title: Peugeot

text: In 2001, Peugeot entered three BTC-T Peugeot 406 Coupés into the British Touring Car Championship to compete with the dominant Vauxhall Astra coupes. Unfortunately, the 406 coupe was at the end of its product lifecycle and was not competitive, despite some promise towards the end of the year, notably when Peugeot's Steve Soper led a race only to suffer engine failure in the last few laps. The 406 coupes were retired at the end of the following year and replaced with the Peugeot 307—again, uncompetitively in 2003. Alongside the BTC-C 406's; two works-supported 306 GTis were also raced in the BTC-P (Production) class by Simon Harrison and Roger Moen, with Harrison emerging class champion.


title: Peugeot

text: In the 1990s the company competed in endurance racing, including the World Sportscar Championship and the 24 Hours of Le Mans race with the 905. The sportscar team was established at Vélizy-Villacoublay, France. After early problems with reliability and aerodynamics, the 905 was successful in the World Sportscar Championship, winning eight of the 14 races across the 1991 and 1992 seasons and winning the team and driver titles in 1992. Peugeot also won the 24 Hours of Le Mans in and .


title: Peugeot

text: Peugeot returned to sportscar racing and Le Mans in 2007 with the diesel-powered Peugeot 908 HDi FAP. At the 2007 24 Hours of Le Mans, Stéphane Sarrazin secured pole position but the 908s proved unreliable and ceded victory to Audi. In , Sarrazin earned a pole position but Audi prevailed once again. For the 2009 24 Hours of Le Mans, the Peugeot 908 HDi FAPs finished first and second overall, led by drivers Marc Gené, David Brabham, and Alexander Wurz.


title: Peugeot

text: The company has also been involved in providing engines to Formula One teams, notably to McLaren in 1994, to Jordan for the 1995, 1996 and 1997 seasons, and to Prost for the 1998, 1999 and 2000 seasons. Despite a number of podium finishes with each of these three teams, the manufacturer did not score any victories, and their F1 interests were sold to Asiatech at the end of the 2000 season.


title: Peugeot

text: In April 2013, a 208 T16 was tested by Sébastien Loeb at Mont Ventoux. Loosely based on the shape and design of the production 208, the T16 is a lightweight vehicle that uses the rear wing from the Peugeot 908, and has a 3.2-litre, twin-turbo V6 engine, developing with the aim of competing at the Pikes Peak International Hill Climb. 30 June 2013 saw this car demolish the standing record on Pikes Peak by over a minute and a half, with an overall time of 8:13.878.


title: Peugeot

text: In the 2017 film "Blade Runner 2049", the main character's flying car (known in-universe as a "Spinner") was branded as a Peugeot as part of a proposed advertising campaign to re-enter the US market. The film's production company, Alcon Entertainment, later sued Peugeot in 2019 for failure to hold up their financial and advertising obligations.


title: Peugeot

text: Peugeot has flagship dealerships, named Peugeot Avenue, located on the Champs-Élysées in Paris, and in Berlin. The Berlin showroom is larger than the Paris one, but both feature regularly changing mini-exhibitions displaying production and concept cars. Both also feature a small Peugeot Boutique, and they are popular places for Peugeot fans to visit. Peugeot Avenue Berlin also features a café, called Café de France. The Peugeot Avenue at Berlin closed in 2009.


title: Peugeot

text: Peugeot Motocycles company remained a major producer of scooters, underbones, mopeds, and bicycles in Europe, as of 2018. Peugeot produced an electric motor scooter, the Peugeot Scoot'Elec, from 1996 to 2006, and was projected to re-enter the market in 2011 with the E-Vivacity.


title: Peugeot

text: Peugeot also produced bicycles starting in 1882 in Beaulieu, France (with ten Tour de France wins between 1903 and 1983), followed by motorcycles and cars in 1889. In the late 1980s Peugeot sold the North American rights to the Peugeot bicycle name to ProCycle, a Canadian company which also sold bicycles under the CCM and Velo Sport names. The European rights were briefly sold to Cycleurope S.A., returning to Peugeot in the 1990s. Today, the Peugeot bicycle brand name remains within the Cycleurope S.A. portfolio.


title: Peugeot

text: As of 2021, the separate Peugeot-family-owned firm Peugeot Saveurs, previously named PSP Peugeot, continues to make and market pepper grinders, salt grinders, corkscrews for wine bottles, cutlery, tableware, and other kitchen- and table-service equipment.


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is frequently imagined as a personified force. In some mythologies, a character known as the Grim Reaper (usually depicted as a berobed skeleton wielding a scythe) causes the victim's death by coming to collect that person's soul. Other beliefs hold that the Spectre of Death is only a psychopomp, serving to sever the last ties between the soul and the body, and to guide the deceased to the afterlife, without having any control over when or how the victim dies. Death is most often personified in male form, although in certain cultures Death is perceived as female (for instance, Marzanna in Slavic mythology, or Santa Muerte in Mexico).


title: Death (personification)

text: As is the case in many Romance languages (including French, Portuguese, Italian, and Romanian), the Spanish word for death, "muerte," is a feminine noun. As such, it is common in Spanish-speaking cultures to personify death as a female figure.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Aztec mythology, Mictecacihuatl is the "Queen of Mictlan" (the Aztec underworld), ruling over the afterlife with her husband Mictlantecuhtli. Other epithets for her include "Lady of the Dead," as her role includes keeping watch over the bones of the dead. Mictecacihuatl was represented with a fleshless body and with jaw agape to swallow the stars during the day. She presided over the ancient festivals of the dead, which evolved from Aztec traditions into the modern Day of the Dead after synthesis with Spanish cultural traditions.


title: Death (personification)

text: There was also the goddess of suicide, Ixtab. She was a minor goddess in the scale of Aztec mythology. She was also known as The Hangwoman as she came to help along those who had killed themselves.


title: Death (personification)

text: Our Lady of the Holy Death (Santa Muerte) is a female deity or folk saint of Mexican folk religion, whose popularity has been growing in Mexico and the United States in recent years. Since the pre-Columbian era, Mexican culture has maintained a certain reverence towards death, as seen in the widespread commemoration of the Day of the Dead. La Calavera Catrina, a character symbolizing death, is also an icon of the Mexican Day of the Dead.


title: Death (personification)

text: San La Muerte (Saint Death) is a skeletal folk saint venerated in Paraguay, northeast Argentina, and southern Brazil. As the result of internal migration in Argentina since the 1960s, the veneration of San La Muerte has been extended to Greater Buenos Aires and the national prison system as well. Saint Death is depicted as a male skeleton figure usually holding a scythe. Although the Catholic Church in Mexico has attacked the devotion of Saint Death as a tradition that mixes paganism with Christianity and is contrary to the Christian belief of Christ defeating death, many devotees consider the veneration of San La Muerte as being part of their Catholic faith. The rituals connected and powers ascribed to San La Muerte are very similar to those of Santa Muerte; the resemblance between their names, however, is coincidental.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Guatemala, San Pascualito is a skeletal folk saint venerated as "King of the Graveyard." He is depicted as a skeletal figure with a scythe, sometimes wearing a cape and crown. He is associated with death and the curing of diseases.


title: Death (personification)

text: In the Brazilian religion Umbanda, the orixá Omolu personifies sickness and death as well as healing. The image of the death is also associated with Exu, lord of the crossroads, who rules cemeteries and the hour of midnight.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Haitian Vodou, the Gede are a family of spirits that embody death and fertility. The most well-known of these spirits is Baron Samedi.


title: Death (personification)

text: Yama was introduced to Chinese mythology through Buddhism. In Chinese, he is known as King Yan ( ,  ,  "Yánwáng") or Yanluo ( ,  ,  "Yánluówáng"), ruling the ten gods of the underworld Diyu. He is normally depicted wearing a Chinese judge's cap and traditional Chinese robes and appears on most forms of hell money offered in ancestor worship. From China, Yama spread to Japan as the Great King Enma (, "Enma-Dai-Ō"), ruler of Jigoku (); Korea as the Great King Yeomra (), ruler of Jiok (); and Vietnam as ', ruler of ' or "".


title: Death (personification)

text: Separately, in Korean mythology, death's principal figure is the "Netherworld Emissary" Jeoseungsaja (, shortened to Saja (사자)). He is depicted as a stern and ruthless bureaucrat in Yeomna's service. A psychopomp, he escorts allgood or evilfrom the land of the living to the netherworld when the time comes. One of the representative names is Ganglim (강림), the Saja who guides the soul to the entrance of the underworld. According to legend, he always carries Jeokpaeji (적패지), the list with the names of the dead written on a red cloth. When he calls the name on Jeokpaeji three times, the soul leaves the body and follows him inevitably.


title: Death (personification)

text: The "Kojiki" relates that the Japanese goddess Izanami was burnt to death giving birth to the fire god Hinokagutsuchi. She then entered a realm of perpetual night called Yomi-no-Kuni. Her husband Izanagi pursued her there but discovered his wife was no longer as beautiful as before. After an argument, she promised she would take a thousand lives every day, becoming a goddess of death, as well as giving birth to the gods, Raijin and Fūjin, while dead. There are also death gods called shinigami (死神), which are closer to the Western tradition of the Grim Reaper; while common in modern Japanese arts and fiction, they were essentially absent in traditional mythology.


title: Death (personification)

text: The Sanskrit word for death is "mrityu" (cognate with Latin "mors" and Lithuanian "mirtis"), which is often personified in Dharmic religions.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Hindu scriptures, the lord of death is called King Yama (, "Yama Rājā"). He is also known as the King of Karmic Justice ("Dharmaraja") as one's karma at death was considered to lead to a just rebirth. Yama rides a black buffalo and carries a rope lasso to lead the soul back to his home, called Naraka, pathalloka, or Yamaloka. There are many forms of reapers, although some say there is only one who disguises himself as a small child. His agents, the Yamadutas, carry souls back to Yamalok. There, all the accounts of a person's good and bad deeds are stored and maintained by Chitragupta. The balance of these deeds allows Yama to decide where the soul should reside in its next life, following the theory of reincarnation. Yama is also mentioned in the Mahabharata as a great philosopher and devotee of the Supreme Brahman.


title: Death (personification)

text: The canaan of the 12th- and 13th-century BC Levant personified death as the god Mot ( "Death"). He was considered a son of the king of the gods, El. His contest with the storm god Baʿal forms part of the myth cycle from the Ugaritic texts. The Phoenicians also worshipped death under the name Mot and a version of Mot later became Maweth, the devil or angel of death in Judaism.


