseph Justus Scaliger affirms that he lost more than 4000 livres by lending money to the needy of them. Fabrot, however, collected the works of Cujas in the edition which he published at Paris, Naples. Cujas Library Papire-Masson, Vie de Cujas, gabor Hamza, Le développement du droit privé eurpéen
13.
Henri de Navarre
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Henry IV, also known by the epithet Good King Henry, was King of Navarre from 1572 to 1610 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first French monarch of the House of Bourbon, baptised as a Catholic but raised in the Protestant faith by his mother Jeanne dAlbret, Queen of Navarre, he inherited the throne of Navarre in 1572 on the death of his mother. As a Huguenot, Henry was involved in the French Wars of Religion, barely escaping assassination in the St. Bartholomews Day massacre, and later led Protestant forces against the royal army. Henry, as Head of the House of Bourbon, was a direct descendant of Louis IX of France. Upon the death of his brother-in-law and distant cousin Henry III of France in 1589 and he initially kept the Protestant faith and had to fight against the Catholic League, which denied that he could wear Frances crown as a Protestant. To obtain mastery over his kingdom, after four years of stalemate, as a pragmatic politician, he displayed an unusual religious tolerance for the era. Notably, he promulgated the Edict of Nantes, which guaranteed religious liberties to Protestants and he was assassinated in 1610 by François Ravaillac, a fanatical Catholic, and was succeeded by his son Louis XIII. Considered a usurper by some Catholics and a traitor by some Protestants, an unpopular king immediately after his accession, Henrys popularity greatly improved after his death, in light of repeated victories over his enemies and his conversion to Catholicism. The Good King Henry was remembered for his geniality and his concern about the welfare of his subjects. He was celebrated in the popular song Vive le roi Henri, Henry was born in Pau, the capital of the joint Kingdom of Navarre with the sovereign principality of Béarn. His parents were Queen Joan III of Navarre and her consort, Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme, although baptised as a Roman Catholic, Henry was raised as a Protestant by his mother, who had declared Calvinism the religion of Navarre. As a teenager, Henry joined the Huguenot forces in the French Wars of Religion, on 9 June 1572, upon his mothers death, he became King of Navarre. At Queen Joans death, it was arranged for Henry to marry Margaret of Valois, daughter of Henry II, the wedding took place in Paris on 18 August 1572 on the parvis of Notre Dame Cathedral. On 24 August, the Saint Bartholomews Day Massacre began in Paris, several thousand Protestants who had come to Paris for Henrys wedding were killed, as well as thousands more throughout the country in the days that followed. Henry narrowly escaped death thanks to the help of his wife and he was made to live at the court of France, but he escaped in early 1576. On 5 February of that year, he formally abjured Catholicism at Tours and he named his 16-year-old sister, Catherine de Bourbon, regent of Béarn. Catherine held the regency for nearly thirty years, Henry became heir presumptive to the French throne in 1584 upon the death of Francis, Duke of Anjou, brother and heir to the Catholic Henry III, who had succeeded Charles IX in 1574. Because Henry of Navarre was the senior agnatic descendant of King Louis IX, King Henry III had no choice
14.
Battle of Ivry
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The Battle of Ivry was fought on 14 March 1590, during the French Wars of Religion. The battle was a victory for Henry IV of France, leading Huguenot and English forces against the Catholic League by the Duc de Mayenne. Henrys forces were victorious and he went on to lay siege to Paris, the battle occurred on the plain of Épieds, Eure near Ivry, Normandy. Ivry-la-Bataille is located on the Eure River and about thirty miles west of Paris, Henry IV had moved rapidly to besiege Dreux, a town controlled by the League. As Mayenne followed intending to raise the siege, Henry withdrew and he deployed his army on the plain of Saint André between the towns of Nonancourt and Ivry. Henry had been reinforced by English troops sent in support by Queen Elizabeth I, Henry had 12,000 foot soldiers and 3,000 men on horseback. Included in this force were 2,000 Spanish pikemen and cavalry had been brought over from Flanders under Philip, Count of Egmont, At first light on 14 March 1590, before the battle, the king famously spurred his troops, Companions. If you today run at risk with me, I will also run at risk with you, look at his and our enemies. Hold your ranks, I beg of you, and if the heat of battle makes you leave them, think also of rallying back and you will find it among those three trees that you can see over there on your right side. If you lose your ensigns, cornets or flags, do never lose sight of my panache, you always find it on the road to honour. The action began with a few deadly cannon volleys from the six pieces of the royal artillery, the cavalry of the two sides then clashed with a dreadful force. The Duke of Mayenne followed up with the troops of the Guelders. The mercenaries, who were sympathetic to the Protestant cause, fired in the air. Aumont soon overcame the Leagues light horse and their royalist counterparts retreated under the attack of a Walloon squadron backed up by two squadrons from the League. It was then the turn of the Jean VI dAumont, the Duc de Montpensier, however, the decisive event took place elsewhere on the battlefield, the King charged the Leagues lancers, who were unable to get far enough back to use their weapons. Mayenne was driven back, the Duke of Aumale forced to surrender, the Duke of Mayenne had lost the battle. Henry pursued the losers, many of whom surrendered for fear of falling into worse hands, the countryside was full of Leaguers and Spaniards in flight, with the kings victorious army pursuing and scattering the remnants of the larger groups that dispersed and re-gathered. Henry defeated Mayenne at Ivry so that he would become the only claimant to the throne of France
15.
Auch
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Auch is a commune in southwestern France. Located in the region of Occitanie, it is the capital of the Gers department, Auch is the historical capital of Gascony. The River Gers flows through the town, Auch is well connected to nearby cities and towns such as Agen, Toulouse and Tarbes by Routes Nationales. Auch is an ancient town, whose settlement was noted by the Romans during their conquest of the area in the 50s BC. At that time, it was settled by an Aquitanian tribe known to the Romans as the Ausci and their name for the town was Climberrum or Elimberris. Following their conquest, the Romans renamed the town Augusta Auscorum or Ausciorum, Augusta Auscorum was one of the twelve civitates of the province of Novempopulana and became the provincial capital after the 409 destruction of Eauze by the Vandals. The common term Augusta was eventually dropped and the name evolved into the modern Gascon Aush, the town became the seat of a Catholic archdiocese which lasted until the French Revolution. Its archbishops claimed the title of Primate of Aquitaine, Novempopulana, and Navarre. R
16.
Jeanne d'Albret
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Jeanne dAlbret, also known as Jeanne III, was the queen regnant of Navarre from 1555 to 1572. She married Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme, and was the mother of Henry of Bourbon, who became King Henry III of Navarre and IV of France and she became the Duchess of Vendôme by marriage. Jeanne was the spiritual and political leader of the French Huguenot movement. After her public conversion to Calvinism in 1560, she joined the Huguenot forces, during the first and second war she remained relatively neutral, but in the third war she fled to La Rochelle, becoming the de facto leader. After negotiating a treaty with Catherine de Medici and arranging the marriage of her son, Henry, to Catherines daughter, Marguerite. Jeanne was the last active ruler of Navarre, in 1620, Jeannes grandson Louis XIII annexed Navarre to the French crown. Her mother, the daughter of Louise of Savoy and Charles and she received an excellent education under the tutelage of humanist Nicolas Bourbon. Described as a frivolous and high-spirited princess, she also, at an early age, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, offered to have her married to his son and heir, Philip, to settle the status of the Kingdom of Navarre. Despite having been whipped into obedience, she, nevertheless, continued to protest and had to be carried bodily to the altar by the Constable of France, before her wedding, Jeanne signed two documents which she had officers of her household sign. She remained at the royal court, after the death of Francis in 1547 and the accession of Henry II to the French throne, Jeanne married Antoine de Bourbon, first prince of the blood, at Moulins in the Bourbonnais on 20 October 1548. The marriage was intended to consolidate territorial possessions in the north and south of France, Jeannes marriage to Antoine was described by author Mark Strage as having been a romantic match. A contemporary of Jeanne said of her that she had no pleasure or occupation except in talking about or writing to and she does it in company and in private. The waters cannot quench the flame of her love, in 1554, he fathered an illegitimate son, Charles, by Louise de La Béraudière de lIsle Rouhet, a court beauty known as La belle Rouet. Antoines frequent absences left Jeanne in Béarn to rule alone, and in charge of a household which she managed with a firm. The couple had five children, of only two, Henry, king of France and king of Navarre, and Catherine, duchess of Lorraine. On 25 May 1555, Henry II of Navarre died, at which time Jeanne, on 18 August 1555 at Pau, Jeanne and Antoine were crowned in a joint ceremony according to the rites of the Roman Catholic Church. The previous month, a coin commemorating the new reign had been minted. It was inscribed in Latin with the words, Antonius et Johanna Dei gratia reges Navarrae Domini Bearni
17.
