title: Glenda Jackson

text: In the 1975 referendum, Jackson voted against Britain joining the European Economic Community. She subsequently changed her mind on the issue, however, and supported Britain remaining in the European Union in the 2016 referendum. Despite this, she disagreed with calls for a second vote. To this effect, she stated her admiration for the then prime minister Theresa May; when this was queried by the interviewer, "The Guardian"'s Emma Brockes, Jackson responded: "I've certainly admired her in the way she has handled herself over Brexit, yes! I do admire her for her tenacity, trying to deliver the referendum result to the people of our country, even though I disapproved of it."


title: Glenda Jackson

text: Interviewed in July 2020, shortly after Sir Keir Starmer had taken over as party leader from Corbyn, Jackson declared herself happy with him in the role. In 2022, she commented on Starmer, "I just wish Keir would get someone to help him develop his voice," calling it "one of his big drawbacks".


title: Glenda Jackson

text: In 1957, Jackson met Roy Hodges, a stage manager and fellow actor in their repertory theatre company. The pair soon embarked upon a relationship. Jackson and Hodges were married on 2 August 1958 at St Marylebone Register Office in London. In 1969, their son, Daniel, was born; Jackson was six months pregnant when filming on "Women in Love" was completed. Dan Hodges is a former Labour Party adviser and commentator, who works as a newspaper columnist for "The Mail on Sunday". When her son told her he was going to write for the conservative newspaper, Jackson responded, "Well, I'll have to emigrate!"


title: Glenda Jackson

text: Jackson's marriage was running into difficulties by the early 1970s, and in 1975, she began an affair with Andy Phillips, the lighting director for a production of "Hedda Gabler" which she was starring in. Roy Hodges sued Jackson for divorce on the grounds of her adultery with Phillips in November that year, and the couple were divorced in 1976. Jackson and Phillips were in an on-off relationship until 1981. It was reported in 2016 that she had been "happily single for decades".


title: Glenda Jackson

text: During the early years of her career, Jackson and her husband lived in Swiss Cottage, north west London, an area she would later represent as an MP. In the late 1960s, the couple moved to Blackheath, south east London. , she lives in a basement granny flat there, with her son, his wife, and their son, her only grandchild, upstairs. Jackson listed her interests in "Who's Who" as cooking, gardening and reading Jane Austen.


title: Esau

text: Esau is the elder son of Isaac in the Hebrew Bible. He is mentioned in the Book of Genesis and by the prophets Obadiah and Malachi. The Christian New Testament alludes to him in the Epistle to the Romans and in the Epistle to the Hebrews.


title: Esau

text: According to the Hebrew Bible, Esau is the progenitor of the Edomites and the elder brother of Jacob, the patriarch of the Israelites. Jacob and Esau were the sons of Isaac and Rebecca, and the grandsons of Abraham and Sarah. Of the twins, Esau was the first to be born with Jacob following, holding his heel. Isaac was sixty years old when the boys were born.


title: Esau

text: Esau, a "man of the field", became a hunter who had "rough" qualities that distinguished him from his twin brother. Among these qualities were his redness and noticeable hairiness. Jacob was a plain or simple man, depending on the translation of the Hebrew word "tam" (which also means "relatively perfect man"). Jacob's color was not mentioned. Throughout Genesis, Esau is frequently shown as being supplanted by his younger twin, Jacob (Israel).


title: Esau

text: According to the Muslim tradition, the prophet Yaqub or Israel was the favorite of his mother, and his twin brother "Esau" was the favorite of his father prophet Ishaq, and he is mentioned in the "Story of Ya'qub" in Qisas al-Anbiya.


title: Esau

text: Genesis 25:25 narrates Esau's birth, "Now the first came forth red, all over like a hairy garment; and they named him Esau." The meaning of the word "esau" itself is not entirely certain. Others have noted the similarity to Arabic "’athaa" (عثا) meaning "hirsute". The name "Edom" is also attributed to Esau, meaning "red" (Heb: " `admoni"); the same color used to describe the color of the hairs of Esau. Genesis parallels his redness to the "red lentil pottage" that he sold his birthright for. Esau became the progenitor of the Edomites in Seir.


title: Esau

text: In Genesis, Esau returned to his twin brother Jacob, famished from the fields. He begs Jacob to give him some "red pottage" (a play on his nickname, "`Edom", meaning "red".) This refers to his red hair. Jacob offers Esau a bowl of lentil stew in exchange for Esau's birthright ( "bəḵōrāh", the right to be recognized as firstborn son with authority over the family), and Esau agrees. Thus Jacob acquires Esau's birthright. This is the origin of the English phrase "to sell one's birthright for a mess of pottage".


title: Esau

text: In , Jacob uses deception, motivated by his mother Rebekah, to lay claim to his blind father Isaac's blessing that was inherently due to the firstborn, Esau.


title: Esau

text: In , Rebekah is listening while Isaac speaks to his son Esau. When Esau goes to the field to hunt for venison to bring home, Rebekah says to her son Jacob, "Behold, I heard thy father speak to thy brother Esau, saying: 'Bring me venison and prepare a savoury food, that I may eat, and bless thee before the Lord before my death. Rebekah then instructs Jacob in an elaborate deception through which Jacob pretends to be Esau, in order to steal from Esau his blessing from Isaac and his inheritance—which in theory Esau had already agreed to give to Jacob. Jacob follows through with the plan to steal his brother's birthright by bringing the meal his father Isaac requested and pretending to be Esau. Jacob pulled off his disguise by covering himself in hairy lamb skin so that when his blind father went to touch him, his smooth skin did not give him away as an imposter of his hairy brother. Jacob successfully received his father Isaac's blessing. As a result, Jacob became the spiritual leader of the family after Isaac's death and the heir of the promises of Abraham ().


title: Esau

text: When Esau learns of his brother's thievery, he is livid and begs his father to undo the blessing. Isaac responds to his eldest son's plea by saying that he only had one blessing to give and that he could not reverse the sacred blessing. Esau is furious and vows to kill Jacob (). Once again Rebekah intervenes to save her younger son from being murdered by his elder twin brother, Esau.


title: Esau

text: Therefore, at Rebekah's urging, Jacob flees to a distant land to work for his uncle Laban (). Jacob does not immediately receive his father's inheritance after the impersonation aimed at taking it from Esau. Having fled for his life, Jacob has left the wealth of Isaac's flocks, land and tents in Esau's hands. Jacob is forced to sleep out on the open ground and then work for wages as a servant in Laban's household. Jacob, who had deceived and cheated his brother, is in turn deceived and cheated by his uncle. Jacob asks to marry Laban's daughter Rachel, whom he has met at the well, and Laban agrees, if Jacob will give him seven years of service. Jacob does so, but after the wedding finds that beneath the veil is not Rachel but Leah, Laban's elder daughter. He agrees to work another seven years and Jacob and Rachel are finally wed. However, despite Laban, Jacob eventually becomes so rich as to incite the envy of Laban and Laban's sons.