title: Death (personification)

text: Latvians named Death Veļu māte, but for Lithuanians it was Giltinė, deriving from the word "gelti" ("to sting"). Giltinė was viewed as an old, ugly woman with a long blue nose and a deadly poisonous tongue. The legend tells that Giltinė was young, pretty, and communicative until she was trapped in a coffin for seven years. Her sister was the goddess of life and destiny, Laima, symbolizing the relationship between beginning and end.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Breton folklore, a spectral figure called the Ankou ("or Angau" in Welsh) portends death. Usually, the Ankou is the spirit of the last person that died within the community and appears as a tall, haggard figure with a wide hat and long white hair or a skeleton with a revolving head. The Ankou drives a deathly wagon or cart with a creaking axle. The cart or wagon is piled high with corpses and a stop at a cabin means instant death for those inside.


title: Death (personification)

text: Irish mythology features a similar creature known as a dullahan, whose head would be tucked under his or her arm (dullahans were not one, but an entire species). The head was said to have large eyes and a smile that could reach the head's ears. The dullahan would ride a black horse or a carriage pulled by black horses, and stop at the house of someone about to die, and call their name, and immediately the person would die. The dullahan did not like being watched, and it was believed that if a dullahan knew someone was watching them, they would lash that person's eyes with their whip, which was made from a spine; or they would toss a basin of blood on the person, which was a sign that the person was next to die.


title: Death (personification)

text: Gaelic lore also involves a female spirit known as Banshee (Modern Irish Gaelic: "bean sí" pron. banshee, literally "fairy woman"), who heralds the death of a person by shrieking or keening. The banshee is often described as wearing red or green, usually with long, disheveled hair. She can appear in a variety of forms, typically that of an ugly, frightful hag, but in some stories she chooses to appear young and beautiful. Some tales recount that the creature was actually a ghost, often of a specific murdered woman or a mother who died in childbirth. When several banshees appeared at once, it was said to indicate the death of someone great or holy. In Ireland and parts of Scotland, a traditional part of mourning is the keening woman (bean chaointe), who wails a lament – in Irish: Caoineadh, caoin meaning "to weep, to wail."


title: Death (personification)

text: In Scottish folklore there was a belief that a black, dark green or white dog known as a Cù Sìth took dying souls to the afterlife. Comparable figures exist in Irish and Welsh stories.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Welsh Folklore, Gwyn ap Nudd is the escort of the grave, the personification of Death and Winter who leads the Wild Hunt to collect wayward souls and escort them to the Otherworld, sometimes it is Maleagant, Arawn or Afallach in a similar position.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Ancient Greek religion and Greek mythology, Death (Thanatos) is one of the twin sons of Nyx (night). Like her, he is seldom portrayed directly. He sometimes appears in art as a winged and bearded man, and occasionally as a winged and beardless youth. When he appears together with his twin brother, Hypnos, the god of sleep, Thanatos generally represents a gentle death. Thanatos, led by Hermes "psychopompos", takes the shade of the deceased to the near shore of the river Styx, whence the ferryman Charon, on payment of a small fee, conveys the shade to Hades, the realm of the dead. Homer's "Iliad" 16.681, and the Euphronios Krater's depiction of the same episode, have Apollo instruct the removal of the heroic, semi-divine Sarpedon's body from the battlefield by Hypnos and Thanatos, and conveyed thence to his homeland for proper funeral rites. Among the other children of Nyx are Thanatos' sisters, the Keres, blood-drinking, vengeant spirits of violent or untimely death, portrayed as fanged and taloned, with bloody garments.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Scandinavia, Norse mythology personified death in the shape of Hel, the goddess of death and ruler over the realm of the same name, where she received a portion of the dead. In the times of the Black Plague, Death would often be depicted as an old woman known by the name of Pesta, meaning "plague hag," wearing a black hood. She would go into a town carrying either a rake or a broom. If she brought the rake, some people would survive the plague; if she brought the broom, however, everyone would die.


title: Death (personification)

text: Scandinavians later adopted the Grim Reaper with a scythe and black robe. Today, Ingmar Bergman's 1957 film "The Seventh Seal" features one of the world's most famous representations of this personification of Death.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Poland, Death – "Śmierć" or "kostuch" – has an appearance similar to the Grim Reaper, although its robe was traditionally white instead of black. Because the word "śmierć" is feminine in gender, death is frequently portrayed as a skeletal old woman, as depicted in 15th-century dialogue ""Rozmowa Mistrza Polikarpa ze Śmiercią"" (Latin: ""Dialogus inter Mortem et Magistrum Polikarpum"").


title: Death (personification)

text: In Serbia and other South Slavic countries, the Grim Reaper is well known as "Smrt" ("Death") or "Kosač" ("Billhook"). Slavic people found this very similar to the Devil and other dark powers. One popular saying about death is: "Smrt ne bira ni vreme, ni mesto, ni godinu" ("Death does not choose a time, place or year" – which means death is destiny.)


title: Death (personification)

text: Morana is a Slavic goddess of winter time, death and rebirth. A figurine of the same name is traditionally created at the end of winter/beginning of spring and symbolically taken away from villages to be set in fire and/or thwown into a river, that takes her away from the world of the living.


title: Death (personification)

text: In the Czech Republic, the medieval Prague Astronomical Clock carries a depiction of Death striking the hour. A version first appeared in 1490.


title: Death (personification)

text: In the Netherlands, and to a lesser extent in Belgium, the personification of Death is known as "Magere Hein" ("Meager Hein") or Pietje de Dood ("Peter the Death"). Historically, he was sometimes simply referred to as "Hein" or variations thereof such as "Heintje", "Heintjeman" and "Oom Hendrik" ("Uncle Hendrik"). Related archaic terms are "Beenderman" ("Bone-man"), "Scherminkel" (very meager person, "skeleton") and "Maaijeman" ("mow-man", a reference to his scythe).


title: Death (personification)

text: The concept of "Magere Hein" predates Christianity, but was Christianized and likely gained its modern name and features (scythe, skeleton, black robe etc.) during the Middle Ages. The designation "Meager" comes from its portrayal as a skeleton, which was largely influenced by the Christian "Dance of Death" (Dutch: "dodendans") theme that was prominent in Europe during the late Middle Ages. "Hein" was a Middle Dutch name originating as a short form of "Heinric" (see Henry (given name)). Its use was possibly related to the comparable German concept of "Freund Hein." Notably, many of the names given to Death can also refer to the Devil; it is likely that fear of death led to Hein's character being merged with that of Satan.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Belgium, this personification of Death is now commonly called "Pietje de Dood" "Little Pete, the Death." Like the other Dutch names, it can also refer to the Devil.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Western Europe, Death has commonly been personified as an animated skeleton since the Middle Ages. This character, which is often depicted wielding a scythe, is said to collect the souls of the dying or recently dead. In English and German culture, Death is typically portrayed as male, but in French, Spanish, and Italian culture, it is not uncommon for Death to be female.


title: Death (personification)

text: In England, the personified "Death" featured in medieval morality plays, later regularly appearing in traditional folk songs. The following is a verse of "Death and the Lady" (Roud 1031) as sung by Henry Burstow in the nineteenth century:In the late 1800s, the character of Death became known as the Grim Reaper in English literature. The earliest appearance of the name "Grim Reaper" in English is in the 1847 book "The Circle of Human Life":


title: Death (personification)

text: The "Angel of the Lord" smites 185,000 men in the Assyrian camp (II Kings 19:35). When the Angel of Death passes through to smite the Egyptian first-born, God prevents "the destroyer" ("shâchath") from entering houses with blood on the lintel and side posts (Exodus 12:23). The "destroying angel" ("mal'ak ha-mashḥit") rages among the people in Jerusalem (II Sam. 24:16). In I Chronicles 21:15 the "angel of the Lord" is seen by King David standing "between the earth and the heaven, having a drawn sword in his hand stretched out over Jerusalem." The biblical Book of Job (33:22) uses the general term "destroyers" ("memitim"), which tradition has identified with "destroying angels" ("mal'ake Khabbalah"), and Prov. 16:14 uses the term the "angels of death" ("mal'ake ha-mavet"). The angel Azra'il is sometimes referred as the Angel of Death as well.


title: Death (personification)

text: Jewish tradition also refers to Death as the Angel of Dark and Light, a name which stems from Talmudic lore. There is also a reference to "Abaddon" (The Destroyer), an angel who is known as the "Angel of the Abyss". In Talmudic lore, he is characterized as archangel Michael.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Hebrew scriptures, Death (""Maweth"/"Mavet(h)"") is sometimes personified as a devil or angel of death (e.g., ; ). In both the Book of Hosea and the Book of Jeremiah, Maweth/Mot is mentioned as a deity to whom Yahweh can turn over Judah as punishment for worshiping other gods. The memitim are a type of angel from biblical lore associated with the mediation over the lives of the dying. The name is derived from the Hebrew word "mĕmītǐm" (מְמִיתִים – "executioners", "slayers", "destroyers") and refers to angels that brought about the destruction of those whom the guardian angels no longer protected. While there may be some debate among religious scholars regarding the exact nature of the memitim, it is generally accepted that, as described in the Book of Job 33:22, they are killers of some sort.


title: Death (personification)

text: According to the Midrash, the Angel of Death was created by God on the first day. His dwelling is in heaven, whence he reaches earth in eight flights, whereas Pestilence reaches it in one. He has twelve wings. "Over all people have I surrendered thee the power," said God to the Angel of Death, "only not over this one [i.e. Moses] which has received freedom from death through the Law." It is said of the Angel of Death that he is full of eyes. In the hour of death, he stands at the head of the departing one with a drawn sword, to which clings a drop of gall. As soon as the dying man sees Death, he is seized with a convulsion and opens his mouth, whereupon Death throws the drop into it. This drop causes his death; he turns putrid, and his face becomes yellow. The expression "the taste of death" originated in the idea that death was caused by a drop of gall.