Book of Genesis
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The Book of Genesis is the first book of the Hebrew Bible and the Christian Old Testament. The basic narrative expresses the theme, God creates the world and appoints man as his regent. The new post-Flood world is also corrupt, God does not destroy it, instead calling one man, Abraham, to be the seed of its salvation. At Gods command Abraham descends from his home into the land of Canaan, given to him by God, Genesis ends with Israel in Egypt, ready for the coming of Moses and the Exodus. The narrative is punctuated by a series of covenants with God, the books author or authors appear to have structured it around ten toledot sections, but modern commentators see it in terms of a primeval history followed by the cycle of Patriarchal stories. In Judaism, the importance of Genesis centers on the covenants linking God to his chosen people. It is not clear, however, what this meant to the original authors, while the first is far shorter than the second, it sets out the basic themes and provides an interpretive key for understanding the entire book. The primeval history has a symmetrical structure hinging on chapters 6–9, God creates the world in six days and consecrates the seventh as a day of rest. God creates the first humans Adam and Eve and all the animals in the Garden of Eden but instructs them not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. A talking serpent portrayed as a creature or trickster, entices Eve into eating it anyway. Eve bears two sons, Cain and Abel, Cain kills Abel after God accepts Abels offering but not Cains. Eve bears another son, Seth, to take Abels place, after many generations of Adam have passed from the lines of Cain and Seth, the world becomes corrupted by the sin of man and Nephilim, and God determines to wipe out mankind. First, he instructs the righteous Noah and his family to build a huge boat, then God sends a great flood to wipe out the rest of the world. When the waters recede, God promises that he not destroy the world a second time with water with the rainbow as the symbol of his promise. But upon seeing mankind cooperating to build a great tower city, God instructs Abram to travel from his home in Mesopotamia to the land of Canaan. Abrams name is changed to Abraham and that of his wife Sarai to Sarah, because Sarah is old, she tells Abraham to take her Egyptian handmaiden, Hagar, as a second wife. God resolves to destroy the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah for the sins of their people, Abraham protests and gets God to agree not to destroy the cities if 10 righteous men can be found. Angels save Abrahams nephew Lot and his family, but his wife back on the destruction against their command and is turned into a pillar of salt
18.
Hexameron
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The term Hexameron refers either to the genre of theological treatise that describes Gods work on the six days of creation or to the six days of creation themselves. Most often these theological works take the form of commentaries on Genesis I, as a genre, hexameral literature was popular in the early church and medieval periods. The word derives its name from the Greek roots hexa-, meaning six, the seventh day is reserved for rest, and so is not counted. Based on this framework, Christian and Jewish authors have written treatises that cover a variety of topics, including cosmology, science, theology, theological anthropology. Saint Basil wrote an early and influential series of homilies around 370 AD which figure as the earliest extant Hexameron, Basil originally performed the work as a series of sermons, and later collected them into a written work which was influential among early church leaders. Among the Latin Fathers, Ambrose and Augustine wrote some of the earliest extant hexameral literature, ambroses Hexameron is heavily influenced by Basils work of the same name. In contrast, Augustine of Hippo wrote several works that serve as commentaries on the Genesis narrative, including The Confessions, one of the more influential elements of Augustines writings is his argument that God created the world all at once. At the same time, this instantaneous creation included a progression of events, thus, creation happened over six days and in one single event. Following these figures, medieval writers such as Thomas Aquinas, Bonaventure, hexameral literature is the medieval Christian literature based on the creation narratives found in the first two chapters of the Book of Genesis. It was commentary or elaboration, sometimes taking on encyclopedic scope, the approach continued in an important literary role until the seventeenth century. The Oxford English Dictionary recognizes a difference between ‘hexaemeric’, pertaining to a ‘hexaemeron’ or six-day creation, and ‘hexameral’, meaning simply in six parts, not every ‘Hexameron’ or ‘Hexaemeron’ is actually part of the genre, since Genesis commentaries can have various themes. Hexameral historical theories, of six or seven eras, date back at least to the City of God of Augustine of Hippo and this literary genre was founded by the Hexaemeron of Basil of Caesarea, though it has been said that Philo started it. Examples include, Ambrose, Hexaemeron, in Latin and the most influential Augustine of Hippo, De Genesi ad litteram, 401-415, influenced by Plato and Greek biology The Venerable Bede, In Genesim. Anastasius Sinaita, Hexaemeron Henry of Langenstein, Lecturae super Genesim It extended into modern times with the Sepmaines of Du Bartas. There is a cusp between Du Bartas, very influential in his time, and Milton, Miltons different approach marks the effective end of the genre. The Medieval Latin Hexameron from Bede to Grosseteste, Ph. D. dissertation, science and Religion,400 BC-AD1550, From Aristotle to Copernicus. Baltimore, Johns Hopkins University Press,2004, C. Kuehn and J. Baggarly, eds. and trans. The Hexaemeral Literature, A Study of the Greek and Latin Commentaries on Genesis, Chicago, University of Chicago Press,1912
19.
Ex nihilo
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Ex nihilo is a Latin phrase meaning out of nothing. In theology, the common phrase creatio ex nihilo, contrasts with creatio ex materia, Creatio continua is the ongoing divine creation. The phrase ex nihilo also appears in the classical philosophical formulation ex nihilo nihil fit, when used outside of religious or metaphysical contexts ex nihilo also refers to something coming from nothing. For example, in a conversation, one might raise a topic ex nihilo if it bears no relation to the topic of discussion. An early conflation of Greek philosophy with the narratives in the Hebrew Bible came from Philo of Alexandria, Philo equated the Hebrew creator-deity Yahweh with Aristotles primum movens in an attempt to prove that the Jews had held monotheistic views even before the Greeks. Theologians debate whether the Bible itself teaches creation ex nihilo, traditional interpreters argue on grammatical and syntactical grounds that this is the meaning of Genesis 1,1, which is commonly rendered, In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. However, other interpreters understand creation ex nihilo as a theological development. According to this view, church fathers opposed notions appearing in pre-Christian creation myths, Jewish thinkers took up the idea, which became important to Judaism, to ongoing strands in the Christian tradition, and—as a corollary—to Islam. The first sentence of the Greek version of Genesis in the Septuagint starts with the words, ἐν ἀρχῇ ἐποίησεν, many ancient texts tend to have similar issues, and those on each side tend to interpret the text according to their understanding. Therefore, an uncaused, personal creator of the universe exists, who without the universe is beginningless, changeless, immaterial, timeless, spaceless, If it is possible for nothing to be, then it must be possible for everything to be. Some scholars have argued that Plethon viewed Plato as positing ex nihilo creation in his Timaeus, eric Voegelin detects in Hesiods chaos a creatio ex nihilo. The School of Chartres understood the creation account in Platos Timaeus to refer to creatio ex nihilo, in The Book of the Articles of Faith and Doctrines of Dogma written by Saadia Gaon the metaphysical problems of the creation of the world and the unity of the Creator are discussed. In this book, Saadia Gaon gives four proofs for the doctrine of the creation of the ex nihilo. To harmonize the biblical statement of the ex nihilo with the doctrine of the primordial elements, the Sefer Yetzirah assumes a double creation, one ideal. The cosmogony of Sefer Yetzirah is even omitted from the discussion of creation in his magnum opus Emunoth ve-Deoth. Several schools of thought stemming from the first cause argument, the following quotations come from Muhammad Asads translation, The Message of The Quran,52,35, Were they created by nothing. Or were they themselves the creators,2,117, The Originator is He of the heavens and the earth, and when He wills a thing to be, He but says unto it, Be—and it is. 19,67, But does man not bear in mind that We have created him aforetime while at one point they were nothing
20.