title: Esau

text: Genesis Chapter 27 verse 16 of the King James Version Bible: "And she put the skins of the kids of the goats upon his hands and upon the smooth of his neck:"


title: Esau

text: Verse 19: "And Jacob said unto his father, I am Esau thy firstborn; I have done according as thou badest me: arise, I pray thee, sit and eat of my venison, that thy soul may bless me."


title: Esau

text: Verse 22-23: "And Jacob went near unto Isaac his father; and he felt him, and said, The voice is Jacob's voice, but the hands are the hands of Esau. And he discerned him not, because his hands were hairy, as his brother Esau's hands: so he blessed him."


title: Esau

text: describes Esau's marriage at the age of forty to two Canaanite women: Judith the daughter of Beeri the Hittite, and Basemath the daughter of Elon the Hittite. This arrangement grieved his parents. Upon seeing that his brother was blessed and that their father rejected Esau's union to Canaanites, Esau went to the house of his uncle Ishmael and married his cousin, Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael, and sister of Nebajoth. Esau's family is again revisited in , this passage names two Canaanite wives; Adah, the daughter of Elon the Hittite, and Aholibamah, the daughter of Anah, daughter of Zibeon the Hivite, and a third: Bashemath, Ishmael's daughter, sister of Nebajoth. Some scholars equate the three wives mentioned in Genesis 26 and 28 with those in Genesis 36. Casting his lot with the Ishmaelites, he was able to drive the Horites out of Mount Seir to settle in that region. According to some views Esau is considered to be the progenitor not only of the Edomites but of the Kenizzites and the Amalekites as well.


title: Esau

text: Esau was also known as Edom, the progenitor of the Edomites who were established to the south of the Israelites. They were an ancient enemy nation of Israel. The minor prophets, such as Obadiah, claim that the Edomites participated in the destruction of the First Temple by Nebuchadnezzar in 587 BC. Exactly how the Edomites participated is not clear. Psalm 137 ("By the waters of Babylon") suggests merely that Edom had encouraged the Babylonians: The Lord is asked to "remember against the Edomites the day of Jerusalem, how they said 'raze it, raze it to its foundations'". But the prophecy of Obadiah insists on the literal "violence done" by Esau "unto your brother Jacob" when the Edomites "entered the gate of my people..., looted his goods..., stood at the parting of the ways to cut off the fugitive... delivered up his survivors on his day of distress".


title: Esau

text: By the intertestamental period, Edom had replaced Babylon as the nation that actually burned the Temple ("Thou hast also vowed to build thy temple, which the Edomites burned when Judah was laid waste by the Chaldees").


title: Esau

text: depicts Esau as unspiritual for thoughtlessly throwing away his birthright. states "Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated," based upon , although this passage goes on to depict the nations of Israel (Jacob) and Edom (Esau).


title: Esau

text: The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan connects the name Esau to the Hebrew "asah", stating, "because he was born fully completed, with hair of the head, beard, teeth, and molars." Other traditional sources connect the word with the Hebrew "šāv`" () meaning "worthless".


title: Esau

text: Jewish commentaries have shed a negative view on Esau because of his rivalry with Jacob, and likewise viewed the apparent reconciliation between the brothers described in Genesis 32–33 as insincere, on Esau's part. The Midrash says that during Rebekah's pregnancy whenever she would pass a house of Torah study, Jacob would struggle to come out; whenever she would pass a house of idolatry, Esau would agitate to come out.


title: Esau

text: He is considered to be a rebellious son who kept a double life until he was 15, when he sold his birthright to Jacob. According to the Talmud, the sale of the birthright took place immediately after Abraham died. The Talmudic dating would give both Esau and Jacob an age of 15 at the time. The lentils Jacob was cooking were meant for his father Isaac, because lentils are the traditional mourner's meal for Jews. On that day before returning, in a rage over the death of Abraham, Esau committed five sins; he raped a betrothed young woman, he committed murder (Nimrod), he denied God, he denied the resurrection of the dead, and he spurned his birthright.


title: Esau

text: Haman's lineage is given in the Targum Sheni as follows: "Haman the son of Hammedatha the Agagite, son of Srach, son of Buza, son of Iphlotas, son of Dyosef, son of Dyosim, son of Prome, son of Ma'dei, son of Bla'akan, son of Intimros, son of Haridom, son of Sh'gar, son of Nigar, son of Farmashta, son of Vayezatha, (son of Agag, son of Sumkei,) son of Amalek, son of the concubine of Eliphaz, firstborn son of Esau".


title: Esau

text: According to Rashi, Isaac, when blessing Jacob in Esau's place, smelled the heavenly scent of Gan Eden (Paradise) when Jacob entered his room and, in contrast, perceived Gehenna opening beneath Esau when the latter entered the room, showing him that he had been deceived all along by Esau's show of piety.<br> In Jewish folklore, the Roman Emperor Titus was a descendant of Esau.


title: Esau

text: According to the Babylonian Talmud, Esau was killed by Hushim, son of Dan, son of Jacob, because Esau obstructed the burial of Jacob into the cave of Machpelah. When Jacob was brought to be buried in the cave, Esau prevented the burial, claiming he had the right to be buried in the cave; after some negotiation Naphtali was sent to Egypt to retrieve the document stating Esau sold his part in the cave to Jacob. Hushim (who was hard of hearing) did not understand what was going on, and why his grandfather was not being buried, so he asked for an explanation; after being given one he became angry and said: "Is my grandfather to lie there in contempt until Naphtali returns from the land of Egypt?" He then took a club and killed Esau, and Esau's head rolled into the cave. This means that the head of Esau is also buried in the cave.


title: Esau

text: Jewish sources state that Esau sold his right to be buried in the cave. According to Shemot Rabbah, Jacob gave all his possessions to acquire a tomb in the Cave of the Patriarchs. He put a large pile of gold and silver before Esau and asked, “My brother, do you prefer your portion of this cave, or all this gold and silver?” Esau's selling to Jacob his right to be buried in the Cave of the Patriarchs is also recorded in "Sefer HaYashar".


title: Esau

text: In the Book of Jubilees, Esau's father, Isaac, compels Esau to swear not to attack or kill Jacob after Isaac has died. However, after the death of Isaac, the sons of Esau convince their father to lead them, and hired mercenaries, against Jacob in order to kill Jacob and his family and seize their wealth (especially the portion of Isaac's wealth that Isaac had left to Jacob upon his death). "Then Ya'aqov bent his bow and sent forth the arrow and struck Esau, his brother on his right breast and slew him (Jubilees 38:2) . . . Ya'aqov buried his brother on the hill which is in Aduram, and he returned to his house (Jubilees 38:9b)."


title: Esau

text: South of the Palestinian town of Sa'ir on the West Bank there is a tomb reputed to be that of Esau – "El 'Ais" in his Arab name.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Pederasty in ancient Greece was a socially acknowledged romantic relationship between an older male (the "erastes") and a younger male (the "eromenos") usually in his teens. It was characteristic of the Archaic and Classical periods. The influence of pederasty on Greek culture of these periods was so pervasive that it has been called "the principal cultural model for free relationships between citizens."