title: Death (personification)

text: The soul escapes through the mouth, or, as is stated in another place, through the throat; therefore, the Angel of Death stands at the head of the patient (Adolf Jellinek, l.c. ii. 94, Midr. Teh. to Ps. xi.). When the soul forsakes the body, its voice goes from one end of the world to the other, but is not heard (Gen. R. vi. 7; Ex. R. v. 9; Pirḳe R. El. xxxiv.). The drawn sword of the Angel of Death, mentioned by the Chronicler (I. Chron. 21:15; comp. Job 15:22; Enoch 62:11), indicates that the Angel of Death was figured as a warrior who kills off the children of men. "Man, on the day of his death, falls down before the Angel of Death like a beast before the slaughterer" (Grünhut, "Liḳḳuṭim", v. 102a). R. Samuel's father (c. 200) said: "The Angel of Death said to me, 'Only for the sake of the honor of mankind do I not tear off their necks as is done to slaughtered beasts'" ('Ab. Zarah 20b). In later representations, the knife sometimes replaces the sword, and reference is also made to the cord of the Angel of Death, which indicates death by throttling. Moses says to God: "I fear the cord of the Angel of Death" (Grünhut, l.c. v. 103a et seq.). Of the four Jewish methods of execution, three are named in connection with the Angel of Death: Burning (by pouring hot lead down the victim's throat), slaughtering (by beheading), and throttling. The Angel of Death administers the particular punishment that God has ordained for the commission of sin.


title: Death (personification)

text: A peculiar mantle ("idra" – according to Levy, "Neuhebr. Wörterb." i. 32, a sword) belongs to the equipment of the Angel of Death (Eccl. R. iv. 7). The Angel of Death takes on the particular form which will best serve his purpose; e.g., he appears to a scholar in the form of a beggar imploring pity (the beggar should receive Tzedakah)(M. Ḳ. 28a). "When pestilence rages in the town, walk not in the middle of the street, because the Angel of Death [i.e., pestilence] strides there; if peace reigns in the town, walk not on the edges of the road. When pestilence rages in the town, go not alone to the synagogue, because there the Angel of Death stores his tools. If the dogs howl, the Angel of Death has entered the city; if they make sport, the prophet Elijah has come" (B. Ḳ. 60b). The "destroyer" ("saṭan ha-mashḥit") in the daily prayer is the Angel of Death (Ber. 16b). Midr. Ma'ase Torah (compare Jellinek, "B. H." ii. 98) says: "There are six Angels of Death: Gabriel over kings; Ḳapẓiel over youths; Mashbir over animals; Mashḥit over children; Af and Ḥemah over man and beast."


title: Death (personification)

text: Samael is considered in Talmudic texts to be a member of the heavenly host with often grim and destructive duties. One of Samael's greatest roles in Jewish lore is that of the main angel of death and the head of "satans".


title: Death (personification)

text: Talmud teachers of the 4th century associate quite familiarly with him. When he appeared to one on the street, the teacher reproached him with rushing upon him as upon a beast, whereupon the angel called upon him at his house. To another, he granted a respite of thirty days, that he might put his knowledge in order before entering the next world. To a third, he had no access, because he could not interrupt the study of the Talmud. To a fourth, he showed a rod of fire, whereby he is recognized as the Angel of Death (M. K. 28a). He often entered the house of Bibi and conversed with him (Ḥag. 4b). Often, he resorts to strategy in order to interrupt and seize his victim (B. M. 86a; Mak. 10a).


title: Death (personification)

text: The death of Joshua ben Levi in particular is surrounded with a web of fable. When the time came for him to die and the Angel of Death appeared to him, he demanded to be shown his place in paradise. When the angel had consented to this, he demanded the angel's knife, that the angel might not frighten him by the way. This request also was granted him, and Joshua sprang with the knife over the wall of paradise; the angel, who is not allowed to enter paradise, caught hold of the end of his garment. Joshua swore that he would not come out, and God declared that he should not leave paradise unless he had ever absolved himself of an oath; he had never absolved himself of an oath so he was allowed to remain. The Angel of Death then demanded back his knife, but Joshua refused. At this point, a heavenly voice ("bat ḳol") rang out: "Give him back the knife, because the children of men have need of it will bring death." Hesitant, Joshua Ben Levi gives back the knife in exchange for the Angel of Death's name. To never forget the name, he carved Troke into his arm, the Angel of Death's chosen name. When the knife was returned to the Angel, Joshua's carving of the name faded, and he forgot.


title: Death (personification)

text: The Rabbis found the Angel of Death mentioned in Psalm 89:48, where the Targum translates: "There is no man who lives and, seeing the Angel of Death, can deliver his soul from his hand." Eccl. 8:4 is thus explained in Midrash Rabbah to the passage: "One may not escape the Angel of Death, nor say to him, 'Wait until I put my affairs in order,' or 'There is my son, my slave: take him in my stead.'" Where the Angel of Death appears, there is no remedy, but his name (Talmud, Ned. 49a; Hul. 7b). If one who has sinned has confessed his fault, the Angel of Death may not touch him (Midrash Tanhuma, ed. Buber, 139). God protects from the Angel of Death (Midrash Genesis Rabbah lxviii.).


title: Death (personification)

text: By acts of benevolence, the anger of the Angel of Death is overcome; when one fails to perform such acts the Angel of Death will make his appearance (Derek Ereẓ Zuṭa, viii.). The Angel of Death receives his orders from God (Ber. 62b). As soon as he has received permission to destroy, however, he makes no distinction between good and bad (B. Ḳ. 60a). In the city of Luz, the Angel of Death has no power, and, when the aged inhabitants are ready to die, they go outside the city (Soṭah 46b; compare Sanh. 97a). A legend to the same effect existed in Ireland in the Middle Ages ("Jew. Quart. Rev." vi. 336).


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is one of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse portrayed in the Book of Revelation, in Revelation 6:7–8.


title: Death (personification)

text: He is also known as the Pale Horseman whose name is Thanatos, the same as that of the ancient Greek personification of death, and the only one of the horsemen to be named.


title: Death (personification)

text: The Christian scriptures contain the first known depiction of Abaddon as an individual entity instead of a place.


title: Death (personification)

text: Although many of Samael's functions resemble the Christian notion of Satan, to the point of being sometimes identified as a fallen angel, in others he is not necessarily evil, since his functions are also regarded as resulting in good, such as destroying sinners.


title: Death (personification)

text: Conversely, the early Christian writer Origen believed the destroying angel of to be Satan. The Grim Reaper, is stated to be destroyed by the Lake of Fire that burns with sulfur.


title: Death (personification)

text: In Islam, Archangel Azrael is the "Malak al-Maut" (angel of death). He and his many subordinates pull the souls out of the bodies, and guide them through the journey of the afterlife. Their appearance depends on the person's deed and actions, with those that did good seeing a beautiful being, and those that did wrong seeing a horrific monster.


title: Death (personification)

text: Islamic tradition discusses elaborately as to what exactly happens before, during, and after the death. The angel of death appears to the dying to take out their souls. The sinners' souls are extracted in a most painful way while the righteous are treated easily. After the burial, two angels – Munkar and Nakir – come to question the dead in order to test their faith. The righteous believers answer correctly and live in peace and comfort while the sinners and disbelievers fail and punishments ensue. The time period or stage between death and resurrection is called "barzakh" (the interregnum).


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is a significant event in Islamic life and theology. It is seen not as the termination of life, rather the continuation of life in another form. In Islamic belief, God has made this worldly life as a test and a preparation ground for the afterlife; and with death, this worldly life comes to an end. Thus, every person has only one chance to prepare themselves for the life to come where God will resurrect and judge every individual and will entitle them to rewards or punishment, based on their good or bad deeds. And death is seen as the gateway to and beginning of the afterlife. In Islamic belief, death is predetermined by God, and the exact time of a person's death is known only to God.


title: Death (personification)

text: The 1960 gospel blues song "Death Don't Have No Mercy", composed and first recorded by Blind Gary Davis, portrays death as an inevitable and periodic visitor. According to the musicologist David Malvinni, it "presents a terrifying personification of the instant, sudden possibility [of] death at any moment that could have come from the medieval era's confrontation with the plague".


title: Death (personification)

text: The 1976 Blue Öyster Cult song "(Don't Fear) The Reaper", recorded for their album "Agents of Fortune", alludes to the Grim Reaper in the title and lyrics. The song encourages the audience not to fear death, but rather to think of it as something that immortalizes love.


title: Death (personification)

text: The 1984 thrash metal song "Creeping Death", recorded by Metallica, references the angel of death, among other religious symbols. It is described by the writer Tom King as "a tale of righteous Biblical rage and devastation straight out of the Book of Revelations".


title: Death (personification)

text: Nobel laureate José Saramago's novel features an anthropomorphised death as its main character, who insists that her name be written lowercase. She is depicted as a skeleton who can shapeshift and be omnipresent and has a scythe, though she doesn't always carry it. Her jurisdiction is limited to the imaginary country where the story happens and to the human species. It is implied that other deaths with jurisdiction over different life forms and territories exist, as well as an overarching death and/or god. The book deals with how society relates to death, both as a phenomenon and a character, and likewise how death relates to the people she is meant to kill and with loneliness and love.


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is a fictional character in Terry Pratchett's "Discworld" series, and depicted as one of many Deaths. His jurisdiction is specifically the Discworld itself; he is only a part, or minion, of Azrael, the universal Death. Death has appeared in every Discworld novel, with the exception of "The Wee Free Men" and "Snuff". "Mort", published in 1987, is the first time Death appears as a leading character.


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is the narrator of Markus Zusak's 2005 novel "The Book Thief." He is a collector of deceased souls in the story. He tells the coming of age story about a girl he witnessed living in Nazi Germany and surviving World War II.


title: Death (personification)

text: Death appears in "The Tale of Three Brothers" in J.K. Rowling's "The Tales of Beedle the Bard," a collection of fairytales featured in her "Harry Potter" series. Three brothers avoid Death and Death, furious at being avoided, offers the brothers gifts. Two of these gifts, the Elder Wand and the Resurrection Stone lead to the first two brothers' deaths. The third brother, gifted with the Invisibility Cloak avoids Death until old age, where he then goes with Death like an old friend. These gifts became the Deathly Hallows.


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is a held office in Piers Anthony's 1983 novel "On a Pale Horse". The character Zane becomes Death after a suicide attempt that ends up killing the previous Death. He is taught by his fellow Incarnations Time and Fate and must defeat the Incarnation of Evil, Satan. He is given several items to aid him on his job, including a watch to stop local time, jewels to measure how much good and evil is in a person for judgment, and his pale horse Mortis, who often takes the form of a pale car. Zane as Death appears in Anthony's following novels, notably "Bearing an Hourglass."