Zedekiah
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Zedekiah, also written Tzidkiyahu, was a biblical character, the last king of Judah before the destruction of the kingdom by Babylon. Zedekiahs reign ended with the siege and fall of Jerusalem to Nebuchadnezzar II, the prophet Jeremiah was his counselor, yet he did not heed the prophet and his epitaph is he did evil in the sight of the Lord. When Babylon rose against Assyria it caused upheavals that led to the destruction of Judah, Egypt, concerned about the new threat, moved northward to support Assyria. It set on the march in 608, moving via Judah, king Josiah attempted to block the Egyptian forces, and fell mortally wounded in battle at Megiddo. Josiahs younger son Jehoahaz was chosen to succeed his father to the throne, three months later the Egyptian pharaoh Necho, returning from the north, deposed Jehoahaz in favor of his older brother, Jehoiakim. Jehoahaz was taken back to Egypt as a captive, after the Egyptians were defeated by the Babylonians at the Battle of Carchemish in 605 BC, Nebuchadnezzar II then besieged Jerusalem. Jehoiakim changed allegiances to avoid the destruction of Jerusalem and he paid tribute from the treasury, some temple artifacts, and some of the royal family and nobility as hostages. In 599 BC, Nebuchadnezzar II invaded Judah and again laid siege to Jerusalem, in 598 BC,9 Jehoiakim died during the siege and was succeeded by his son Jeconiah. Jeconiah was deposed by Nebuchadnezzar, who installed Zedekiah, Jehoiakims brother, according to the Hebrew Bible, Zedekiah was made king of Judah by Nebuchadnezzar II in 597 BC at the age of twenty-one. This is in agreement with a Babylonian chronicle, which states, The seventh year, In the month Kislev the king of Akkad mustered his army and he encamped against the city of Judah and on the second day of the month Adar he captured the city seized king. A king of his own choice he appointed in the city taking the vast tribute he brought it into Babylon, the kingdom was at that time tributary to Nebuchadnezzar II. Nebuchadnezzar began a siege of Jerusalem in December 589 BC, during this siege, which lasted about thirty months, every worst woe befell the city, which drank the cup of Gods fury to the dregs. At the end of Zedekiahs eleven-year reign, Nebuchadnezzar succeeded in capturing Jerusalem, Zedekiah and his followers attempted to escape, making their way out of the city, but were captured on the plains of Jericho, and were taken to Riblah. There, after seeing his sons put to death, his own eyes were put out, and, being loaded with chains, he was carried captive to Babylon, after the fall of Jerusalem, Nebuzaradan was sent to destroy it. The city was plundered and razed to the ground, only a small number of vinedressers and husbandmen were permitted to remain in the land. Gedaliah, with a Chaldean guard stationed at Mizpah, was governor to rule over the remnant of Judah. On hearing this news, all the Jews that were in Moab, Ammon, Edom, however, before long Gedaliah was assassinated, and the population that was left in the land and those that had returned fled to Egypt for safety. In Egypt, they settled in Migdol, Tahpanhes, Noph, the Babylonian Chronicles give 2 Adar,597 BC, as the date that Nebuchadnezzar captured Jerusalem, thus putting an end to the reign of Jehoaichin
21.
Tower of Babel
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The Tower of Babel is a Near Eastern etiological myth that is recorded in the Jewish Tanakhs first book, it is meant to explain the origin of different languages. According to the story, a united humanity of the following the Great Flood, speaking a single language and migrating eastward. The Great Ziggurat of Babylon was 91 metres in height, Alexander the Great ordered it demolished circa 331 BCE in preparation for a reconstruction that his death forestalled. A Sumerian story with similar elements is told in Enmerkar. The story of the city of Babel is recorded in Genesis 11, everyone on earth spoke the same language. As people migrated east, they settled in the land of Shinar, People there sought to make bricks and build a city and a tower with its top in the sky, to make a name for themselves, so that they not be scattered over the world. God came down to look at the city and tower, and remarked that as one people with one language, nothing that they sought would be out of their reach. God went down and confounded their speech, so that they could not understand each other, and scattered them over the face of the earth, thus the city was called Babel. As it appears in the King James version of the Bible,1. Now the whole world had one language, as people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there. 2. They said to other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly. ”They used brick instead of stone. 3 And they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower whose top is in the heavens, let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth. ”4 But the Lord came down to see the city and the tower which the sons of men had built. 5 And the Lord said, “Indeed the people are one and they all have one language, and this is what they begin to do, now nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them. 6 Come, let Us go down and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. ”7 So the Lord scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they ceased building the city. 8 Therefore its name is called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of all the earth, the phrase Tower of Babel does not appear in the Bible, it is always the city and the tower or just the city. The original derivation of the name Babel is uncertain, but it may come from bab-ilum, according to the Bible, the city received the name Babel from the Hebrew word balal, meaning to jumble or to confuse. The story of the Tower of Babel explains the confusion of tongues, the storys theme of competition between God and humans appears elsewhere in Genesis, in the story of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. The 1st-century Jewish interpretation found in Flavius Josephus explains the construction of the tower as an act of defiance against God ordered by the arrogant tyrant Nimrod. There have, however, been some challenges to this classical interpretation, with emphasis placed on the explicit motive of cultural
22.
Josephus
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Josephus claimed the Jewish Messianic prophecies that initiated the First Roman-Jewish War made reference to Vespasian becoming Emperor of Rome. In response Vespasian decided to keep Josephus as a slave and interpreter, after Vespasian became Emperor in 69 CE, he granted Josephus his freedom, at which time Josephus assumed the emperors family name of Flavius. Flavius Josephus fully defected to the Roman side and was granted Roman citizenship and he became an advisor and friend of Vespasians son Titus, serving as his translator when Titus led the Siege of Jerusalem. Since the siege proved ineffective at stopping the Jewish revolt, the citys destruction, Josephus recorded Jewish history, with special emphasis on the first century CE and the First Jewish–Roman War, including the Siege of Masada. His most important works were The Jewish War and Antiquities of the Jews, the Jewish War recounts the Jewish revolt against Roman occupation. Antiquities of the Jews recounts the history of the world from a Jewish perspective for an ostensibly Roman audience and these works provide valuable insight into first century Judaism and the background of Early Christianity. Josephus introduces himself in Greek as Iōsēpos, son of Matthias and he was the second-born son of Matthias. His older full-blooded brother was also called Matthias and their mother was an aristocratic woman who descended from the royal and formerly ruling Hasmonean dynasty. Josephuss paternal grandparents were Josephus and his wife—an unnamed Hebrew noblewoman, distant relatives of each other and he descended through his father from the priestly order of the Jehoiarib, which was the first of the 24 orders of priests in the Temple in Jerusalem. Josephus was a descendant of the high priest Jonathon, born and raised in Jerusalem, Josephus was educated alongside his brother. In his early twenties, he traveled to negotiate with Emperor Nero for the release of 12 Jewish priests, Josephus successfully fought the Roman army in Galilee, until he was captured by the Romans during the height of the war. After the Jewish garrison of Yodfat fell under siege, the Romans invaded, killing thousands, according to Josephus, he was trapped in a cave with 40 of his companions in July 67 CE. The Romans asked the group to surrender, but they refused, Josephus suggested a method of collective suicide, they drew lots and killed each other, one by one, counting to every third person. Two men were left, who surrendered to the Roman forces, in 69 CE, Josephus was released. According to his account, he acted as a negotiator with the defenders during the Siege of Jerusalem in 70 CE, in which his parents and first wife died. While being confined at Yodfat, Josephus claimed to have experienced a divine revelation, after the prediction came true, he was released by Vespasian, who considered his gift of prophecy to be divine. In 71 CE, he went to Rome in the entourage of Titus, becoming a Roman citizen, in addition to Roman citizenship, he was granted accommodation in conquered Judaea and a decent, if not extravagant, pension. While in Rome and under Flavian patronage, Josephus wrote all of his known works, although he uses Josephus, he appears to have taken the Roman praenomen Titus and nomen Flavius from his patrons
23.