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Some scholars locate its origin in initiation ritual, particularly rites of passage on Crete, where it was associated with entrance into military life and the religion of Zeus. It has no formal existence in the Homeric epics, and seems to have developed in the late 7th century BC as an aspect of Greek homosocial culture, which was characterized also by athletic and artistic nudity, delayed marriage for aristocrats, symposia, and the social seclusion of women.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Pederasty was both idealized and criticized in ancient literature and philosophy. The argument has recently been made that idealization was universal in the Archaic period; criticism began in Athens as part of the general Classical Athenian reassessment of Archaic culture.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Scholars have debated the role or extent of pederasty, which is likely to have varied according to local custom and individual inclination. The English word "pederasty" in present-day usage might imply the abuse of minors in certain jurisdictions, but Athenian law, for instance, recognized both consent and age as factors in regulating sexual behavior.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Since the publication in 1978 of Kenneth Dover's work "Greek Homosexuality", the terms "erastês" and "erômenos" have been standard for the two pederastic roles. Both words derive from the Greek verb "erô", "erân", "to love"; see also eros. In Dover's strict dichotomy, the "erastês" (, plural "erastai") is the older sexual actor, seen as the active or dominant participant, with the suffix "-tês" (-) denoting agency. "Erastês" should be distinguished from Greek "paiderastês", which meant "lover of boys" usually with a negative connotation. The Greek word "paiderastia" () is an abstract noun. It is formed from "paiderastês", which in turn is a compound of "pais" ("child", plural "paides") and "erastês" (see below). Although the word "pais" can refer to a child of either sex, "paiderastia" is defined by Liddell and Scott's "Greek-English Lexicon" as "the love of boys", and the verb "paiderasteuein" as "to be a lover of boys". The "erastês" himself might only be in his early twenties, and thus the age difference between the two males who engage in sexual activity might be negligible.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The word "erômenos", or "beloved" (ἐρώμενος, plural "eromenoi"), is the masculine form of the present passive participle from "erô", viewed by Dover as the passive or subordinate sexual participant. An "erômenos" can also be called "pais", "child". The "pais" was regarded as a future citizen, not an "inferior object of sexual gratification", and was portrayed with respect in art. The word can be understood as an endearment such as a parent might use, found also in the poetry of Sappho and a designation of only relative age. Both art and other literary references show that the "erômenos" was at least a teen, with modern age estimates ranging from 13 to 20, or in some cases up to 30. Most evidence indicates that to be an eligible "erômenos", a youth would be of an age when an aristocrat began his formal military training, that is, from fifteen to seventeen. As an indication of physical maturity, the "erômenos" was sometimes as tall as or taller than the older "erastês", and may have his first facial hair. Another word used by the Greeks for the younger sexual participant was "paidika", a neuter plural adjective ("things having to do with children") treated syntactically as masculine singular.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: In poetry and philosophical literature, the "erômenos" is often an embodiment of idealized youth; a related ideal depiction of youth in Archaic culture was the "kouros", the long-haired male statuary nude. In "The Fragility of Goodness", Martha Nussbaum, following Dover, defines the ideal "erômenos" as


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: a beautiful creature without pressing needs of his own. He is aware of his attractiveness, but self-absorbed in his relationship with those who desire him. He will smile sweetly at the admiring lover; he will show appreciation for the other's friendship, advice, and assistance. He will allow the lover to greet him by touching, affectionately, his genitals and his face, while he looks, himself, demurely at the ground. … The inner experience of an "erômenos" would be characterized, we may imagine, by a feeling of proud self-sufficiency. Though the object of importunate solicitation, he is himself not in need of anything beyond himself. He is unwilling to let himself be explored by the other's needy curiosity, and he has, himself, little curiosity about the other. He is something like a god, or the statue of a god.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Dover insisted that the active role of the "erastês" and the passivity of the "erômenos" is a distinction "of the highest importance", but subsequent scholars have tried to present a more varied picture of the behaviors and values associated with "paiderastia". Although ancient Greek writers use "erastês" and "erômenos" in a pederastic context, the words are not technical terms for social roles, and can refer to the "lover" and "beloved" in other hetero- and homosexual couples.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The Greek practice of pederasty came suddenly into prominence at the end of the Archaic period of Greek history. There is a brass plaque from Crete, about 650–625 BC, which is the oldest surviving representation of pederastic custom. Such representations appear from all over Greece in the next century; literary sources show it as being established custom in many cities by the 5th century BC.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Cretan pederasty as a social institution seems to have been grounded in an initiation which involved abduction. A man ( – "philetor", "lover") selected a youth, enlisted the chosen one's friends to help him, and carried off the object of his affections to his "andreion", a sort of men's club or meeting hall. The youth received gifts, and the "philetor" along with the friends went away with him for two months into the countryside, where they hunted and feasted. At the end of this time, the "philetor" presented the youth with three contractually required gifts: military attire, an ox, and a drinking cup. Other costly gifts followed. Upon their return to the city, the youth sacrificed the ox to Zeus, and his friends joined him at the feast. He received special clothing that in adult life marked him as "kleinos", "famous, renowned". The initiate was called a "parastatheis", "he who stands beside", perhaps because, like Ganymede the cup-bearer of Zeus, he stood at the side of the "philetor" during meals in the "andreion" and served him from the cup that had been ceremonially presented. In this interpretation, the formal custom reflects myth and ritual.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The "erastês-erômenos" relationship played a role in the Classical Greek social and educational system, had its own complex social-sexual etiquette and was an important social institution among the upper classes. Pederasty has been understood as educative, and Greek authors from Aristophanes to Pindar felt it naturally present in the context of aristocratic education ("paideia"). In general, pederasty as described in the Greek literary sources is an institution reserved for free citizens, perhaps to be regarded as a dyadic mentorship. According to historian Sarah Iles Johnston, "pederasty was widely accepted in Greece as part of a male's coming-of-age, even if its function is still widely debated". The scene of Xenophon's "Symposium", and also that of Plato's "Protagoras", is set at Callias III's house during a banquet hosted by him for his beloved Autolykos in honour of a victory gained by the handsome young man in the pentathlon at the Panathenaic Games.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: In Crete, in order for the suitor to carry out the ritual abduction, the father had to approve him as worthy of the honor. Among the Athenians, as Socrates claims in Xenophon's "Symposium," "Nothing [of what concerns the boy] is kept hidden from the father, by an ideal lover". In order to protect their sons from inappropriate attempts at seduction, fathers appointed slaves called "pedagogues" to watch over their sons. However, according to Aeschines, Athenian fathers would pray that their sons would be handsome and attractive, with the full knowledge that they would then attract the attention of men and "be the objects of fights because of erotic passions".