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is a career in Christopher Moore's "A Dirty Job". Charlie Asher is chosen to be a "Death Merchant" for retrieving souls and protect them from dark forces while managing his story and raising his newborn daughter.


title: Death (personification)

text: Death first appeared in "The Sandman" vol. 2, #8 (August 1989), and was created by Neil Gaiman and Mike Dringenberg. She is both an embodiment of death and a psychopomp in The Sandman Universe, and depicted as a down to earth, perky, and nurturing figure. Death is the second born of The Endless and she states "When the last living thing dies, my job will be finished. I'll put the chairs on the tables, turn out the lights and lock the universe behind me when I leave."


title: Death (personification)

text: Death also appears briefly in "Fables" #11 (May 2003) titled "Bag O' Bones", where Jack Horner traps Death in a magical bag that never gets full. There has been no indication as to whether Fables has any connection to the Sandman universe.


title: Death (personification)

text: The character first appeared in "Captain Marvel" #26 (Jun. 1973) and was created by Mike Friedrich and Jim Starlin. Death is an abstract entity, the embodiment of the end of life in the Marvel Universe, and resides inside a pocket dimension known as the Realm of Death. The character can change appearance at will shown in a storyline of "Captain Marvel" where Thanos' scheme to conquer the universe, as the character becomes determined to prove his love for Death by destroying all life.


title: Death (personification)

text: Lady MacDeath is a Grim Reaper, the personification of Death who is responsible of going after all people whose time to die has come, although unlike a typical Grim Reaper, her body is not pictured as made of bones. She uses her sickle to kill people, by hitting them in the head, and then she takes their souls to the purgatory, for them to be judged and sent whether to hell or heaven (sometimes after much bureaucracy). She always carries a list with the name of the people she must kill on the day. Most of her stories feature a pursuit, sometimes punctuated with struggles faced every day by normal people. Maurício de Souza says that the purpose of creating her is "taking death less seriously, while it doesn't come to us".


title: Death (personification)

text: After years of questioning why people fear him, Death takes on human form for three days so that he can mingle among mortals and find an answer. He finds a host in Duke Lambert after revealing himself and his intentions to the Duke, and takes up temporary residence in the Duke's villa. However, events soon spiral out of control as Death falls in love with the beautiful young Grazia. As he does so, Duke Lambert, the father of Grazia's mortal lover Corrado, begs him to give Grazia up and leave her among the living. Death must decide whether to seek his own happiness, or sacrifice it so that Grazia may live.


title: Death (personification)

text: The 1998 American film "Meet Joe Black" is loosely based on the 1934 film. While on Earth, Death, living under the name Joe Black, enlists the wealthy Bill Parrish to be his guide to mortal life, and in exchange guarantees that Bill will not die as long as he serves as "Joe's" guide. Joe falls in love with Bill's youngest daughter, Susan, a resident in internal medicine, and learns the meaning of both friendship and love.


title: Death (personification)

text: Death is one of the main characters in 1957 Swedish historical fantasy film "The Seventh Seal". The film tells the story of a knight encountering Death, whom he challenges to a chess match, believing he can survive as long as the game continues.


title: Death (personification)

text: These scenes are parodied in the 1991 comedy film "Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey", in which the title characters repeatedly beat Death playing a variety of family board games such as Battleship and Twister. Death goes on to accompany Bill and Ted for the remainder of the film as a major supporting character. The scene from "The Seventh Seal" is also parodied in a one-act play by Woody Allen called "Death," in which the personification of death agrees to play gin rummy and loses badly, altering his plans to "take" his opponent.


title: Death (personification)

text: Throughout the film, Munchausen is pursued by Death, a skeletal angel with raven's wings, carrying a scythe in one hand and an hourglass in the other. At the end, Death, in the form of a grim physician, extracts Munchausen's glowing life force, and Munchausen is given a lavish funeral before boldly claiming it was "one of the many times I faced Death."


title: Death (personification)

text: In each of the "Final Destination" films, one of the protagonists experiences a premonition of an impending disaster. When these visions come true, the protagonists manage to avoid harm, though many innocent people are killed. Their escapes alter the design intended by Death, which – while never portrayed as a physical entity – is described as an omniscient supernatural force. In each film, the characters learn that they can never truly escape from death, and that they are each doomed to be killed one by one.


title: Death (personification)

text: In 1987 the Australian government produced a controversial commercial featuring the Grim Reaper in order to raise public awareness about the danger of HIV/AIDS.


title: Death (personification)

text: The Grim Reaper is one of the main characters of the 2000s Cartoon Network series "The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy". The Grim Reaper ("Death") appears in some early episodes of "Family Guy" as a character.


title: Death (personification)

text: The Showtime television series "Dead Like Me" features a small team of characters taking the role of the "grim reaper", removing the souls of people just prior to their imminent death. Unlike most depictions of Death, the show depicted "grim reaper" as a job title, held by multiple people at once.


title: Death (personification)

text: In the British children's sketch television show "Horrible Histories", Death (portaryed by Simon Farnaby) is a reoccurring character who appears the segment, "Stupid Deaths" and later in its sixth series, "Chatty Deaths".


title: Death (personification)

text: The personification of Death or the Grim Reaper is the leading male role in the 1992 Viennese musical, depicting the titular Empress of Austria-Hungary's fictionalised life and her entanglements and obsession with Death. Portrayals of Death varies between productions from androgynous to masculine, dressed at various times in all black or all white.


title: Death (personification)

text: The personification of Death appears many times in many different games, especially "Castlevania" and "The Sims". Nearly all iterations of a "Death" or "Grim Reaper" character feature most of the same characteristics seen in other media and pop culture: a skeleton wearing a cloak and wielding a scythe. Darksiders II has Death as the player character.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Late Bronze Age collapse was a time of widespread societal collapse during the 12th century BC, between c. 1200 and 1150. The collapse affected a large area of the Eastern Mediterranean (North Africa and Southeast Europe) and the Near East, in particular Egypt, eastern Libya, the Balkans, the Aegean, Anatolia, and the Caucasus. It was sudden, violent, and culturally disruptive for many Bronze Age civilizations, and it brought a sharp economic decline to regional powers, notably ushering in the Greek Dark Ages.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The palace economy of Mycenaean Greece, the Aegean region, and Anatolia that characterized the Late Bronze Age disintegrated, transforming into the small isolated village cultures of the Greek Dark Ages, which lasted from around 1100 to the beginning of the better-known Archaic age around 750 BC. The Hittite Empire of Anatolia and the Levant collapsed, while states such as the Middle Assyrian Empire in Mesopotamia and the New Kingdom of Egypt survived but were weakened. Conversely, some peoples such as the Phoenicians enjoyed increased autonomy and power with the waning military presence of Egypt and Assyria in the Eastern Mediterranean and Mesopotamia.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The reason why the arbitrary date 1200 BC acts as the beginning of the end of the Late Bronze Age goes back to one German historian, Arnold Hermann Ludwig Heeren. In one of his histories on ancient Greece from 1817, Heeren stated that the first period of Greek prehistory ended around 1200 BC, basing this date on the fall of Troy at 1190 after ten years of war. He then went on in 1826 to date the end of the Egyptian 19th Dynasty as well to around 1200 BC. Throughout the remainder of the 19th century A.D. other events were then subsumed into the year 1200 BC including the invasion of the Sea Peoples, the Dorian invasion, the fall of Mycenaean Greece, and eventually in 1896 the first mention of Palestine in the southern Levant recorded on the Merneptah Stele.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Competing theories of the cause of the Late Bronze Age collapse have been proposed since the 19th century. These include volcanic eruptions, droughts, disease, invasions by the Sea Peoples or migrations of the Dorians, economic disruptions due to increased ironworking, and changes in military technology and methods that brought the decline of chariot warfare. Following the collapse, gradual changes in metallurgic technology led to the subsequent Iron Age across Eurasia and Africa during the 1st millennium BC.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The half century between and 1150 BCE saw the cultural collapse of the Mycenaean kingdoms, the Kassites in Babylonia, the Hittite Empire in Anatolia and the Levant, and the New Kingdom of Egypt, as well as the destruction of Ugarit and the Amorite states in the Levant, the fragmentation of the Luwian states of western Anatolia, and a period of chaos in Canaan. The deterioration of these governments interrupted trade routes and led to severely reduced literacy in much of this area.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: In the first phase of this period, almost every city between Pylos and Gaza was violently destroyed, and many were abandoned, including Hattusa, Mycenae, and Ugarit. According to Robert Drews, "Within a period of forty to fifty years at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the twelfth century, almost every significant city in the eastern Mediterranean world was destroyed, many of them never to be occupied again."


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Only a few powerful states survived the Bronze Age collapse, particularly Assyria (albeit temporarily weakened), the New Kingdom of Egypt (also weakened), the Phoenician city-states and Elam. Even among these comparative survivors, success was mixed. By the end of the 12th century, Elam waned after its defeat by Nebuchadnezzar I, who briefly revived Babylonian fortunes before suffering a series of defeats by the Assyrians. After the death of Ashur-bel-kala in 1056, Assyria declined for a century. Its empire shrank significantly by 1020 BCE, apparently leaving it in control only of the areas in its immediate vicinity, although its heartland remained well-defended. By the time of Wenamun, Phoenicia had regained independence from Egypt.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Robert Drews describes the collapse as "arguably the worst disaster in ancient history, even more calamitous than the collapse of the Western Roman Empire". Cultural memories of the disaster told of a "lost golden age". For example, Hesiod spoke of Ages of Gold, Silver, and Bronze, separated from the cruel modern Age of Iron by the Age of Heroes. Rodney Castleden suggests that memories of the Bronze Age collapse influenced Plato's story of Atlantis in "Timaeus" and the "Critias".