Seth
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Seth, in Judaism, Christianity, Mandaeism, and Islam, was the third son of Adam and Eve and brother of Cain and Abel, who were the only other of their children mentioned by name in the Tanakh. According to Genesis 4,25, Seth was born after Abels murder, according to Genesis, Seth was born when Adam was 130 years old a son in his likeness and image. The genealogy is repeated at 1 Chronicles 1, 1–3, Genesis 5, 4–5 states that Adam fathered sons and daughters before his death, aged 930 years. According to the Bible, Seth lived to the age of 912, Seth figures in the Life of Adam and Eve, also known in its Greek version as the Apocalypse of Moses, a Jewish pseudepigraphical group of writings. It recounts the lives of Adam and Eve from after their expulsion from the Garden of Eden to their deaths, the surviving versions were composed from the early 3rd to the 5th century, the literary units in the work are considered to be older and predominantly of Jewish origin. There is wide agreement that the original was composed in a Semitic language in the 1st century AD/CE, in the Greek versions Seth and Eve travel to the doors of the Garden to beg for some oil of the tree of mercy. On the way Seth is attacked and bitten by a wild beast, on their return, Adam says to Eve, What hast thou done. Thou hast brought us great wrath which is death. Later only Seth can witness the taking-up of Adam at his funeral in a divine chariot, rashi refers to Seth as the ancestor of Noah and hence the father of all mankind, all other humans having perished in the Great Flood. In gnosticism, Seth is seen as a replacement given by God for Abel and it is said that late in life, Adam gave Seth secret teachings that would become the kabbalah. The Zohar refers to Seth as ancestor of all the generations of the tzaddikim, according to Seder Olam Rabbah, based on Jewish reckoning, he was born in 130 AM. According to Aggadah, he had 33 sons and 23 daughters, according to the Seder Olam Rabbah, he died in 1042 AM. Josephus reports that the pillar of stone remained in the land of Siriad in his day and he stated that there was no way for any pillars of Seth to survive the deluge, because the deluge buried all such pillars and edifices far underground in the sediment of its waters. The 2nd century BC Book of Jubilees, regarded as noncanonical except in the Alexandrian Rite, according to it, in 231 AM Seth married his sister, Azura, who was four years younger than he was. In the year 235 AM, Azura gave birth to Enos, Seth is commemorated as one of the Holy Forefathers in the Calendar of Saints of the Armenian Apostolic Church, along with Adam, Abel, and others, with a feast day on July 26. He is also included in the Genealogy of Jesus, according to Luke 3, the Sethians were a Christian Gnostic sect who may date their existence to before Christianity. Their influence spread throughout the Mediterranean into the systems of the Basilideans. Their thinking, though it is predominantly Judaic in foundation, is strongly influenced by Platonism
24.
Sodom and Gomorrah
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Sodom and Gomorrah were cities mentioned in the Book of Genesis and throughout the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament and in the deuterocanonical books, as well as in the Quran and the hadith. According to the Torah, the kingdoms of Sodom and Gomorrah were allied with the cities of Admah, Zeboim and these five cities, also known as the cities of the plain, were situated on the Jordan River plain in the southern region of the land of Canaan. The plain, which corresponds to the area just north of the modern-day Dead Sea, was compared to the garden of Eden as being well-watered and green, suitable for grazing livestock. Divine judgment by God was then passed upon Sodom and Gomorrah, neighboring Zoar was the only city to be spared. In Abrahamic religions, Sodom and Gomorrah have become synonymous with impenitent sin, Sodom and Gomorrah have been used as metaphors for vice and homosexuality viewed as a deviation. The story has given rise to words in several languages. These include the English word sodomy, used in laws to describe sexual crimes against nature, namely anal or oral sex. Some Islamic societies incorporate punishments associated with Sodom and Gomorrah into sharia, the etymology of both names is uncertain. The exact original meanings of the names are also uncertain, of the five cities of the plain, only Bela, modern Zoara, is securely identified, and remained a settlement long after the biblical period. The ancient Greek historiographer Strabo states that locals living near Moasada say that there were once thirteen inhabited cities in that region of which Sodom was the metropolis. Strabo identifies a limestone and salt hill at the western tip of the Dead Sea. However, Sayce later mentions that the more closely resembles the doom of Sennacheribs host. The names si-da-mu and ì-ma-ar were identified as representing Sodom and Gomorrah, today, the scholarly consensus is that Ebla has no bearing on. If the cities existed, they might have been destroyed as the result of a natural disaster. One theory says that the Dead Sea was devastated by an earthquake between 2100 and 1900 BCE, which could have unleashed showers of steaming tar. It is possible that the towns were destroyed by an earthquake in the region, especially if the towns lay along a major fault, However, there is a lack of contemporary accounts of seismic activity within the necessary timeframe to corroborate this theory. Other possibilities also include Numeira, al-Safi, Feifa, and Khanazir, all sites were near the Dead Sea, with evidence of burning and traces of sulfur. However, according to Schaub, who dug at Bab edh-Dhra, Numeira was destroyed at a different time period from Bab edh-Dhra, Archaeological remains excavated from Bab edh-Dhra are currently displayed in Karak Archaeological Museum, Amman Citadel Museum, and the British Museum
25.
Isaac
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Isaac (/ˈaɪzək/ was the son of Abraham and Sarah and father of Jacob, his name means he laughs, reflecting Sarahs response when told that she will have a child. He was one of the three patriarchs of the Israelites, the one whose name was not changed, and the only one who did not move out of Canaan. He died when he was 180 years old, the longest-lived of the three, the anglicized name Isaac is a transliteration of the Hebrew term Yiṣḥāq which literally means He laughs/will laugh. Ugaritic texts dating from the 13th century BCE refer to the benevolent smile of the Canaanite deity El, Genesis, however, ascribes the laughter to Isaacs parents, Abraham and Sarah, rather than El. According to the narrative, Abraham fell on his face. He laughed because Sarah was past the age of childbearing, both she and Abraham were advanced in age, later, when Sarah overheard three messengers of the Lord renew the promise, she laughed inwardly for the same reason. Sarah denied laughing when God questioned Abraham about it and it was prophesied to the patriarch Abraham that he would have a son and that his name should be Isaac. When Abraham became one hundred years old, this son was born to him by his first wife Sarah, though this was Abrahams second son it was Sarahs first and only child. On the eighth day from his birth, Isaac was circumcised, as was necessary for all males of Abrahams household, in order to be in compliance with Yahwehs covenant. After Isaac had been weaned, Sarah saw Ishmael mocking, and urged her husband to cast out Hagar the bondservant and her son, Abraham was hesitant, but at Gods order he listened to his wifes request. At some point in Isaacs youth, his father Abraham brought him to Mount Moriah, at Gods command, Abraham was to build a sacrificial altar and sacrifice his son Isaac upon it. After he had bound his son to the altar and drawn his knife to kill him, rather, he was directed to sacrifice instead a nearby ram that was stuck in thickets. This event served as a test of Abrahams faith in God, when Isaac was 40, Abraham sent Eliezer, his steward, into Mesopotamia to find a wife for Isaac, from his nephew Bethuels family. Eliezer chose the Aramean Rebekah for Isaac, after many years of marriage to Isaac, Rebekah had still not given birth to a child and was believed to be barren. Isaac prayed for her and she conceived, Rebekah gave birth to twin boys, Esau and Jacob. Isaac was 60 years old when his two sons were born, Isaac favored Esau, and Rebekah favored Jacob. Isaac is unique among the patriarchs for remaining faithful to his wife, at the age of 75, Isaac moved to Beer-lahai-roi after his father died. When the land experienced famine, he removed to the Philistine land of Gerar where his father once lived and this land was still under the control of King Abimelech as it was in the days of Abraham
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Joshua
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Joshua /ˈdʒɒʃuə/ or Jehoshua is the central figure in the Hebrew Bibles Book of Joshua. According to the books of Exodus, Numbers and Joshua, he was Moses assistant and his name was Hoshea the son of Nun, of the tribe of Ephraim, but Moses called him Yehoshua the name by which he is commonly known. The name is shortened to Yeshua in Nehemiah, according to the Bible he was born in Egypt prior to the Exodus. According to the Hebrew Bible, Joshua was one of the spies of Israel sent by Moses to explore the land of Canaan. In Numbers 13, 1–16, and after the death of Moses, he led the Israelite tribes in the conquest of Canaan, according to Biblical chronology, Joshua lived between 1355 and 1245 BCE, or sometime in the late Bronze Age. According to Joshua 24,29, Joshua died at the age of 110, Joshua also holds a position of respect among Muslims. According to Islamic tradition, he was, along with Caleb, all Muslims also see Joshua as the leader of the Israelites, following the death of Moses. Some Muslims also believe Joshua to be the attendant of Moses mentioned in the Qurān, before Moses meets Khidr, the English name Joshua is a rendering of the Hebrew language Yehoshua, meaning Yahweh is salvation. The vocalization of the second name component may be read as Hoshea—the name used in the Torah before Moses added the divine name, Jesus is the English of the Greek transliteration of Yehoshua via Latin. In the Septuagint, all instances of the word Yehoshua are rendered as Ἰησοῦς, thus, in Greek, Joshua is called Jesus son of Naue to differentiate him from Jesus Christ. This is also true in the Slavic languages following the Eastern Orthodox tradition, Joshua was a major figure in the events of the Exodus. He was charged by Moses with selecting and commanding a group for their first battle after exiting Egypt, against the Amalekites in Rephidim. He later accompanied Moses when he ascended biblical Mount Sinai to commune with God, visualize Gods plan for the Israelite tabernacle and receive the Ten Commandments. Joshua was with Moses when he descended from the mountain, heard the Israelites celebrations around the Golden Calf, and broke the tablets bearing the words of the commandments. However, when Moses returned to the mountain to re-create the tablets recording the Ten Commandments, Joshua was not present, according to Joshua 1, 1-9, God appointed Joshua to succeed Moses as leader of the Israelites along with giving him a blessing of invincibility during his lifetime. The first part of the book of Joshua covers the period when he led the conquest of Canaan, at the Jordan River, the waters parted, as they had for Moses at the Red Sea. The first battle after the crossing of the Jordan was the Battle of Jericho, Joshua led the destruction of Jericho, then moved on to Ai, a small neighboring city to the west. However, they were defeated with thirty-six Israelite deaths, the defeat was attributed to Achan taking an accursed thing from Jericho, and was followed by Achan and his family and animals being stoned to death to restore Gods favor
27.