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The age-range when boys entered into such relationships was consonant with that of Greek girls given in marriage, often to adult husbands many years their senior. Boys, however, usually had to be courted and were free to choose their mate, while marriages for girls were arranged for economic and political advantage at the discretion of father and suitor. These connections were also an advantage for a youth and his family, as the relationship with an influential older man resulted in an expanded social network. Thus, some considered it desirable to have had many admirers or mentors, if not necessarily lovers "per se", in one's younger years. Typically, after their sexual relationship had ended and the young man had married, the older man and his protégé would remain on close terms throughout their life.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: In parts of Greece, pederasty was an acceptable form of homoeroticism that had other, less socially accepted manifestations, such as the sexual use of slaves or being a "pornos" (prostitute) or "hetairos" (the male equivalent of a hetaira). Male prostitution was treated as a perfectly routine matter and visiting prostitutes of either sex were considered completely acceptable for a male citizen. However, adolescent citizens of free status who prostituted themselves were sometimes ridiculed, and were permanently prohibited by Attic law from performing some seven official functions because it was believed that since they had sold their own body "for the pleasure of others" (, "eph' hybrei"), they would not hesitate to sell the interests of the community as a whole. If they, or an adult citizen of free status who had prostituted himself, performed any of the official functions prohibited to them by law (in later life), they were liable to prosecution and punishment. However, if they did not perform those specific functions, did not present themselves for the allocation of those functions and declared themselves ineligible if they were somehow mistakenly elected to perform those specific functions, they were safe from prosecution and punishment. As non-citizens visiting or residing in a city-state could not perform official functions in any case whatsoever, they could prostitute themselves as much as they wanted.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Transgressions of the customs pertaining to the proper expression of homosexuality within the bounds of "pederaistia" could be used to damage the reputation of a public figure. In his speech "Against Timarchus" in 346 BC, the Athenian politician Aeschines argues against further allowing Timarchus, an experienced middle-aged politician, certain political rights, as Attic law prohibited anyone who had prostituted himself from exercising those rights and Timarchus was known to have spent his adolescence as the sexual partner of a series of wealthy men in order to obtain money. Such a law existed because it was believed that anyone who had sold their own body would not hesitate to sell the interests of the city-state. Aeschines won his case, and Timarchus was sentenced to "atimia" (disenfranchisement and civic disempowerment). Aeschines acknowledges his own dalliances with beautiful boys, the erotic poems he dedicated to these youths, and the scrapes he has gotten into as a result of his affairs, but he emphasizes that none of these were mediated by money. A financial motive thus was viewed as threatening a man's status as free.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: By contrast, as expressed in Pausanias' speech in Plato's "Symposium," pederastic love was said to be favorable to democracy and feared by tyrants, because the bond between the "erastês" and "erômenos" was stronger than that of obedience to a despotic ruler. Athenaeus states that "Hieronymus the Aristotelian says that love with boys was fashionable because several tyrannies had been overturned by young men in their prime, joined together as comrades in mutual sympathy". He gives as examples of such pederastic couples the Athenians Harmodius and Aristogeiton, who were credited (perhaps symbolically) with the overthrow of the tyrant Hippias and the establishment of democracy, and also Chariton and Melanippus. Others, such as Aristotle, claimed that the Cretan lawgivers encouraged pederasty as a means of population control, by directing love and sexual desire into non-procreative channels:


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: and the lawgiver has devised many wise measures to secure the benefit of moderation at table, and the segregation of the women in order that they may not bear many children, for which purpose he instituted association with the male sex.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: For I know not any greater blessing to a young man who is beginning in life than a virtuous lover, or to a lover than a beloved youth. For the principle, I say, neither kindred, nor honor, nor wealth, nor any motive is able to implant so well as love. Of what am I speaking? Of the sense of honor and dishonor, without which neither states nor individuals ever do any good or great work… And if there were only some way of contriving that a state or an army should be made up of lovers and their loves, they would be the very best governors of their own city, abstaining from all dishonor and emulating one another in honor; and it is scarcely an exaggeration to say that when fighting at each other’s side, although a mere handful, they would overcome the world.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Plato states here that "we all", possibly referring to society as a whole or simply his social group, believe the story of Ganymede's homosexuality to have been fabricated by the Cretans to justify immoral behaviours.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The Athenian stranger in Plato's "Laws" blames pederasty for promoting civil strife and driving many to their wits' end, and recommends the prohibition of sexual intercourse with youths, laying out a path whereby this may be accomplished.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The myth of Ganymede's abduction by Zeus was invoked as a precedent for the pederastic relationship, as Theognis asserts to a friend:


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: There is some pleasure in loving a boy ("paidophilein"), since once in fact even the son of Cronus [that is, Zeus], king of immortals, fell in love with Ganymede, seized him, carried him off to Olympus, and made him divine, keeping the lovely bloom of boyhood ("paideia"). So, don't be astonished, Simonides, that I too have been revealed as captivated by love for a handsome boy.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The myth of Ganymede's abduction, however, was not taken seriously by some in Athenian society, and deemed to be a Cretan fabrication designed to justify homoeroticism.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The 5th century BC poet Pindar constructed the story of a sexual pederastic relationship between Poseidon and Pelops, intended to replace an earlier story of cannibalism that Pindar deemed an unsavoury representation of the Gods. The story tells of Poseidon's love for a mortal boy, Pelops, who wins a chariot race with help from his admirer Poseidon.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Though examples of such a custom exist in earlier Greek works, myths providing examples of young men who were the lovers of gods began to emerge in Classical literature, around the 6th century BC. In these later tales, pederastic love is ascribed to Zeus (with Ganymede), Poseidon (with Pelops), Apollo (with Cyparissus, Hyacinthus and Admetus), Orpheus, Heracles, Dionysus, Hermes, and Pan. All the Olympian gods except Ares are purported to have had these relationships, which some scholars argue demonstrates that the specific customs of "paiderastia" originated in initiatory rituals.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Myths attributed to the homosexuality of Dionysus are very late and often post-pagan additions. The tale of Dionysus and Ampelos was written by the Egyptian poet Nonnus sometime between the 4th and 5th centuries CE, making it unreliable. Likewise, the tale of Dionysus and Polymnus, which tells that the former anally masturbated with a fig branch over the latter's grave, was written by Christians, whose aim was to discredit pagan mythology.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Dover, however, believed that these myths are only literary versions expressing or explaining the "overt" homosexuality of Greek Archaic culture, the distinctiveness of which he contrasted to attitudes in other ancient societies such as Egypt and Israel.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Greek vase painting is a major source for scholars seeking to understand attitudes and practices associated with "paiderastia". Hundreds of pederastic scenes are depicted on Attic black-figure vases. In the early 20th century, John Beazley classified pederastic vases into three types:


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Certain gifts traditionally given by the "erômenos" became symbols that contributed to interpreting a given scene as pederastic. Animal gifts—most commonly hares and roosters, but also deer and felines—point toward hunting as an aristocratic pastime and as a metaphor for sexual pursuit.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: These animal gifts were commonly given to boys, whereas women often received money as a gift for sex. This difference in gifts furthered the closeness of pederastic relations. Women received money as a product of the sexual exchange and boys were given culturally significant gifts. Gifts given to boys are commonly depicted in ancient Greek art, but money given to women for sex is not.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The explicit nature of some images has led in particular to discussions of whether the "erômenos" took active pleasure in the sex act. The youthful beloved is never pictured with an erection; his penis "remains flaccid even in circumstances to which one would expect the penis of any healthy adolescent to respond willy-nilly". Fondling the youth's genitals was one of the most common images of pederastic courtship on vases, a gesture indicated also in Aristophanes' comedy "Birds" (line 142). Some vases do show the younger partner as sexually responsive, prompting one scholar to wonder, "What can the point of this act have been unless lovers in fact derived some pleasure from feeling and watching the boy's developing organ wake up and respond to their manual stimulation?"


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Chronological study of the vase paintings also reveals a changing aesthetic in the depiction of the "erômenos". In the 6th century BC, he is a young beardless man with long hair, of adult height and physique, usually nude. As the 5th century begins, he has become smaller and slighter, "barely pubescent", and often draped as a girl would be. No inferences about social customs should be based on this element of the courtship scene alone.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: There are many pederastic references among the works of the Megaran poet Theognis addressed to Cyrnus (Greek "Kyrnos"). Some portions of the Theognidean corpus are probably not by the individual from Megara, but rather represent "several generations of wisdom poetry". The poems are "social, political, or ethical precepts transmitted to Cyrnus as part of his formation into an adult Megarian aristocrat in Theognis' own image".


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The relationship between Theognis and Kyrnos eludes categorization. Although it was assumed in antiquity that Kyrnos was the poet's "erômenos", the poems that are most explicitly erotic are not addressed to himthe poetry on "the joys and sorrows" of pederasty seem more apt for sharing with a fellow "erastês", perhaps in the setting of the symposium"the relationship, in any case, is left vague". In general, Theognis (and the tradition that appears under his name) treats the pederastic relationship as heavily pedagogical.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The poetic traditions of Ionia and Aeolia featured poets such as Anacreon, Mimnermus and Alcaeus, who composed many of the sympotic skolia that were to become later part of the mainland tradition. Ibycus came from Rhegium in the Greek west and entertained the court of Polycrates in Samos with pederastic verses. By contrast with Theognis, these poets portray a version of pederasty that is non-pedagogical, focused exclusively on love and seduction. Theocritus, a Hellenistic poet, describes a kissing contest for youths that took place at the tomb of a certain Diocles of Megara, a warrior renowned for his love of boys; he notes that invoking Ganymede was proper to the occasion.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Vase paintings and references to the "erômenos"'s thighs in poetry indicate that when the pederastic couple engaged in sex acts, the preferred form was intercrural. To preserve his dignity and honor, the "erômenos" limits the man who desires him to penetration between closed thighs.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: There are no known visual depictions of anal sex between pederastic couples. Some vase paintings, which historian William Percy considers a fourth type of pederastic scene in addition to Beazley's three, show the "erastês" seated with an erection and the "erômenos" either approaching or climbing into his lap. The composition of these scenes is the same as that for depictions of women mounting men who are seated and aroused for intercourse. As a cultural norm considered apart from personal preference, anal penetration was most often seen as dishonorable to the one penetrated, or shameful, because of "its potential appearance of being turned into a woman" and because it was feared that it may distract the "erômenos" from playing the active, penetrative role later in life. A fable attributed to Aesop tells how Aeschyne (Shame) consented to enter the human body from behind only as long as Eros did not follow the same path, and would fly away at once if he did. A man who acted as the receiver during anal intercourse may have been the recipient of the insult ""kinaidos"", meaning effeminate. No shame was associated with intercrural penetration or any other act that did not involve anal penetration. This interpretation is largely based on the thesis presented by Kenneth Dover in 1979. Oral sex is likewise not depicted, or directly suggested; anal and oral penetration seem to have been reserved for prostitutes or slaves.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Dover maintained that the "erômenos" was ideally not supposed to feel "unmanly" desire for the "erastês". Nussbaum argues that the depiction of the "erômenos" as deriving no sexual pleasure from sex with the "erastês" "may well be a cultural norm that conceals a more complicated reality", as the "erômenos" is known to have frequently felt intense affection for his "erastês" and there is evidence that he experienced sexual arousal with him as well. In Plato's "Phaedrus", it is related that, with time, the "erômenos" develops a "passionate longing" for his "erastês" and a "reciprocal love" ("anteros") for him that is a replica of the "erastês"’ love. The "erômenos" is also said to have a desire "similar to the erastes', albeit weaker, to see, to touch, to kiss and to lie with him".


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Many of the practices described above concern Athens, while Attic pottery is a major source for modern scholars attempting to understand the institution of pederasty. In Athens, as elsewhere, "pederastia" appears to have been characteristic of the aristocracy. The age of youth depicted has been estimated variously from 12 to 18. A number of Athenian laws addressed the pederastic relationship.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Unlike the Dorians, where an older male would usually have only one "erômenos" (younger boy), in the east a man might have several "erômenoi" over the course of his life. Poems of Alcaeus indicate that the older male would customarily invite his "erômenos" to dine with him.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Greek pederasty was seemingly already institutionalized in Crete at the time of Thaletas, which included a "Dance of Naked Youths". It has been suggested both Crete and Sparta influenced Athenian pederasty.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The nature of Spartan pederasty is in dispute among ancient sources and modern historians. Some think Spartan views on pederasty and homoeroticism were more chaste than those of other parts of Greece, while others find no significant difference between them.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: According to Xenophon, a relationship ("association") between a man and a boy could be tolerated, but only if it was based around friendship and love and not solely around physical, sexual attraction, in which case it was considered "an abomination" tantamount to incest. Conversely, Plutarch states that, when Spartan boys reached puberty, they became available for sexual relationships with older males. Aelian talks about the responsibilities of an older Spartan citizen to younger less sexually experienced males.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Historian Thomas F. Scanlon argues Sparta, during its Dorian polis time, was the first city to practice athletic nudity, and one of the first to formalize pederasty. Sparta also imported Thaletas' songs from Crete.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: In Sparta, the "erastês" was regarded as a guardian of the "erômenos" and was held responsible for any wrongdoings of the latter. Researchers of the Spartan civilization, such as Paul Cartledge, remain uncertain about the sexual aspect of the institution. Cartledge underscores that the terms "εισπνήλας" ("eispnílas") and "αΐτας" ("aḯtas") have a moralistic and pedagogic content, indicating a relationship with a paternalistic character, but argues that sexual relations were possible in some or most cases. The nature of these possible sexual relations remains, however, disputed and lost to history.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Megara cultivated good relations with Sparta, and may have been culturally attracted to emulate Spartan practices in the 7th century, when pederasty is postulated to have first been formalized in Dorian cities. One of the first cities after Sparta to be associated with the custom of athletic nudity, Megara was home to the runner Orsippus who was famed as the first to run the footrace naked at the Olympic Games and "first of all Greeks to be crowned victor naked". In one poem, the Megaran poet Theognis saw athletic nudity as a prelude to pederasty, writing, "Happy is the lover who works out naked / And then goes home to sleep all day with a beautiful boy."