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Various explanations for the collapse have been proposed, including climatic changes (such as drought or effects of volcanic eruptions), invasions by groups such as the Sea Peoples, effects of the spread of iron metallurgy, developments in military weapons and tactics, and a variety of failures of political, social and economic systems, but none has achieved consensus. More than one of these factors probably played a part.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Gradually, by the end of the ensuing Dark Age, remnants of the Hittites coalesced into small Syro-Hittite states in Cilicia and in the Levant, where the new states were composed of mixed Hittite and Aramean polities. Beginning in the mid-10th century BC, a series of small Aramean kingdoms formed in the Levant, and the Philistines settled in southern Canaan, where Canaanite speakers had coalesced into a number of polities such as Israel, Moab, Edom and Ammon.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Before the Bronze Age collapse, Anatolia (Asia Minor) was dominated by a number of peoples of varying ethno-linguistic origins, including: Semitic-speaking Assyrians and Amorites, Hurro-Urartian-speaking Hurrians, Kaskians and Hattians, and later-arriving Indo-European peoples such as the Luwians, Hittites, Mitanni, and Mycenaeans.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: From the 16th century BC, the Mitanni, a migratory minority speaking an Indo-Aryan language, formed a ruling class over the Hurrians. Similarly, the Indo-European-speaking Hittites absorbed the Hattians, a people speaking a language that may have been of the non-Indo-European North Caucasian languages or a language isolate.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Every Anatolian site, apart from integral Assyrian regions in the southeast and regions in eastern, central and southern Anatolia under the control of the powerful Middle Assyrian Empire (1392–1050) that was important during the preceding Late Bronze Age, shows a destruction layer and it appears that in these regions civilization did not recover to the level of the Assyrians and Hittites for another thousand years or so. The Hittites, already weakened by a series of military defeats and annexations of their territory by the Middle Assyrian Empire, which had already destroyed the Hurrian-Mitanni Empire, it was initially assumed that they then suffered a coup de grâce when Hattusa, the Hittite capital, was burned, probably by the Kaskians, long indigenous to the southern shores of the Black Sea, possibly aided by the incoming Indo-European-speaking Phrygians. However, Jürgen Seeher, the former lead excavator at Hattusa, has demonstrated that the city was not completely destroyed in a catastrophic assault. He states that:1) There is no burnt 'horizon', only a certain number of burnt ruins the date of whose destruction is not established; 2) for the most part these burnt ruins contained no finds, which suggests that they burnt down only after they had lost their function and had been emptied of artefacts; 3) the emptying was presumably carried out by inhabitants of the city – after all, an enemy that is attacking a city does not go to the trouble of emptying buildings virtually down to the last pot before torching them; 4) the only buildings to have burnt are official ones – temples, palace buildings – while the residential districts remained unscathed; this too argues against an assault from outside.Karaoğlan, near present-day Ankara, was burned and the corpses left unburied. Many other sites that were not destroyed were abandoned. The Luwian city of Troy, famed site of the Trojan War, was destroyed at least twice in this period, before being abandoned until Roman times.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Phrygians had arrived, probably through the Bosporus or over the Caucasus Mountains, in the 13th century, before being first stopped by the Assyrians and then conquered by them in the Early Iron Age of the 12th century. Other groups of Indo-European peoples followed the Phrygians into the region, most prominently the Dorians and Lydians, and in the centuries after the period of Bronze Age Collapse, Cimmerians and the Iranian-speaking Scythians also appeared. Semitic-speaking Arameans and Kartvelian-speaking Colchians, and revived Hurrian polities, particularly Urartu, Nairi and Shupria, also emerged in parts of the region and Transcaucasia. The Assyrians continued their extant policies, conquering the new peoples and polities they came into contact with, as they had with the preceding polities of the region. However, Assyria gradually withdrew from much of the region for a time in the second half of the 11th century, although they continued to campaign militarily at times, in order to protect their borders and keep trade routes open, until a renewed vigorous period of expansion in the late 10th century.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: During the reign of the Hittite king Tudḫaliya IV (reigned c. 1237–1209), the island was briefly invaded by the Hittites, either to secure the copper resource or as a way of preventing piracy. Shortly afterwards, the island was reconquered by his son Suppiluliuma II around 1200.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: There is little evidence of destruction on the island of Cyprus in the years surrounding 1200 which marks the separation between the Late Cypriot II (LCII) from the LCIII period. The city of Kition is commonly cited as destroyed at the end of the LC IIC, but the excavator, Vassos Karageorghis, made it expressly clear that it was not destroyed stating, "At Kition, major rebuilding was carried out in both excavated Areas I and II, but there is no evidence of violent destruction; on the contrary, we observe a cultural continuity." Jesse Millek has demonstrated that while it is possible that the city of Enkomi was destroyed, the archaeological evidence is not clear. Of the two buildings dating to the end of the LC IIC excavated at Enkomi, both had limited evidence of burning and most rooms were without any kind of damage. The same can be said for the site of Sinda as it is not clear if it was destroyed since only some ash was found but no other evidence that the city was destroyed like fallen walls or burnt rubble. The only settlement on Cyprus that has clear evidence it was destroyed around 1200 was Maa Palaeokastro which was likely destroyed by some sort of attack though the excavators were not sure who attacked it saying, "We might suggest that [the attackers] were ‘pirates’, ‘adventurers’ or remnants of the ‘Sea Peoples’, but this is simply another way of saying that we do not know."


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Several settlements on Cyprus were abandoned at the end of the LC IIC or during the first half of the 12th century without destruction such as Pyla Kokkinokremmos, Toumba tou Skourou, Alassa, and Maroni-Vournes. In a trend which appears to go against much of the Eastern Mediterranean at this time, several areas of Cyprus, Kition and Paphos, appear to have flourished after 1200 during the LC IIIA rather than experiencing any sort of downturn.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Ancient Syria had been initially dominated by a number of indigenous Semitic-speaking peoples. The East Semitic-speaking polities of Ebla and the Akkadian Empire and the Northwest Semitic-speaking Amorites ("Amurru") and the people of Ugarit were prominent among them. Syria during this time was known as "The land of the Amurru".


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Before and during the Bronze Age Collapse, Syria became a battleground between the Hittites, the Middle Assyrian Empire, the Mitanni and the New Kingdom of Egypt between the 15th and late 13th centuries BC, with the Assyrians destroying the Hurri-Mitanni empire and annexing much of the Hittite empire. The Egyptian empire had withdrawn from the region after failing to overcome the Hittites and being fearful of the ever-growing Assyrian might, leaving much of the region under Assyrian control until the late 11th century. Later the coastal regions came under attack from the Sea Peoples. During this period, from the 12th century, the incoming Northwest Semitic-speaking Arameans came to demographic prominence in Syria, the region outside of the Canaanite-speaking Phoenician coastal areas eventually came to speak Aramaic and the region came to be known as Aramea and Eber Nari.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Babylonians belatedly attempted to gain a foothold in the region during their brief revival under Nebuchadnezzar I in the 12th century, but they too were overcome by their Assyrian neighbors. The modern term "Syria" is a later Indo-European corruption of "Assyria", which only became formally applied to the Levant during the Seleucid Empire (323–150 BC) (see Etymology of Syria).


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Levantine sites previously showed evidence of trade links with Mesopotamia (Sumer, Akkad, Assyria and Babylonia), Anatolia (Hattia, Hurria, Luwia and later the Hittites), Egypt and the Aegean in the Late Bronze Age. Evidence at Ugarit shows that the destruction there occurred after the reign of Merneptah (r. 1213–1203) and even the fall of Chancellor Bay (d. 1192). The last Bronze Age king of Ugarit, Ammurapi, was a contemporary of the last-known Hittite king, Suppiluliuma II. The exact dates of his reign are unknown.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: A letter by the king is preserved on one of the clay tablets found baked in the conflagration of the destruction of the city. Ammurapi stresses the seriousness of the crisis faced by many Levantine states due to attacks. In response to a plea for assistance from the king of Alasiya, Ammurapi highlights the desperate situation Ugarit faced in letter RS 18.147:


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The ruler of Carchemish sent troops to assist Ugarit, but Ugarit was sacked. Letter RS 19.011 (KTU 2.61) sent from Ugarit following the destruction said:


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: This quote is frequently interpreted as "the degraded one ..." referring to the army being humiliated, destroyed, or both. The letter is also quoted with the final statement "Mayst thou know it"/"May you know it" repeated twice for effect in several later sources, while no such repetition appears to occur in the original.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The destruction levels of Ugarit contained Late Helladic IIIB ware, but no LH IIIC (see Mycenaean Greece). Therefore, the date of the destruction is important for the dating of the LH IIIC phase. Since an Egyptian sword bearing the name of Pharaoh Merneptah was found in the destruction levels, 1190 was taken as the date for the beginning of the LH IIIC. A cuneiform tablet found in 1986 shows that Ugarit was destroyed after the death of Merneptah. It is generally agreed that Ugarit had already been destroyed by the 8th year of Ramesses III, 1178. Letters on clay tablets that were baked in the conflagration caused by the destruction of the city speak of attack from the sea, and a letter from Alashiya (Cyprus) speaks of cities already being destroyed by attackers who came by sea.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: There is clear evidence that Ugarit was destroyed in some kind of assault, though the exact assailant is not known. In one residential area called the Ville sud, thirty two arrowheads were found scattered throughout the area with 12 of the arrowheads were found on the streets and in the open spaces. Along with the arrowheads, two lance heads, four javelin heads, five bronze daggers, one bronze sword, and three bronze pieces of armor were scattered throughout the houses and streets suggesting a fight took place in this residential neighborhood. An additional twenty five arrowheads were also recovered scattered around the Centre de la ville all of which suggests the city was burnt by an assault not by an earthquake. At the city of Emar, on the Euphrates, at some time between 1187–1175 only the monumental and religious structures were targeted for destruction while the houses appear to have been emptied, abandoned and were not destroyed with the monumental structures which suggests that the city was burned by attackers even though no weapons were recovered.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: While certain cities such as Ugarit and Emar were destroyed at the end of the Late Bronze Age, there are several others which were not destroyed even though they erroneously appear on most maps of destruction from the end of the Late Bronze Age. No evidence of destruction has been found at Hama, Qatna, Kadesh, Alalakh, and Aleppo, while for Tell Sukas, archaeologists only found some minor burning on some floors likely indicating that the town was not burned to the ground around 1200 BC.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The West Semitic Arameans eventually superseded the earlier Amorites and people of Ugarit. The Arameans, together with the Phoenicians and the Syro-Hittite states came to dominate most of the region demographically; however, these people, and the Levant in general, were also conquered and dominated politically and militarily by the Middle Assyrian Empire until Assyria's withdrawal in the late 11th century, although the Assyrians continued to conduct military campaigns in the region. However, with the rise of the Neo-Assyrian Empire in the late 10th century, the entire region once again fell to Assyria.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Egyptian evidence shows that from the reign of Horemheb (ruled either 1319 or 1306 to 1292), wandering Shasu were more problematic than the earlier Apiru. Ramesses II (r. 1279–1213) campaigned against them, pursuing them as far as Moab, where he established a fortress, after a near defeat at the Battle of Kadesh. During the reign of Merneptah, the Shasu threatened the "Way of Horus" north from Gaza. Evidence shows that Deir Alla (Succoth) was destroyed, likely by an earthquake, after the reign of Queen Twosret (r. 1191–1189) though the date of this destruction appears to be much later dating to roughly 1150.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: There is little evidence that any major city or settlement in the southern Levant was destroyed around 1200. At Lachish, The Fosse Temple III was ritually terminated while a house in Area S appears to have burned in a house fire as the most severe evidence of burning was next to two ovens while no other part of the city had evidence of burning. After this though the city was rebuilt in a grander fashion than before. For Megiddo, most parts of the city did not have any signs of damage and it is only possible that the palace in Area AA might have been destroyed though this is not certain. While the monumental structures at Hazor were indeed destroyed, this destruction was in the mid-13th century long before the end of the Late Bronze Age began. However, many sites were not burned to the ground around 1200 including: Ashkelon, Ashdod, Tell es-Safi, Tel Batash, Tel Burna, Tel Dor, Tel Gerisa, Tell Jemmeh, Khirbet Rabud, Tel Zeror, and Tell Abu Hawam among others.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: During the reign of Ramesses III, Philistines were allowed to resettle the coastal strip from Gaza to Joppa, Denyen (possibly the tribe of Dan in the Bible, or more likely the people of Adana, also known as Danuna, part of the Hittite Empire) settled from Joppa to Acre, and Tjekker in Acre. The sites quickly achieved independence, as the "Tale of Wenamun" shows.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Despite many theories which claim that trade relations broke down after 1200 in the southern Levant, there is ample evidence that trade with other regions continued after the end of the Late Bronze Age in the Southern Levant. Archaeologist Jesse Millek has shown that while the common assuption is that trade in Cypriot and Mycenaean pottery ended around 1200, trade in Cypriot pottery actually largely came to an end at 1300, while for Mycenaean pottery, this trade ended at 1250, and destruction around 1200 could not have affected either pattern of international trade since it ended before the end of the Late Bronze Age. He has also demonstrated that trade with Egypt continued after 1200. Archaeometallurgical studies performed by various teams have also shown that trade in tin, a non-local metal necessary to make bronze, did not stop or decrease after 1200, even though the closest source of the metal were modern Afghanistan, Kazakhstan, or perhaps even Cornwall, England. Lead from Sardinia was still being imported to the southern Levant after 1200 during the early Iron Age.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Destruction was heaviest at palaces and fortified sites, and none of the Mycenaean palaces of the Late Bronze Age survived (with the possible exception of the Cyclopean fortifications on the Acropolis of Athens). Thebes was one of the earliest examples of this, having its palace sacked repeatedly between 1300 and 1200 and eventually completely destroyed by fire. The extent of this destruction is highlighted by Robert Drews, who reasons that the destruction was such that Thebes did not resume a significant position in Greece until at least the late 12th century. Many other sites offer less conclusive causes; for example it is unclear what happened at Athens, although it is clear that the settlement saw a significant decline during the Bronze Age Collapse. While there is no evidence of remnants of a destroyed palace or central structure, a change in location of living quarters and burial sites demonstrates a significant recession. Furthermore, the increase in fortification at this site suggests much fear of the decline in Athens. Vincent Desborough asserts that this is evidence of later migrations away from the city in reaction to its initial decline, although a significant population did remain. It remains possible that this emigration from Athens was not flight from violence. Nancy Demand posits that environmental changes could have played an important role in the collapse of Athens. In particular Demand notes the presence of "enclosed and protected means of access to water sources at Athens" as evidence of persistent droughts in the region that could have resulted in a fragile reliance on imports.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Up to 90% of small sites in the Peloponnese were abandoned, suggesting a major depopulation. Again, as with many of the sites of destruction in Greece, it is unclear how a lot of this destruction came about. The city of Mycenae for example was initially destroyed in an earthquake in 1250 as evidenced by the presence of crushed bodies buried in collapsed buildings. However, the site was rebuilt only to face destruction in 1190 as the result of a series of major fires. There is a suggestion by Robert Drews that the fires could have been the result of an attack on the site and its palace; however, Eric Cline points out the lack of archaeological evidence for an attack. Thus, while fire was definitely the cause of the destruction, it is unclear what or who caused it. A similar situation occurred Tiryns in 1200 BC, when an earthquake destroyed much of the city including its palace. It is likely however that the city continued to be inhabited for some time following the earthquake. As a result, there is a general agreement that earthquakes did not permanently destroy Mycenae or Tiryns because, as is highlighted by Guy Middleton, "Physical destruction then cannot fully explain the collapse". Drews points out that there was continued occupation at these sites, accompanied by attempts to rebuild, demonstrating the continuation of Tiryns as a settlement. Demand suggests instead that the cause could again be environmental, particularly the lack of homegrown food and the important role of palaces in managing and storing food imports, implying that their destruction only stood to exacerbate the more crucial factor of food shortage. The importance of trade as a factor is supported by Spyros Iakovidis, who points out the lack of evidence for violent or sudden decline in Mycenae.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Pylos offers some more clues to its destruction, as the intensive and extensive destruction by fire around 1180 reflects the violent destruction of the city. There is some evidence of Pylos expecting a seaborne attack, with tablets at Pylos discussing "Watchers guarding the coast". Eric Cline rebuts the idea that this is evidence of an attack by Sea People, pointing out that the tablet does not say what is being watched for or why. Cline does not see naval attacks as playing a role in Pylos's decline. Demand, however, argues that, regardless of what the threat from the sea was, it likely played a role in the decline, at least in hindering trade and perhaps vital food imports.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Bronze Age collapse marked the start of what has been called the Greek Dark Ages, which lasted roughly 400 years and ended with the establishment of Archaic Greece. Other cities, such as Athens, continued to be occupied, but with a more local sphere of influence, limited evidence of trade and an impoverished culture, from which it took centuries to recover.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Middle Assyrian Empire (1392–1056) had destroyed the Hurrian-Mitanni Empire, annexed much of the Hittite Empire and eclipsed the Egyptian Empire. At the beginning of the Late Bronze Age collapse, it controlled an empire stretching from the Caucasus mountains in the north to the Arabian peninsula in the south, and from Ancient Iran in the east to Cyprus in the west. However, in the 12th century, Assyrian satrapies in Anatolia came under attack from the Mushki (who may have been Phrygians) and those in the Levant from Arameans, but Tiglath-Pileser I (reigned 1114–1076 BC) was able to defeat and repel these attacks, conquering the attackers. The Middle Assyrian Empire survived intact throughout much of this period, with Assyria dominating and often ruling Babylonia directly, and controlling southeastern and southwestern Anatolia, northwestern Iran and much of northern and central Syria and Canaan, as far as the Mediterranean and Cyprus.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Arameans and Phrygians were subjugated, and Assyria and its colonies were not threatened by the Sea Peoples who had ravaged Egypt and much of the East Mediterranean, and the Assyrians often conquered as far as Phoenicia and the East Mediterranean. However, after the death of Ashur-bel-kala in 1056, Assyria withdrew to areas close to its natural borders, encompassing what is today northern Iraq, northeastern Syria, the fringes of northwestern Iran, and southeastern Turkey. It still retained a stable monarchy, the best army in the world, and an efficient civil administration, enabling it to survive the Bronze Age Collapse intact. Assyrian written records remained numerous and the most consistent in the world during the period, and the Assyrians were still able to mount long range military campaigns in all directions when necessary. From the late 10th century, Assyria once more asserted itself internationally, and the Neo-Assyrian Empire grew to be the largest the world had yet seen.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The situation in Babylonia was very different. After the Assyrian withdrawal, it was still subject to periodic Assyrian (and Elamite) subjugation, and new groups of Semitic speakers such as the Arameans and Suteans (and in the period after the Bronze Age Collapse, Chaldeans also) spread unchecked into Babylonia from the Levant, and the power of its weak kings barely extended beyond the city limits of Babylon. Babylon was sacked by the Elamites under Shutruk-Nahhunte (c. 1185–1155), and lost control of the Diyala River valley to Assyria.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: While it survived the Bronze Age collapse, the Egyptian Empire of the New Kingdom era receded considerably in territorial and economic strength during the mid-twelfth century (during the reign of Ramesses VI, 1145 to 1137). Previously, the Merneptah Stele (c. 1200) spoke of attacks (Libyan War) from Putrians (from modern Libya), with associated people of Ekwesh, Shekelesh, Lukka, Shardana and Teresh (possibly Troas), and a Canaanite revolt, in the cities of Ashkelon, Yenoam and among the people of Israel. A second attack (Battle of the Delta and Battle of Djahy) during the reign of Ramesses III (1186–1155) involved Peleset, Tjeker, Shardana and Denyen.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Nubian War, the First Libyan War, the Northern War and the Second Libyan War were all victories for Ramesses. Due to this, however, the economy of Egypt fell into decline and state treasuries were nearly bankrupt. By defeating the Sea People, Libyans, and Nubians, the territory around Egypt was safe during the collapse of the Bronze Age, but military campaigns in Asia depleted the economy. With his victory over the Sea People, Ramesses III stated, "My sword is great and mighty like that of Montu. No land can stand fast before my arms. I am a king rejoicing in slaughter. My reign is calmed in peace." With this claim, Ramesses implied that his reign was safe in the wake of the Bronze Age collapse.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Egypt’s withdrawal from the southern Levant was a protracted process lasting some one hundred years and was most likely a product of the political turmoil in Egypt proper. Many Egyptian garrisons or sites with an “Egyptian governor’s residence” in the southern Levant were abandoned without destruction including Dier el-Balah, Ashkelon, Tel Mor, Tell el-Far'ah (South), Tel Gerisa, Tell Jemmeh, Tel Masos, and Qubur el-Walaydah. Not all Egyptian sites in the southern Levant were abandoned without destruction. The Egyptian garrison at Aphek was destroyed, likely in an act of warfare at the end of the 13th century. The Egyptian gate complex uncovered at Jaffa was destroyed at the end of the 12th century between 1134-1115 based on C14 dates, while Beth-Shean was partially though not completely destroyed, possibly by an earthquake, in the mid-12th century.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Various theories have been put forward as possible contributors to the collapse, many of them mutually compatible.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Some Egyptologists have dated the Hekla 3 volcanic eruption in Iceland to 1159 BC and blamed it for famines under Ramesses III during the wider Bronze Age collapse. The event is thought to have caused a volcanic winter.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Other estimated dates for the Hekla 3 eruption range from 1021 (±130) to 1135 BC (±130) and 929 (±34). Other scholars prefer the neutral and vague "3000 BP".