Samuel
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Samuel, is a leader of ancient Israel in the Books of Samuel in the Hebrew Bible. He is also known as a prophet by Christians and Muslims and his status, as viewed by rabbinical literature, is that he was the last of the Hebrew Judges and the first of the major prophets who began to prophesy inside the Land of Israel. He was thus on the cusp of two eras, according to the text of the Books of Samuel, he also anointed the first two kings of the Kingdom of Israel, Saul and David. Samuels mother was Hannah and his father was Elkanah, Elkanah lived at Ramathaim in the district of Zuph. His genealogy is found in a pedigree of the Kohathites and in that of Heman. According to the tables in Chronicles, Elkanah was a Levite - a fact not mentioned in the books of Samuel. The fact that Elkanah, a Levite, was denominated an Ephraimite is analogous to the designation of a Levite belonging to Judah, according to 1 Samuel 1, 1-28, Elkanah had two wives, Peninnah and Hannah. Peninnah had children, Hannah did not, jealous, Penninah reproached Hannah for her lack of children, causing Hannah much heartache. The relationship of Penninah and Hannah recalls that between Hagar and Sarah, Elkanah was a devout man and would periodically take his family on pilgrimage to the holy site of Shiloh. The motif of Elkanah and Hannah as devout, childless parents will reoccur with Zachariah and Elizabeth and the birth of John the Baptist, and with Joachim and Anna, on one occasion Hannah went to the sanctuary and prayed for a child. In tears, she vowed that were she granted a child, Eli, who was sitting at the foot of the doorpost in the sanctuary at Shiloh, saw her apparently mumbling to herself and thought she was drunk, but was soon assured of her motivation and sobriety. Eli was the priest of Shiloh, and one of the last Israelite Judges before the rule of kings in ancient Israel and he had assumed the leadership after Samsons death. Eli blessed her and she returned home, subsequently Hannah became pregnant and gave birth to Samuel. Hannahs exultant hymn of thanksgiving resembles in several points Marys later Magnificat, after the child was weaned, she left him in Elis care, and from time to time she would come to visit her son. According to 1 Samuel 1,20, Hannah named Samuel to commemorate her prayer to God for a child, called his name Samuel, saying, Because I have asked him of the Lord. The Hebrew root rendered as asked in the KJV is sha’al, once it is even mentioned in the form sha’ul, Saul’s name in Hebrew. Biblical historian Michael Coogan suggests that Saul’s birth narrative was transferred to Samuel by the Deuteronomist historians, however, Gordon himself did not see this hypothesis as justified by the available evidence. According to the Holman Bible Dictionary, Samuel was a name in the Ancient Near East meaning, Sumu is God but understood in Israel as The name is God, God is exalted
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David
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David was, according to the Hebrew Bible, the second king of the United Kingdom of Israel and Judah, reigning in c. He is described as a man after Gods own heart in 1 Samuel 13,14 and Acts 13,22. The Hebrew prophets regarded him as the ancestor of the future messiah, the New Testament says he was an ancestor of Jesus. God is angered when Saul, Israels king, unlawfully offers a sacrifice and later disobeys a divine instruction to not only all of the Amalekites. Consequently, he sends the prophet Samuel to anoint David, the youngest son of Jesse of Bethlehem, God sends an evil spirit to torment Saul. Sauls courtiers recommend that he send for David, a man skillful on the lyre, wise in speech, and brave in battle. So David enters Sauls service as one of the royal armour-bearers, and plays the lyre to soothe the king, war comes between Israel and the Philistines, and the giant Goliath challenges the Israelites to send out a champion to face him in single combat. David, sent by his father to bring provisions to his brothers serving in Sauls army, refusing the kings offer of the royal armour, he kills Goliath with his sling. Saul inquires the name of the heros father. Saul sets David over his army, all Israel loves David, but his popularity causes Saul to fear him. Saul plots his death, but Sauls son Jonathan, one of those who loves David, warns him of his fathers schemes and David flees. He becomes a vassal of the Philistine king Achish of Gath, but Achishs nobles question his loyalty, Jonathan and Saul are killed, and David is anointed king over Judah. In the north, Sauls son Ish-Bosheth is anointed king of Israel, with the death of Sauls son, the elders of Israel come to Hebron and David is anointed king over all Israel. He conquers Jerusalem, previously a Jebusite stronghold, and makes it his capital. He brings the Ark of the Covenant to the city, intending to build a temple for God, Nathan also prophesies that God has made a covenant with the house of David, Your throne shall be established forever. David wins more victories over the Philistines, while the Moabites, Edomites, Amalekites, Ammonites, during a battle to conquer the Ammonite capital of Rabbah, David seduces Bathsheba and causes the death of her husband Uriah the Hittite. In response, Nathan prophesies the punishment that shall fall upon him, in fulfillment of these words Davids son Absalom rebels. The rebellion ends at the battle of the Wood of Ephraim, Absaloms forces are routed, and Absalom is caught by his long hair in the branches of a tree, and killed by Joab, contrary to Davids order. Joab was the commander of Davids army, David laments the death of his favourite son, O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom
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Solomon
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Solomon, also called Jedidiah, was, according to the Bible, Quran, hadith and Hidden Words a fabulously wealthy and wise king of Israel and a son of David, the previous king of Israel. The conventional dates of Solomons reign are circa 970 to 931 BC and he is described as the third king of the United Monarchy, which would break apart into the northern Kingdom of Israel and the southern Kingdom of Judah shortly after his death. Following the split, his descendants ruled over Judah alone. According to the Talmud, Solomon is one of the 48 prophets, in the Quran, he is considered a major prophet, and Muslims generally refer to him by the Arabic variant Sulayman, son of David. Solomon was, according to the Quran, a king of ancient Israel as well as the son of David, the Hebrew Bible credits him as the builder of the First Temple in Jerusalem. It portrays him as great in wisdom, wealth, and power any of the previous kings of the country. His sins included idolatry, marrying foreign women, and ultimately turning away from Yahweh, Solomon is the subject of many other later references and legends, most notably in the 1st-century apocryphal work known as the Testament of Solomon. Solomon was born in Jerusalem, the second child of David and his wife Bathsheba. The first child, a son conceived adulterously during Uriahs lifetime, had died before Solomon was conceived as a punishment on account of the death of Uriah by Davids order. Solomon had three named full brothers through Bathsheba, Nathan, Shammua, and Shobab, besides six known older half-brothers through as many mothers, according to the First Book of Kings, when David was old, he could not get warm. So they sought a young woman throughout all the territory of Israel, and found Abishag the Shunammite. The young woman was very beautiful, and she was of service to the king and attended to him, while David was in this state, court factions were maneuvering for power. Solomon greatly expanded his military strength, especially the cavalry and chariot arms and he founded numerous colonies, some of which doubled as trading posts and military outposts. Trade relationships were a focus of his administration, Solomon is considered the most wealthy of the Israelite kings named in the Bible. Solomon also built the First Temple, beginning in the year of his reign. Solomon was the Biblical king most famous for his wisdom, in 1 Kings he sacrificed to God and prayed for wisdom. God personally answered his prayer, promising him great wisdom because he did not ask for self-serving rewards like long life or the death of his enemies. Perhaps the best known story of his wisdom is the Judgment of Solomon, Solomon easily resolved the dispute by commanding the child to be cut in half and shared between the two
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Books of Kings
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In the Hebrew Bible, Kings is a single book called the Book of Kings. The fourth book of Neviim, the division of the Tanakh. In the Septuagint, Samuel and Kings was divided into four books and Kings became III, the two Books of Kings presents a history of ancient Israel and Judah from the death of David to the release of Jehoiachin from imprisonment in Babylon, a period of some 400 years. Solomon comes to the throne after Davids death, at the beginning of his reign he assumes Gods promises to David and brings splendour to Israel and peace and prosperity to his people. The centrepiece of Solomons reign is the building of the First Temple, at the end, however, he follows other gods and oppresses Israel. The kings who follow Rehoboam in Jerusalem continue the line of David, in the north, however, dynasties follow each other in rapid succession. At length God brings the Assyrians to destroy the northern kingdom, Yahweh saves Jerusalem and the kingdom from an invasion by Assyria. But Manasseh, the king, reverses the reforms. Manassehs righteous grandson Josiah reinstitutes the reforms of Hezekiah, but it is too late, God, speaking through the prophetess Huldah, affirms that Jerusalem is to be destroyed. God brings the Babylonians against Jerusalem, Yahweh deserts his people, Jerusalem is razed and the Temple destroyed, in the original Hebrew Bible First and Second Kings are a single book, as are First and Second Samuel. When this was translated into Greek in the last few centuries BCE, then, what it is now commonly known as 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel are called by the Vulgate, in imitation of the Septuagint,1 Kings and 2 Kings respectively. What it is now known as 1 Kings and 2 Kings would be 3 Kings and 4 Kings in old Bibles before the year 1516 such as the Vulgate. The division we know today, used by Protestant Bibles and adopted by Catholics, some Bibles still preserve the old denomination, for example, Douay Rheims bible. According to Jewish tradition the author of Kings was Jeremiah, who would have been alive during the fall of Jerusalem in 586 BCE. The Deuteronomic perspective is particularly evident in prayers and speeches spoken by key figures at major transition points, a third source, or set of sources, were cycles of stories about various prophets, plus a few smaller miscellaneous traditions. The conclusion of the book was based on personal knowledge. A few sections were editorial additions not based on sources, judgement is not punishment, but simply the natural consequence of Israels failure to worship Yahweh alone. Another and related theme is that of prophecy, the main point of the prophetic stories is that Gods prophecies are always fulfilled, so that any not yet fulfilled will be so in the future