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: In Thebes, the main polis in Boeotia, renowned for its practice of pederasty, the tradition was enshrined in the founding myth of the city. The story was meant to teach by counterexample. It depicts Laius, one of the mythical ancestors of the Thebans, in the role of a lover who betrays the father and rapes the son. Other Boeotian pederastic myths are the stories of Narcissus and of Heracles and Iolaus.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The legislator Philolaus of Corinth, lover of the stadion race winner Diocles of Corinth at the Ancient Olympic Games of 728 BC, crafted laws for the Thebans in the 8th century BC that gave special support to male unions, contributing to the development of Theban pederasty in which, unlike other places in ancient Greece, it favored the continuity of the union of male couples even after the younger man reached adulthood, as was the case with him and Diocles, who lived together in Thebes until the end of their lives.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: According to Plutarch, Theban pederasty was instituted as an educational device for boys in order to "soften, while they were young, their natural fierceness", and to "temper the manners and characters of the youth". According to tradition, the Sacred Band of Thebes comprised pederastic couples.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Boeotian pottery, in contrast to that of Athens, does not exhibit the three types of pederastic scenes identified by Beazley. The limited survival and cataloguing of pottery that can be proven to have been made in Boeotia diminishes the value of this evidence in distinguishing a specifically local tradition of "paiderastia".


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: The ethical views held in ancient societies, such as Athens, Thebes, Crete, Sparta, Elis and others, on the practice of pederasty have been explored by scholars only since the end of the 19th century. One of the first to do so was John Addington Symonds, who wrote his seminal work "A Problem in Greek Ethics" in 1873, but after a private edition of 10 copies (1883), only in 1901 was the work published in revised form. Edward Carpenter expanded the scope of the study, with his 1914 work, "Intermediate Types among Primitive Folk". The text examines homoerotic practices of all types, not only pederastic ones, and ranges over cultures spanning the globe. In Germany the study was continued by classicist Paul Brandt writing under the pseudonym Hans Licht, who published "Sexual Life in Ancient Greece" in 1932.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Kenneth J. Dover's seminal "Greek Homosexuality" (1978) triggered a number of debates which still continue. 20th-century sociologist Michel Foucault declared that pederasty was "problematized" in Greek culture, that it was "the object of a special—and especially intense—moral preoccupation", which was "subjected to an interplay of positive and negative interplays so complex as to make the ethics that governed it difficult to decipher". A modern line of thought leading from Dover to Foucault to David M. Halperin holds that the "erômenos" did not reciprocate the love and desire of the "erastês", and that the relationship was factored on a sexual domination of the younger by the older, a politics of penetration held to be true of all adult male Athenians' relations with their social inferiors—boys, women and slaves. This theory was also propounded by Eva Keuls.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Similarly, Enid Bloch argues that many Greek boys in these relationships may have been traumatized by knowing that they were violating social customs, since the "most shameful thing that could happen to any Greek male was penetration by another male". She further argues that vases showing "a boy standing perfectly still as a man reaches out for his genitals" indicate the boy may have been "psychologically immobilized, unable to move or run away". From this and the previous perspectives, the relationships are characterized and factored on a power differential between the participants, and as essentially asymmetrical.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Other scholars point to more artwork on vases, poetry and philosophical works such as the Platonic discussion of "anteros", "love returned", all of which show tenderness and desire and love on the part of the "erômenos" matching and responding to that of the "erastês". Critics of the posture defended by Dover, Bloch and their followers also point out that they ignore all material which argued against their "overly theoretical" interpretation of a human and emotional relationship and counter that "clearly, a mutual, consensual bond was formed", and that it is "a modern fairy tale that the younger "erômenos" was never aroused".


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: Halperin's position has been criticized by Thomas K. Hubbard as a "persistently negative and judgmental rhetoric implying exploitation and domination as the fundamental characteristics of pre-modern sexual models", challenging it as a polemic of "mainstream assimilationist gay apologists" and an attempt to "demonize and purge from the movement" all non-orthodox male sexualities, especially those involving adults and adolescents.


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: As classical historian Robin Osborne has pointed out, historical discussion of "paiderastia" is complicated by 21st-century moral standards:


title: Pederasty in ancient Greece

text: It is the historian's job to draw attention to the personal, social, political and indeed moral issues behind the literary and artistic representations of the Greek world. The historian's job is to present pederasty and all, to make sure that … we come face to face with the way the glory that was Greece was part of a world in which many of our own core values find themselves challenged rather than reinforced.


title: Return to Oz

text: Return to Oz is a 1985 dark fantasy film released by Walt Disney Pictures, co-written and directed by Walter Murch. It stars Nicol Williamson, Jean Marsh, Piper Laurie, and Fairuza Balk as Dorothy Gale in her first screen role. The film is an unofficial sequel to the 1939 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer film "The Wizard of Oz," and it is based on L. Frank Baum's early 20th century "Oz" novels, mainly "The Marvelous Land of Oz" (1904) and "Ozma of Oz" (1907). In the plot, Dorothy returns to the Land of Oz to find it has been conquered by the Nome King; she must restore it with her new friends Billina, Tik-Tok, Jack Pumpkinhead, the Gump, and Princess Ozma.


title: Return to Oz

text: In 1954, Walt Disney Productions bought the film rights to Baum's remaining "Oz" books to use in the television series "Disneyland;" this led to the live-action film "Rainbow Road to Oz", which was never completed. Murch suggested making another "Oz" film in 1980. Disney approved the project as they were due to lose the film rights to the series. Though MGM was not involved in the production, Disney had to pay a large fee to use the ruby slippers created for the 1939 film. "Return to Oz" fell behind schedule during production, and, following a change of Disney management, Murch was briefly fired.