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: During what may have been the driest era of the Late Bronze Age, tree cover of the Mediterranean forest dwindled. Primary sources report that the era was marked by large-scale migration of people at the end of the Late Bronze Age.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: In the Dead Sea region (The Southern Levant), the subsurface water level dropped by more than 50 meters during the end of the second millennium B.C.E. According to the geography of that region, for water levels to drop so drastically the amount of rain the surrounding mountains received would have been dismal.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Drought in the Nile Valley also may have contributed to the rise of the Sea Peoples and their sudden migration across the eastern Mediterranean. It was suspected that crop failures, famine and the population reduction that resulted from the lackluster flow of the Nile and the migration of the Sea Peoples led to New Kingdom Egypt falling into political instability at the end of the Late Bronze Age and well into the Iron Age.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Using the Palmer Drought Index for 35 Greek, Turkish and Middle Eastern weather stations, it was shown that a drought of the kind that persisted from January 1972 AD would have affected all of the sites associated with the Late Bronze Age collapse. Drought could have easily precipitated or hastened socioeconomic problems and led to wars.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: In 2012 it was suggested that the diversion of midwinter storms from the Atlantic to north of the Pyrenees and the Alps, bringing wetter conditions to Central Europe but drought to the Eastern Mediterranean, was associated with the Late Bronze Age collapse. Analysis of multiple lines of paleoenvironmental evidence suggests climate change was one aspect associated with this period, but not the sole cause.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Recent evidence suggests the collapse of the cultures in Mycenaean Greece, Hittite Anatolia, and the Levant may have been precipitated or worsened by the arrival of an early and now-extinct strain of the Bubonic Plague that was brought from central Asia by the Sea Peoples or other migrating groups.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The Bronze Age collapse may be seen in the context of a technological history that saw the slow spread of ironworking technology from present-day Bulgaria and Romania in the 13th and the 12th centuries BC.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Leonard R. Palmer suggested that iron, which is superior to bronze for weapons manufacturing, was in more plentiful supply and so allowed larger armies of iron users to overwhelm the smaller bronze-equipped armies that consisted largely of Maryannu chariotry.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Robert Drews argues for the appearance of massed infantry, using newly developed weapons and armour, such as cast rather than forged spearheads and long swords, a revolutionizing cut-and-thrust weapon, and javelins. The appearance of bronze foundries suggests "that mass production of bronze artefacts was suddenly important in the Aegean". For example, Homer uses "spears" as a metonym for "warriors".


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: Such new weaponry, in the hands of large numbers of "running skirmishers", who could swarm and cut down a chariot army, would destabilize states that were based upon the use of chariots by the ruling class. That would precipitate an abrupt social collapse as raiders began to conquer, loot and burn cities.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: A general systems collapse has been put forward as an explanation for the reversals in culture that occurred between the Urnfield culture of the 12th and 13th centuries BC and the rise of the Celtic Hallstatt culture in the 9th and 10th centuries BC. General systems collapse theory, pioneered by Joseph Tainter, proposes that societal collapse results from an increase in social complexity beyond a sustainable level, leading people to revert to simpler ways of life.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: In the specific context of the Middle East, a variety of factorsincluding population growth, soil degradation, drought, cast bronze weapon and iron production technologiescould have combined to push the relative price of weaponry (compared to arable land) to a level unsustainable for traditional warrior aristocracies. In complex societies that were increasingly fragile and less resilient, the combination of factors may have contributed to the collapse.


title: Late Bronze Age collapse

text: The growing complexity and specialization of the Late Bronze Age political, economic, and social organization, in Carol Thomas and Craig Conant's phrase, together made the organization of civilization too intricate to reestablish piecewise when disrupted. That could explain why the collapse was so widespread and rendered the Bronze Age civilizations incapable of recovery. The critical flaws of the Late Bronze Age are its centralization, specialization, complexity, and top-heavy political structure. These flaws then were exposed by sociopolitical events (revolt of peasantry and defection of mercenaries), fragility of all kingdoms (Mycenaean, Hittite, Ugaritic, and Egyptian), demographic crises (overpopulation), and wars between states. Other factors that could have placed increasing pressure on the fragile kingdoms include piracy by the Sea Peoples interrupting maritime trade, as well as drought, crop failure, famine, or the Dorian migration or invasion.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Ally McBeal is an American legal comedy drama television series, originally aired on Fox from September 8, 1997, to May 20, 2002. Created by David E. Kelley, the series stars Calista Flockhart in the title role as a lawyer working in the Boston law firm Cage and Fish, with other lawyers whose lives and loves are eccentric, humorous, and dramatic. The series received critical acclaim in its early seasons, winning the Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series – Musical or Comedy in 1998 and 1999, and also winning the Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series in 1999. As of August 2022, a revival is in development over at ABC.


title: Ally McBeal

text: The series, set in the fictional Boston law firm Cage & Fish, begins with main character Allison Marie "Ally" McBeal joining the firm co-owned by her law school classmate Richard Fish (Greg Germann) after leaving her previous job due to sexual harassment. On her first day, Ally is horrified to find that she will be working alongside her ex-boyfriend Billy Thomas (Gil Bellows)—whom she has never gotten over. To make things worse, Billy is now married to fellow lawyer Georgia (Courtney Thorne-Smith), who later joins Cage and Fish. The triangle among the three forms the basis for the main plot for the show's first three seasons.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Although ostensibly a legal drama, the main focus of the series was the romantic and personal lives of the main characters, often using legal proceedings as plot devices to contrast or reinforce a character's drama. For example, bitter divorce litigation of a client might provide a backdrop for Ally's decision to break up with a boyfriend. Legal arguments were also frequently used to explore multiple sides of various social issues.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Cage and Fish (which becomes Cage/Fish & McBeal or Cage, Fish, & Associates towards the end of the series), the fictional law firm where most of the characters work, is depicted as a highly sexualized environment symbolized by its unisex restroom. Lawyers and secretaries in the firm routinely date, flirt with, or have a romantic history with one another and frequently run into former or potential romantic interests in the courtroom or on the street outside.


title: Ally McBeal

text: The series had many offbeat and frequently surreal running gags and themes, such as Ally's tendency to immediately fall over whenever she met somebody she found attractive, Richard Fish's wattle fetish and humorous mottos ("Fishisms" & "Bygones"), John's gymnastic dismounts out of the office's unisex bathroom stalls, or the dancing twins (played by Eric & Steve Cohen) at the bar, that ran through the series. The show also used vivid, dramatic fantasy sequences for Ally's and other characters' wishful thinking; of particular note is the early internet sensation the dancing baby.


title: Ally McBeal

text: The series also featured regular visits to a local bar where singer Vonda Shepard regularly performed (though occasionally handing over the microphone to the characters). Star contemporary singers also performed in the bar at the end of the shows, including acts such as Mariah Carey, Barry White and Anastacia. The series also took place in the same continuity as David E. Kelley's legal drama "The Practice" (which aired on ABC), as the two shows crossed over with one another on occasion, a very rare occurrence for two shows that aired on different networks.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Ultimately, in the last installment of the fifth and final season, "Bygones", Ally decided to resign from Cage & Fish, leave Boston, and go to New York City.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Fox canceled "Ally McBeal" after five seasons. In addition to being the lowest-rated season of "Ally McBeal" and the grounds for the show's cancellation, the fifth season was also the only season of the show that failed to win any Emmy or Golden Globe awards.


title: Ally McBeal

text: In Australia, "Ally McBeal" was aired by the Seven Network from 1997 to 2002. In 2010, it was aired repeatedly by Network 10.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Seymore Walsh, a stern judge often exasperated by the eccentricities of the Cage & Fish lawyers and played by actor Albert Hall, was also a recurring character on "The Practice". In addition, Judge Jennifer (Whipper) Cone appears on "The Practice" episode "Line of Duty" (S02 E15), while Judge Roberta Kittelson, a recurring character on "The Practice", has a featured guest role in the "Ally McBeal" episode "Do you Wanna Dance?"


title: Ally McBeal

text: Most of the primary "Practice" cast members guest starred in the "Ally McBeal" episode "The Inmates" (S01 E20), in a storyline that concluded with the "Practice" episode "Axe Murderer" (S02 E26), featuring Calista Flockhart and Gil Bellows reprising their "Ally" characters. Unusually for a TV crossover, "Ally McBeal" and "The Practice" aired on different networks. Bobby Donnell, the main character of "The Practice" played by Dylan McDermott, was featured heavily in both this crossover and another "Ally McBeal" episode, "These are the Days".


title: Ally McBeal

text: Regular "Practice" cast members Lara Flynn Boyle and Michael Badalucco each had a cameo in "Ally McBeal" (Boyle as a woman who trades insults with Ally in the episode "Making Spirits Bright" and Badalucco as one of Ally's dates in the episode "I Know him by Heart") but it is unclear whether they were playing the same characters they play on "The Practice".


title: Ally McBeal

text: In Season 5, Lara Flynn Boyle had an uncredited guest appearance as a rebuttal witness opposite guest star Heather Locklear's character in the episode, "Tom Dooley".


title: Ally McBeal

text: 14 Beacon Street in Boston was the exterior which was used as the location for the law firm "Cage & Fish" (later "Cage, Fish, & McBeal"), which was located on the 7th floor of this building.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Upon premiering in 1997, the show was an instant hit, averaging around 11 million viewers per episode. The show's second season saw an increase in ratings and soon became a top 20 show, averaging around 13 million viewers per episode. The show's ratings began to decline in the third season, but stabilized in the fourth season after Robert Downey Jr. joined the regular cast as Ally's boyfriend Larry Paul, and a fresher aesthetic was created by new art director Matthew DeCoste. However, Downey's character was written out after the end of the season due to the actor's troubles with drug addiction.