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Book of Chronicles
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In the Hebrew Bible, Chronicles is a single book, called Diḇrê Hayyāmîm, and is the final book of Ketuvim, the third and last part of the Tanakh. Chronicles was divided into two books in the Septuagint and called I and II Paralipoménōn, the English name comes from the Latin name chronikon, which was given to the text by scholar Jerome in the 5th century. Chronicles present the narrative from the first human being, Adam, through the history of ancient Judah. The Chronicles narrative begins with Adam and the story is carried forward, almost entirely by genealogical lists. The bulk of the remainder of 1 Chronicles, after an account of Saul, is concerned with the reign of David. The next long section concerns Davids son Solomon, and the part is concerned with the Kingdom of Judah with occasional references to the second kingdom of Israel. Originally a single work, Chronicles was divided into two in the Septuagint, a Greek translation produced in the immediately preceding Jesus. Within this broad structure there are signs that the author has used various devices to structure his work. The last events in Chronicles take place in the reign of Cyrus the Great, the Persian king who conquered Babylon in 539 BC and it was probably composed between 400–250 BC, with the period 350–300 BC the most likely. The latest person mentioned in Chronicles is Anani, a descendant of King Jehoiachin according to the Masoretic Text. Ananis birth would likely have been sometime between 425 and 400 BC, the Septuagint gives an additional five generations in the genealogy of Anani. For those scholars who side with the Septuagints reading, Ananis likely date of birth is a century later, Chronicles appears to be largely the work of a single individual, with some later additions and editing. The writer was probably male, probably a Levite, and probably from Jerusalem and he was well read, a skilled editor, and a sophisticated theologian. His intention was to use Israels past to convey messages to his peers. One of the most striking, although inconclusive, features of Chronicles is that its closing sentence is repeated as the opening of Ezra–Nehemiah. The last half of the 20th century saw a radical reappraisal, despite much discussion of this issue, no agreement has been reached. Recent suggestions have been that it was intended as a clarification of the history in Genesis-Kings, the message which the author wished to give to his audience was this, God is active in history, and especially the history of Israel. The faithfulness or sins of individual kings are immediately rewarded or punished by God, God calls Israel to a special relationship
32.
Simon Goulart
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Simon Goulart was a French Reformed theologian, humanist and poet. He was born at Senlis in northern France and he first studied law, then adopted the Reformed faith and became one of the pastors at Geneva in Switzerland. He was called to Antwerp, to Orange, to Montpellier and to Nîmes as minister, and to Lausanne as professor, in 1595 he preached aggressively against Gabrielle dEstrées, the favorite of Henry IV of France. He was put in prison by order of the Council of Geneva, after eight days he was released and he wrote a number of books on history and theology. New Schaff–Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge, london and New York, Funk and Wagnalls
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Pierre de Ronsard
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Pierre de Ronsard was a French poet or, as his own generation in France called him, a prince of poets. Pierre de Ronsard was born at the Manoir de la Possonnière, in the village of Couture-sur-Loir, baudouin de Ronsard or Rossart was the founder of the French branch of the house, and made his mark in the early stages of the Hundred Years War. The poets father was Louis de Ronsard, and his mother was Jeanne de Chaudrier, loys de Ronsard was maître dhôtel du roi to Francis I, whose captivity after Pavia had just been softened by treaty, and he had to quit his home shortly after Pierres birth. The future poet was educated at home in his earliest years, a year after the death of the queen, he returned to France, travelling back through England. Afterwards he was attached in the way to the suite of the cardinal du Bellay-Langey. His apparently promising diplomatic career was, however, cut short by an attack of deafness that no physician could cure, antoine de Baïf, Daurats pupil, accompanied Ronsard, Belleau shortly followed, Joachim du Bellay, the second of the seven, joined not much later. Muretus, a scholar and by means of his Latin plays a great influence in the creation of French tragedy, was also a student here. The Défense et illustration de la langue française of the latter appeared in 1549, Ronsards own work came a little later, and a rather idle story is told of a trick of Du Bellays which at last determined him to publish. These books excited a violent literary quarrel and his popularity in his own time was overwhelming and immediate, and his prosperity was unbroken. To this same year belongs his most important and interesting Abrégé de lart poétique français, the rapid change of sovereigns did Ronsard no harm. Charles IX, King of France, who succeeded his brother after a short time, was even better inclined to him than Henry. He gave him rooms in the palace, he bestowed upon him diverse abbacies and priories, neither was Charles IX a bad poet. This royal patronage, however, had its disagreeable side, according to some words of his own, they were not contented with this variety of argument, but attempted to have him assassinated. One party in the state were certain to look coldly on the work of a minion of the court at such a juncture, the other had something else to think of. The death of Charles made little difference in the favour which Ronsard enjoyed. It seems also that he had a house of his own in the Fauhourg Saint-Marcel. At any rate his preferments made him in perfectly easy circumstances, on the other hand, he received not merely gifts and endowments from his own sovereign but presents from many others, including Elizabeth I of England. Mary, Queen of Scots addressed him from her prison, and his last years were saddened not merely by the death of many of his closest friends, but by increasing ill-health
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Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve
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Charles Augustin Sainte-Beuve was a literary critic of French literature. He was born in Boulogne, educated there, and studied medicine at the Collège Charlemagne in Paris, in 1828, he served in the St Louis Hospital. Sainte-Beuve became friendly with Hugo after publishing a review of the authors work but later had an affair with Hugos wife. His articles and essays were collected the volumes Port-Royal and Portraits littéraires, during the rebellions of 1848 in Europe, he lectured at Liège on Chateaubriand and his literary circle. He returned to Paris in 1849 and began his series of columns, Causeries du lundi in the newspaper. When Louis Napoleon became Emperor, he made Sainte-Beuve professor of Latin poetry at the Collège de France, but anti-Imperialist students hissed him, and he resigned. After several books of poetry and a couple of failed novels, Sainte-Beuve began to do literary research and he continued to contribute to La Revue contemporaine. Port-Royal, probably Sainte-Beuves masterpiece, is an history of the Jansenist abbey of Port-Royal-des-Champs. It not only influenced the historiography of religious belief, i. e. the method of research, but also the philosophy of history. He was made Senator in 1865, in which capacity he distinguished himself by his pleas for freedom of speech, according to Jules Amédée Barbey dAurevilly, Sainte-Beuve was a clever man with the temper of a turkey. In his last years, he was a sufferer and lived much in retirement. One of Sainte-Beuves critical contentions was that, in order to understand an artist and his work, marcel Proust took issue with this notion and refuted it in a set of essays, Contre Sainte-Beuve. Proust developed the ideas first voiced in those essays in À la recherche du temps perdu, friedrich Nietzsche, actually an avowed opponent of Sainte-Beuve, prompted in 1880 the wife of his friend Franz Overbeck, Ida Overbeck, to translate the Causeries du lundi into German. Until then, Sainte-Beuve was never published in German despite his great importance in France, since it was considered representative of a French way of thinking detested in Germany, Ida Overbecks translation appeared in 1880 under the title Die Menschen des XVIII. Nietzsche wrote to Ida Overbeck on August 18,1880, An hour ago I received the Die Menschen des XVIII, jahrhunderts, It is just a marvellous book. Ida Overbecks translation is an important document of the transfer between Germany and France in a period of strong tension, but it was largely ignored. It was not until 2014 that a critical and annotated edition of this appeared in print. Non-fiction Tableau Historique et Critique de la Poésie Française et du Théâtre Français au XVIe Siècle, poetry Vie, Poésies et Pensées de Joseph Delorme