title: Return to Oz

text: "Return to Oz" was released in theaters on June 21, 1985. It performed poorly at the box office, grossing $11.1 million in the United States on a $28 million budget, and received mixed reviews, with critics praising the effects and performances but criticizing the dark content and twisted visuals with many deeming it inferior to the original film. However, it performed well outside the US, and has since acquired a cult following from fans of the Oz books for being more faithful to L. Frank Baum's works and those who saw the film at a young age. It received an Oscar nomination for Best Visual Effects.


title: Return to Oz

text: In autumn of 1899, Dorothy Gale's obsession with the Land of Oz troubles her Aunt Em and Uncle Henry, who believe she is delusional. They take her to the sanitarium of Dr. Worley who, assisted by Nurse Wilson, plans to administer electrotherapy before lightning causes a power failure. Dorothy is freed by a mysterious girl who tells her that Worley's machines damage patients. Nurse Wilson chases the girls into a river, where Dorothy climbs aboard a floating chicken coop but is unable to save the other girl and floats away downstream.


title: Return to Oz

text: Dorothy wakes up in Oz with her chicken Billina, who can now talk. They follow a damaged Yellow Brick Road to the Emerald City, now in ruins and its citizens turned to stone. They are attacked by the Wheelers, people with wheels instead of hands and feet, but are saved by Tik-Tok, a mechanical man who was told by Scarecrow, the king of Oz, to wait for Dorothy's return. Learning the Nome King is responsible for the devastation, Dorothy, Billina and Tik-Tok then travel to Princess Mombi's castle with the hope of finding out where Scarecrow is.


title: Return to Oz

text: Mombi, who has a collection of different heads she "wears", reveals that Scarecrow is being held by the Nome King at his mountain. Intending to take Dorothy's head for her collection, Mombi imprisons the group in a tower with Jack Pumpkinhead, who explains he was brought to life by Mombi's Powder of Life. The four construct a flying creature out of furniture with the head of the Gump, a moose-like animal, and Dorothy steals the powder from Mombi to bring it to life. The Gump flies them across the Deadly Desert to the Nome King's mountain, Mombi has the Wheelers take her in pursuit of Dorothy.


title: Return to Oz

text: The Gump crashes on the Nome King's mountain, where Dorothy is briefly reunited with Scarecrow before he is turned into an ornament by the Nome King. He gives each of the group three attempts to identify which ornament in his large collection is Scarecrow; the Gump, Jack and Tik-Tok all fail and are turned into ornaments themselves. Before Dorothy begins her turn, The Nome King reveals to her he has her lost ruby slippers, which he had used to conquer Oz, and offers to use them to send her home instead. Dorothy refuses and goes to find her companions while Mombi arrives at the mountain.


title: Return to Oz

text: With her last guess, Dorothy turns a green gem into Scarecrow and realizes people from Oz turn into green objects. She proceeds to find and restore Jack and the Gump, enraging the Nome King who imprisons Mombi in a cage for allowing Dorothy's escape. He then grows to a gigantic size and prepares to eat Jack when Billina, hiding in Jack's head, lays an egg that falls into the Nome King's mouth, fatally poisoning him. Dorothy retrieves the ruby slippers and hurriedly puts them on as the ornament room and all of the subterranean Nome kingdom collapses. She wishes for the group to be returned to a restored Emerald City, where they find a green medal on Gump's antler that Dorothy restores into Tik-Tok.


title: Return to Oz

text: The people of Oz ask Dorothy to be their Queen, but she expresses her desire to return home. Princess Ozma - the girl from the sanitarium and rightful ruler of Oz - is freed from the mirror Mombi imprisoned her in and ascends the throne. Ozma receives the ruby slippers from Dorothy and uses them to send Dorothy home, promising she can return if she ever wishes it, while Billina chooses to stay in Oz. Dorothy is found by her family on a riverbank in Kansas and Aunt Em tells her the clinic was struck by lightning and burned down; everyone survived except Worley, who died trying to save his machines. Dorothy returns home and sees Billina and Ozma through her bedroom mirror; she calls out for Aunt Em, but they signal for her to keep Oz a secret.


title: Return to Oz

text: Walter Murch began development of "Return to Oz" in 1980, during a brainstorming session with Walt Disney Productions production chief Tom Wilhite. Murch told Wilhite he was interested in making an "Oz" film and Wilhite "sort of straightened up in his chair". Unbeknownst to Murch, Disney owned the rights to the "Oz" series and wanted to make a new film as the copyright was soon to expire. In September 1981, Disney president Ron W. Miller announced that the studio would be making the film, not as a sequel or continuation of the 1939 movie, but instead an entirely new story with a different look to the original film.


title: Return to Oz

text: "Return to Oz" is based on the second and third "Oz" books, "The Marvelous Land of Oz" (1904) and "Ozma of Oz" (1907). The element about Tik-Tok being "The Royal Army of Oz" derives from "Tik-Tok of Oz" (1914), in which he is made the Royal Army of Oogaboo and also makes frequent cries of "Pick me up!" That book was itself based on a dramatic production, "The Tik-Tok Man of Oz" (1913). Murch also used the book "Wisconsin Death Trip" as a historical source for the film. Murch co-wrote the screenplay with Gill Dennis, intentionally writing a film that was unlike the original to avoid accusations of blasphemy. Executive Producer Gary Kurtz noted, "We're not trying to make a sequel, although technically the books are sequels to each other", suggesting that the movie would be more faithful to the books than the 1939 film was.


title: Return to Oz

text: Murch took a darker take on Baum's source material than the 1939 adaptation, which he knew would be a gamble. Between the development period and actual shooting, there was a change of leadership at the Walt Disney studios (with Wilhite replaced by Richard Berger), and the film's budget increased. Despite an original $20 million budget, this eventually rose to $28 million.


title: Return to Oz

text: The film was developed and produced without the involvement of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, the studio behind the 1939 film. No approval was necessary because, by 1985, the "Oz" books on which it was based were in the public domain, and the subsequent "Oz" books had been optioned to Disney many years earlier. The ruby slippers were created by MGM specifically for the 1939 film to replace the Silver Shoes of the original stories and, as the slippers remained MGM's intellectual property, a fee was paid. Another carry-over from the 1939 film was the framework in which real characters from Kansas reappeared in Oz, which Murch kept in order to keep harmony between the two films.


title: Return to Oz

text: Fairuza Balk was one of 600 from Vancouver chosen to audition for the role of Dorothy. Having spent four days in Los Angeles during November 1983, she learned she had secured the role the following month. Speaking of the audition process, Balk said "I just burst with tears because I was so happy. It was a really big thing for me even to get an audition for a real feature film." In casting the relatively unknown Balk, who was the second youngest auditionee from around 1,000 children auditioned across eight cities, Murch said he "wanted to find somebody who might be Judy Garland's cousin once removed." Maslansky believed Balk was born to play the role, saying "She is Dorothy as described by Baum. She is also Dorothy as I think Judy Garland would have loved to play her if she were that age."