title: Ally McBeal

text: The first two seasons, as well as the fourth, remain the most critically acclaimed and saw the most awards success at the Emmys, SAG Awards and the Golden Globes. In 2007, "Ally McBeal" placed #48 on "Entertainment Weekly" 2007 "New TV Classics" list.


title: Ally McBeal

text: "Ally McBeal" received some criticism from TV critics and feminists who found the title character annoying and demeaning to women (specifically regarding professional women) because of her perceived flightiness, lack of demonstrated legal knowledge, short skirts, and emotional instability. Perhaps the most notorious example of the debate sparked by the show was the June 29, 1998, cover story of "Time" magazine, which juxtaposed McBeal with three pioneering feminists (Susan B. Anthony, Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem) and asked "Is Feminism Dead?" In episode 12 of the second season of the show, Ally talks to her co-worker John Cage about a dream she had, saying "You know, I had a dream that they put my face on the cover of "Time" magazine as 'the face of feminism'."


title: Ally McBeal

text: Music was a prominent feature of "Ally McBeal". Vonda Shepard, a relatively unknown musician at the time, performed regularly on the show and her song "Searchin' My Soul" was the show's theme song. Many of the songs Shepard performed were established hits with lyrics that paralleled the events of each episode, for example, "Both Sides Now", "Hooked on a Feeling" and "Tell Him". Besides recording background music for the show, Shepard frequently appeared at the ends of episodes as a musician performing at a local piano bar frequented by the main characters. On rare occasions, her character would have conventional dialogue. A portion of "Searchin' My Soul" was played at the beginning of each episode, but the song was never played in its entirety.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Several of the characters had a musical leitmotif that played when they appeared. John Cage's was "You're the First, the Last, My Everything", Ling Woo's was the Wicked Witch of the West theme from "The Wizard of Oz", and Ally McBeal herself picked "Tell Him", when told by a psychiatrist that she needed a theme song in a Season 1 episode.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Due to the popularity of the show and Shepard's music, a soundtrack titled "Songs from Ally McBeal" was released in 1998, as well as a successor soundtrack titled "" in 1999. Two compilation albums from the show featuring Shepard were also released in 2000 and 2001. A Christmas album was also released under the title "Ally McBeal: A Very Ally Christmas". The album received positive reviews, and Shephard's version of Kay Starr's Christmas song "(Everybody's Waitin' for) The Man with the Bag", received considerable airplay during the holiday season.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Other artists featured on the show include Barry White, Al Green, Gladys Knight, Tina Turner, Macy Gray, Gloria Gaynor, Chayanne, Barry Manilow, Anastacia, Elton John, Sting and Mariah Carey. Josh Groban played the role of Malcolm Wyatt in the May 2001 season finale, performing "You're Still You". The series creator, David E. Kelley, was impressed with Groban's performance at The Family Celebration event and based on the audience reaction to Groban's singing, Kelley created a character for him in that finale. The background score for the show was composed by Danny Lux.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Due to music licensing issues, none of the seasons of "Ally McBeal" were available on DVD in the United States (only 6 random episodes could be found on the R1 edition) until 2009, though the show had been available in Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Japan, Hong Kong, Portugal, Spain, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Mexico, Taiwan, Australia, Brazil, and the Czech Republic with all the show's music intact since 2005. In the UK, Ireland, and Spain all seasons are available in a complete box set.


title: Ally McBeal

text: 20th Century Fox released the complete first season on DVD in Region 1 on October 6, 2009. They also released a special complete series edition on the same day. Season 1 does not contain any special features, but the complete series set contains several bonus features, including featurettes, an all-new retrospective, the episode of "The Practice" in which Calista Flockhart guest-starred, and a bonus disc entitled "The Best of Ally McBeal Soundtrack." In addition, both releases contain all of the original music. Season 2 was released on April 6, 2010. Seasons 3, 4, and 5 were all released on October 5, 2010.


title: Ally McBeal

text: In 1999, at the height of the show's popularity, a half-hour version entitled "Ally" began airing in parallel with the main program. This version, designed in a sitcom format, used re-edited scenes from the main program, along with previously unseen footage. The intention was to further develop the plots in the comedy drama in a sitcom style. It also focused only on Ally's personal life, cutting all the courtroom plots. The repackaged show was cancelled partway through its initial run. While 13 episodes of "Ally" were produced, only ten aired.


title: Ally McBeal

text: In March 2021, it was reported that a revival as a limited series was in early development by 20th Television with Flockhart possibly returning.


title: Ally McBeal

text: In August 2022, it was reported that ABC was in early development of a sequel series with Karin Gist writing and executive producing.


title: Ally McBeal

text: In episode 2, season 3 of the British comedy "The Adam and Joe Show", the show was parodied as "Ally McSqueal" using soft toys.


title: Ally McBeal

text: Episode 12, season 1 of the show "Futurama", "When Aliens Attack", centers on an invasion of Earth by the Omicronians precipitated by a signal loss during the climax of an episode of "Single Female Lawyer", whose main character is Jenny McNeal.


title: Ally McBeal

text: In episode 8, season 4 of the show "The Good Place", the Judge hands Ted Danson's character a petition to reboot Ally McBeal stating "everything else is getting rebooted."


title: Ally McBeal

text: In the 2021 film "The Mauritanian", Guantanamo Bay detention camp detainee Mohamedou Ould Salahi says to a US judge "Even in Mauritania, we have watched "Law & Order" and "Ally McBeal"."


title: John Prine

text: John Edward Prine (; October 10, 1946 – April 7, 2020) was an American singer-songwriter of country-folk music. He was active as a composer, recording artist, live performer, and occasional actor from the early 1970s until his death. He was known for an often humorous style of original music that has elements of protest and social commentary.


title: John Prine

text: Born and raised in Maywood, Illinois, Prine learned to play the guitar at age 14. He attended classes at Chicago's Old Town School of Folk Music. After serving in West Germany with the U.S. Army, he returned to Chicago in the late 1960s, where he worked as a mailman, writing and singing songs first as a hobby and then as a club performer.


title: John Prine

text: A member of Chicago's folk revival, a laudatory review by critic Roger Ebert built Prine's popularity. Singer-songwriter Kris Kristofferson heard Prine at Steve Goodman's insistence, and Kristofferson invited Prine to be his opening act, leading to Prine's eponymous debut album with Atlantic Records in 1971. The acclaim Prine earned from his first LP led to three more albums for Atlantic. He then recorded three albums with Asylum Records. In 1981, he co-founded Oh Boy Records, an independent label where he released most of his subsequent albums.


title: John Prine

text: Widely cited as one of the most influential songwriters of his generation, Prine was known for humorous lyrics about love, life, and current events, as well as serious songs with social commentary and songs that recollect sometimes melancholy tales from his life. According to Nobel laureate songwriter Bob Dylan, "Prine's stuff is pure Proustian existentialism. Midwestern mindtrips to the nth degree. And he writes beautiful songs. . . . All that stuff about 'Sam Stone', the soldier junkie daddy, and 'Donald and Lydia', where people make love from ten miles away. Nobody but Prine could write like that." In 2020, Prine received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award.


title: John Prine

text: Prine was the son of William Mason Prine, a tool-and-die maker, and Verna Valentine (Hamm), a homemaker, both originally from Muhlenberg County, Kentucky. He was born and raised in the Chicago suburb of Maywood. In summers, they would go back to visit family near Paradise, Kentucky. Prine started playing guitar at age 14, taught by his brother, David. He attended classes at Chicago's Old Town School of Folk Music, and graduated from Proviso East High School in Maywood, Illinois. He was a U.S. Postal Service mailman for five years and was drafted into the United States Army during the Vietnam War era, serving as a vehicle mechanic in West Germany before beginning his musical career in Chicago.


title: John Prine

text: In the late 1960s, while Prine was delivering mail, he began to sing his songs (often first written in his head on the mail route) at open-microphone evenings at the Fifth Peg on Armitage Avenue in Chicago. The bar was a gathering spot for nearby Old Town School of Folk Music teachers and students. Prine was initially a spectator, reluctant to perform, but eventually did so in response to a "You think you can do better?" comment made to him by another performer. After his first open mic, he was offered paying gigs. In 1970, "Chicago Sun-Times" movie critic Roger Ebert heard him by chance at the Fifth Peg and wrote the first review Prine ever received, calling him a great songwriter: After the review was published, Prine's popularity grew. He became a central figure in the Chicago folk revival, which also included such singer-songwriters as Steve Goodman, Michael Peter Smith, Bonnie Koloc, Jim Post, Tom Dundee, Anne Hills, and Fred Holstein. Joined by such established musicians as Jethro Burns and Bob Gibson, Prine performed frequently at a variety of Chicago clubs. He was offered a one-album deal of covers and with a few of his original songs, by Bob Koester from Delmark Records, but decided the project was not right for him.


title: John Prine

text: In 1971, Prine was playing regularly at the Earl of Old Town. Steve Goodman, who was performing with Kris Kristofferson at another Chicago club, persuaded Kristofferson to go see Prine late one night. Kristofferson later recalled, "By the end of the first line we knew we were hearing something else. It must’ve been like stumbling onto Dylan when he first busted onto the Village scene."


title: John Prine

text: Prine's self-titled debut album was released in 1971. Kristofferson (who once remarked that Prine wrote songs so good that "we'll have to break his thumbs") invited Prine and Goodman to open for him at The Bitter End in New York City. In the audience was Jerry Wexler, who signed Prine to Atlantic Records the next day. The album included Prine's signature songs "Illegal Smile" and "Sam Stone", and songs that became folk and country standards, "Angel from Montgomery" and "Paradise." The album also featured "Hello in There", a song about aging that was later covered by numerous artists, and "Far From Me", a lonely waltz about lost love for a waitress, which Prine later said was his favorite of all his songs. The album received many positive reviews, and some hailed Prine as "the next Dylan". Bob Dylan himself appeared unannounced at one of Prine's first New York City club appearances, anonymously backing him on harmonica.


title: John Prine

text: Prine's second album, "Diamonds in the Rough" (1972), was a surprise for many after the critical success of his first LP; it was an uncommercial, stripped-down affair that reflected Prine's fondness for bluegrass music and features songs reminiscent of Hank Williams. Highlights of the compilation include the allegorical "The Great Compromise", which includes a recitation and addresses the Vietnam War, and the ballad "Souvenirs", which Prine later recorded with Goodman.