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James VI and I
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James VI and I was King of Scotland as James VI from 24 July 1567 and King of England and Ireland as James I from the union of the Scottish and English crowns on 24 March 1603 until his death. The kingdoms of Scotland and England were individual sovereign states, with their own parliaments, judiciary, and laws, though both were ruled by James in personal union. James was the son of Mary, Queen of Scots, James succeeded to the Scottish throne at the age of thirteen months, after his mother Mary was compelled to abdicate in his favour. Four different regents governed during his minority, which ended officially in 1578, in 1603, he succeeded the last Tudor monarch of England and Ireland, Elizabeth I, who died without issue. He continued to reign in all three kingdoms for 22 years, a period known after him as the Jacobean era, until his death in 1625 at the age of 58. After the Union of the Crowns, he based himself in England from 1603, only returning to Scotland once in 1617 and he was a major advocate of a single parliament for England and Scotland. In his reign, the Plantation of Ulster and British colonization of the Americas began, at 57 years and 246 days, Jamess reign in Scotland was longer than those of any of his predecessors. He achieved most of his aims in Scotland but faced difficulties in England, including the Gunpowder Plot in 1605. James himself was a scholar, the author of works such as Daemonologie, The True Law of Free Monarchies. He sponsored the translation of the Bible that would later be named after him, Sir Anthony Weldon claimed that James had been termed the wisest fool in Christendom, an epithet associated with his character ever since. Since the latter half of the 20th century, historians have tended to revise Jamess reputation and treat him as a serious, James was the only son of Mary, Queen of Scots, and her second husband, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Both Mary and Darnley were great-grandchildren of Henry VII of England through Margaret Tudor, Marys rule over Scotland was insecure, and she and her husband, being Roman Catholics, faced a rebellion by Protestant noblemen. James was born on 19 June 1566 at Edinburgh Castle, and as the eldest son and heir apparent of the monarch automatically became Duke of Rothesay and Prince and he was baptised Charles James or James Charles on 17 December 1566 in a Catholic ceremony held at Stirling Castle. His godparents were Charles IX of France, Elizabeth I of England, Mary refused to let the Archbishop of St Andrews, whom she referred to as a pocky priest, spit in the childs mouth, as was then the custom. The subsequent entertainment, devised by Frenchman Bastian Pagez, featured men dressed as satyrs and sporting tails, Jamess father, Darnley, was murdered on 10 February 1567 at Kirk o Field, Edinburgh, perhaps in revenge for Rizzios death. James inherited his fathers titles of Duke of Albany and Earl of Ross, Mary was already unpopular, and her marriage on 15 May 1567 to James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell, who was widely suspected of murdering Darnley, heightened widespread bad feeling towards her. In June 1567, Protestant rebels arrested Mary and imprisoned her in Loch Leven Castle and she was forced to abdicate on 24 July 1567 in favour of the infant James and to appoint her illegitimate half-brother, James Stewart, Earl of Moray, as regent. The care of James was entrusted to the Earl and Countess of Mar, to be conserved, nursed, and upbrought in the security of Stirling Castle
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Scotland
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Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and covers the northern third of the island of Great Britain. It shares a border with England to the south, and is surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean, with the North Sea to the east. In addition to the mainland, the country is made up of more than 790 islands, including the Northern Isles, the Kingdom of Scotland emerged as an independent sovereign state in the Early Middle Ages and continued to exist until 1707. By inheritance in 1603, James VI, King of Scots, became King of England and King of Ireland, Scotland subsequently entered into a political union with the Kingdom of England on 1 May 1707 to create the new Kingdom of Great Britain. The union also created a new Parliament of Great Britain, which succeeded both the Parliament of Scotland and the Parliament of England. Within Scotland, the monarchy of the United Kingdom has continued to use a variety of styles, titles, the legal system within Scotland has also remained separate from those of England and Wales and Northern Ireland, Scotland constitutes a distinct jurisdiction in both public and private law. Glasgow, Scotlands largest city, was one of the worlds leading industrial cities. Other major urban areas are Aberdeen and Dundee, Scottish waters consist of a large sector of the North Atlantic and the North Sea, containing the largest oil reserves in the European Union. This has given Aberdeen, the third-largest city in Scotland, the title of Europes oil capital, following a referendum in 1997, a Scottish Parliament was re-established, in the form of a devolved unicameral legislature comprising 129 members, having authority over many areas of domestic policy. Scotland is represented in the UK Parliament by 59 MPs and in the European Parliament by 6 MEPs, Scotland is also a member nation of the British–Irish Council, and the British–Irish Parliamentary Assembly. Scotland comes from Scoti, the Latin name for the Gaels, the Late Latin word Scotia was initially used to refer to Ireland. By the 11th century at the latest, Scotia was being used to refer to Scotland north of the River Forth, alongside Albania or Albany, the use of the words Scots and Scotland to encompass all of what is now Scotland became common in the Late Middle Ages. Repeated glaciations, which covered the land mass of modern Scotland. It is believed the first post-glacial groups of hunter-gatherers arrived in Scotland around 12,800 years ago, the groups of settlers began building the first known permanent houses on Scottish soil around 9,500 years ago, and the first villages around 6,000 years ago. The well-preserved village of Skara Brae on the mainland of Orkney dates from this period and it contains the remains of an early Bronze Age ruler laid out on white quartz pebbles and birch bark. It was also discovered for the first time that early Bronze Age people placed flowers in their graves, in the winter of 1850, a severe storm hit Scotland, causing widespread damage and over 200 deaths. In the Bay of Skaill, the storm stripped the earth from a large irregular knoll, when the storm cleared, local villagers found the outline of a village, consisting of a number of small houses without roofs. William Watt of Skaill, the laird, began an amateur excavation of the site, but after uncovering four houses
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Catherine de Bourbon
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Catherine de Bourbon, was a Princess of Navarre and Duchess consort of Lorraine. She was the daughter of Queen Jeanne III dAlbret and Antoine of Bourbon and she served as regent of Béarn for more than two decades. Catherine was born on 7 February 1559 to Antoine de Bourbon and his wife, Jeanne dAlbret and she was named after her godmother, Catherine de Medici. Catherines mother, Jeanne dAlbret, converted to Calvinism a year after Catherines birth, Antoine de Bourbon remained a Catholic and turned against Jeanne and threatened to divorce her. He died fighting for the Catholic cause on 17 November 1562, Catherine was with her mother and elder brother, the future Henry III and IV, as they fought for the Protestant cause. Jeanne died on 9 June 1572, and Catherines custody was assigned to Catherine de Medici, during the St. Bartholomews Day Massacre, Catherine and her elder brother were forced to convert to Catholicism. After the death of Charles IX in 1574, the new king, Henry III and she almost married James VI of Scotland. Her brother, who became ruler of the principality of Béarn in 1572, Henry IV of France, after his escape from captivity in 1576, he entrusted Catherine with the government of Béarn. She served almost continuously as regent until 1596, where among her other responsibilities, she, a staunch Protestant, hosted Antonio Perez, a famous Spanish Catholic refugee from King Philip II. After the accession of her brother, Henry of Navarre, to the French throne, in 1589, she was created Duchess of Albret and Countess of Armagnac. Appointed by her brother to sit on his Council as a representative of French Protestant interests in 1598, as part of the treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye between Henry IV and Charles III, Duke of Lorraine, it was agreed that Catherine should marry Charles elder son, Henry. The marriage agreement was signed on 13 July 1598, however, Catherine was a confirmed Calvinist, who refused to convert to Roman Catholicism, whilst her husband was a devout Catholic, and a former member of the Holy League. Thus, the Pope was required to make a dispensation to allow the two to marry, on 29 December 1598 Pope Clement VIII declared himself opposed to the marriage. Dissatisfied, Henry IV intimidated the Archbishop of Reims into granting an authorisation of marriage and this was made at Saint-Germain-en-Laye on 31 January 1599. Until the birth of her nephew on 27 September 1601, she was heir presumptive to the Navarrese crown, however, Catherine was not married long before she died, childless. Her husband remarried to Margerita Gonzaga, a niece of Marie de Medici, Catherine de Bourbon was also a writer. Her works consist principally of sonnets and correspondence, Catherine de Bourbon, Influence politique, religieuse et culturelle d’une princesse calviniste
38.
The Battle of Lepanto (Luna painting)
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The Battle of Lepanto is a famous painting by Filipino painter and hero Juan Luna. Luna is one of the first Filipinos to excel and earn recognition in the field of arts. Painted by Luna in 1887, the masterpiece is about the Battle of Lepanto of October 7,1571, the painting features Don Juan of Austria in battle while at the bow of a ship. It is one of the “huge epic canvasses” painted by Luna, the painting is also known as The Battle of Lepanto of 1571. Some of the paintings were The Battle of Lepanto, together with Peuple et Rois. It was the Spanish Senate, through the influence of King Alfonso XII of Spain, King Alfonso XIIs plan was to hang Luna’s Battle of Lepanto side by side with Francisco Pradilla Ortiz’s 1878 grand-prize winning masterpiece La rendicion de granada. A biased jury, known as the Jury of Honor did not grant Luna the prize because he was a Filipino, one year after, The Battle of Lepanto became a gold medalist during the 1888 Fine Arts Exhibition in Barcelona, Spain. During the victory gathering of Filipinos in Madrid, Philippine national hero José Rizal praised Luna and Hidalgo for their achievements, “mastery, graciano Lopez Jaena, another Filipino hero, also gave Luna and Hidalgo a “congratulatory speech” for their success. Luna’s The Battle of Lepanto provides significance to the victory against the Turks”. However, the victory at Lepanto was not merely a Spanish victory against the Turks, the victory at Lepanto was a Catholic victory over the invading forces of Islam. At Lepanto a coalition of Catholics defeated the forces of Islam who were attempting to conquer, both paintings are still currently displayed at the Madrid Senate Hall. Luna also received, through the order of Queen Regent Maria Christina. A description of Juan Lunas The Battle of Lepanto painting, and of Juan Luna himself together with Félix Resurrección Hidalgo from Popular Science Monthly, Volume 55, page 474 at wikisource. org
39.
Castalian Band
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Its name is derived from the classical term Castalian Spring, a symbol for poetic inspiration. It was H. However, apart from this verse, no scholar has produced any evidence for any such self-aware grouping. Nevertheless, other writers have seized on the concept, in a celebrated article from 2001, the reputed literary scholar Priscilla Bawcutt examined the claims closely, and - in the opinion of most modern authorities - demolished them. However, the persistence of the idea of the Castalian Band has its own interest - as Bawcutt noted, whether or not there ever was such a Court grouping as the Castalian Band, it seems likely that there were cultivated circles of educated gentlemen in Scotland at the time. The King wrote a detailed treatise intended to establish a standard of practice in Scots poetry - his Reulis and Cautelis -, activities of some the poets recognized to be working in Scotland at the time is known to a limited extent. The principal literary figure to be associated with the court was Alexander Montgomerie. Music may also played an important part in performances, some of the poems of Montgomerie, french influences were particularly important for the King. James himself made translations of work by the Gascon soldier-poet du Bartas, du Bartas himself visited the Scottish Court on a diplomatic mission in 1587 during which time James unsuccessfully attempted to persuade him to stay. Other Castalian makars produced translation as well as original works, many Scots translations predated first translations of the same works in England. Chief among the circle was arguably the soldier, courtier and makar Alexander Montgomerie and he had achieved celebrity after victory over Patrick Hume in The Flyting Betwixt Montgomerie and Polwart. Sonnets on various themes include a sequence that deftly charts frustration with the laws delay. Even when Montgomerie came to be excluded from the court sometime in the mid 1590s as a result of his Catholic sympathies. The court also attracted figures from furth of Scotland, thomas produced translations as well as original work. Under James patronage he was translator of du Bartas. Names on the fringes of court literary circles include, William Alexander, Earl of Stirling Robert Aytoun Alexander and they came to prominence more properly after the Union of the Crowns. Its well-developed structure and language as theatre may suggest that our picture of activity in the Scottish court of James is not complete. The exact identity of the dramatist is open to speculation and it is arguable that the existence of the Castalians was passed over in general literary histories. Scottish Jacobean writers have largely overshadowed by the contemporaneous literary scene in London in the age of Shakespeare
40.
William Drummond of Hawthornden
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William Drummond, called of Hawthornden, was a Scottish poet. Drummond was born at Hawthornden Castle, Midlothian, to John Drummond, the first laird of Hawthornden, Sir Robert Drummond of Carnock, one-time Master of Work to the Crown of Scotland, was his grandfather. Drummond received his education at the Royal High School of Edinburgh. His father was an usher at the English court and William, in a visit to London in 1606. His collection contains many first editions of the most famous productions of the age, in 1612 began his correspondence with Sir William Alexander of Menstrie, afterwards Earl of Stirling, which ripened into a lifelong friendship after Drummonds visit to Menstrie in 1614. Drummonds first publication appeared in 1613, an elegy on the death of Henry, Prince of Wales, the poem shows the influence of Spensers and Sidneys pastoralism. In the same year he published an anthology of the elegies of Chapman, Wither and others, entitled Mausoleum, the poems bear marks of a close study of Sidney, and of the Italian poets. He sometimes translates direct from the Italian, especially from Giambattista Marino, forth Feasting, A Panegyricke to the Kings Most Excellent Majestie, a poem written in heroic couplets of remarkable facility, celebrates Jamess visit to Scotland in that year. In 1618 Drummond began a correspondence with Michael Drayton, the two poets continued to write at intervals for thirteen years, the last letter being dated in the year of Draytons death. The latter had almost been persuaded by his dear Drummond to print the books of Poly-Olbion at Harts Edinburgh press. In the winter of 1618-1619, Drummond had included Ben Jonson in his circle of literary friends, in 1623 appeared the poets fourth publication, entitled Flowers of Sion, By William Drummond of Hawthornedenne, to which is adjoyned his Cypresse Grove. From 1625 till 1630 Drummond was probably for the most part engaged in travelling on the Continent, on 29 September 1626 he received a sixteen patents for diverse devices, mainly military. However, there is no evidence that he actually produced any of these devices, the same year,1627, is the date of Drummonds munificent gift of about 500 volumes to the library of the University of Edinburgh. In 1630 Drummond again began to reside permanently at Hawthornden, and in 1632 he married Elizabeth Logan, by whom he had five sons, in 1633 Charles made his coronation-visit to Scotland, and Drummonds pen was employed in writing congratulatory speeches and verses. He was involved in organising the Kings triumphal procession through Edinburgh, as Drummond preferred Episcopacy to Presbytery, and was an extremely loyal subject, he supported Charless general policy, though he protested against the methods employed to enforce it. Partly to please his kinsman the earl of Perth, and partly to satisfy his own curiosity and his next work was called forth by the kings enforced submission to the opposition of his Scottish subjects. In 1639 Drummond had to sign the Covenant in self-protection, but was uneasy under the burden and its burden is an invective on the intolerance of the then dominant Presbyterian clergy. His later works may be described briefly as royalist pamphlets, written more or less caution