title: Return to Oz

text: Emma Ridley was cast in the role of Ozma, which she described as "a dream come true". In preparation for the role, she would watch visual adaptions of the story and analyzed the opinions of critics of Ozma. Ridley described how she tried to make her Kansas character "very calm, very studious", opting to wear little makeup and perform barefoot, while wanting a complete difference for Ozma, who was shown with a transformed appearance and attire. There was a gap of several months between Ridley filming the Kansas scenes to the Oz scenes. Ridley, who was born in London, had her voice in the film dubbed by Beatrice Murch, daughter of Walter Murch, so that the character of Ozma would have an American-sounding voice.


title: Return to Oz

text: Leo McKern and Christopher Lloyd were each considered for the role of Dr. J.B. Worley/The Nome King before Nicol Williamson was cast.


title: Return to Oz

text: For the role of Billina, around 40 real chickens were available during filming, each that were good for different things. Cages were tagged with the chicken's purpose, including perch, sit, carry and run to name a few, as well as chickens that would attack and others to run towards cast members. As Balk's small arms could not handle carrying a full-size chicken, a smaller one was used for those scenes. A mechanical chicken was also used for certain scenes, at times behaving so similar to a real chicken that crew in the screening room were unable to tell the difference. The dog playing the role of Toto was Tansy, a brown-eyed border terrier family pet. Director Walter Murch had already seen around 50 dogs before seeing Tansy.


title: Return to Oz

text: Principal photography began on February 20, 1984, and wrapped in October 1984. Originally, filming was to be shot 75% on location, including Oz-like locations in Algeria and Italy; however, due to budget restraints from Disney, the movie was filmed entirely in the United Kingdom at Elstree Studios. Kansas scenes were filmed at Salisbury Plain, which was described as a "natural choice" by Maslansky due to it being flat and within close proximity to London. The temperature at Salisbury Plain during filming was described by Maslansky as "freezing", saying of Balk that "she would cry from the cold, from the pain of the cold – but she would never complain." The original cameraman, Freddie Francis, quit after shooting the Kansas scenes due to impatience with Murch.


title: Return to Oz

text: Once shooting began, Murch began to fall behind schedule, and there was further pressure from the studio. Five weeks into production, Disney was unhappy with the footage. By then, mostly the Kansas scenes had been shot; however, Murch was looking unwell and was fired from the role without protestation. Murch later recalled the experience, saying "had I fought back... they might have said OK, but I couldn't fight back. I felt what the soul feels after it's left the body after a car accident — pain but tremendous relief." High-profile film-makers including George Lucas and Francis Ford Coppola supported Murch in discussions with the studio, and Murch was reinstated and finished the film. Lucas guaranteed that he would step in as replacement if any further problems emerged.


title: Return to Oz

text: Balk and Ridley, the only two child actors on set, had limited working hours per day. Balk, who was in around 98% of all scenes, was permitted to work no more than three-and-a-half hours each day, restricted to between 9:30am to 4:30pm which included breaks and private educational tuition. Balk's privacy was carefully guarded and she was not available to meet with journalists. Whilst Balk did her own stunts, Ridley had a stand-in. Filming for the river scenes took place in a sound stage, described by Ridley as being "like a hot Jacuzzi".


title: Return to Oz

text: Various scenes, in particular those with the Nome King, used clay animation to achieve the desired effect. When interviewed in 2020, director and animator Doug Aberle explained the process involved in animating the Nome King and other characters with clay, including the technical difficulties encountered. Each section, such as the outside rocks with faces on, was allocated to an animator. Nome King scenes in the throne room were animated progressively, with the character initially made entirely of clay, progressing gradually closer to human form until finally portrayed by Nicol Williamson in live action. Towards the end of the film when the Nome King crumbles, Aberle explains how it took him four attempts to animate this accurately.


title: Return to Oz

text: The Emerald City scenes towards the end of film had to be fully reshot, as the character of Ozma was originally dressed in a gold lace dress which was deemed unsuitable during post-production. The scenes were re-shot with the actress wearing a white and green dress, described by Ridley as being "very itchy and very uncomfortable", as she had grown by the time filming took place. At one point during filming these scenes, Balk collapsed due to the high on-set temperature.


title: Return to Oz

text: On describing the movie compared with the 1939 version, Balk said "it's a different story and a different picture, and I didn't try to copy anything Judy Garland did. It's not that much scarier, but it isn't as bright." She enjoyed working with the cast of 30 chickens, describing them as "really sweet" and praising their acting ability. Jean Marsh said she thought 'Return to Oz' would be easy to film, noting "I thought this picture would be a breeze, but it's difficult to hit it absolutely right." She trusted Murch's direction in making his dream a reality, describing him "like a mad, vague professor. He's totally original."


title: Return to Oz

text: "Return to Oz" had its world premiere in the United States on June 21, 1985, opening in 1,300 theaters including the Radio City Music Hall in New York City. Disney spent approximately $6 million on printing and advertising to promote the film, as well as adding a scene on a "Return to Oz" float, including characters from the film which appeared as part of Disneyland's Main Street Electrical Parade. The film was released in London theatres on July 11, 1985. This was the first film to use the Walt Disney Pictures logo from 1985 to 2006, which would later receive a fanfare, based on "When You Wish Upon a Star", composed by John Debney, with "The Black Cauldron".


title: Return to Oz

text: The film has been released to VHS, Betamax, Laserdisc, DVD, and Blu-ray over the years. The initial release, to VHS, Laserdisc, and Beta, occurred in December 1985 shortly after the theatrical release, with the VHS initially priced with a list price of $79.95. Disney reissued it in 1992 with alternate cover art. In 1999, Anchor Bay Entertainment, who had obtained the home video rights to several titles from Disney's live-action catalogue, issued the film on full-screen and letterbox VHS, as well as a DVD release featuring both versions. All three releases featured an intro by Fairuza Balk before the film and an interview featurette with her after it. All three versions went out of print shortly after their release.


title: Return to Oz

text: In 2004, Disney released their own DVD, which dropped the Anchor Bay disc's fullscreen version and added anamorphic enhancement for 16:9 TVs for the widescreen version, upgraded the audio to 5.1 surround, retained the Anchor Bay disc's extras, and added four TV spots and a theatrical trailer. In 2015, Disney released a 30th Anniversary Edition of the film on Blu-ray exclusively through the Disney Movie Club, featuring a newly remastered and cleaned up transfer and DTS Master Audio 5.1 sound, but none of the bonus features from the 2004 DVD.


title: Return to Oz

text: It earned $2,844,895 in its opening weekend, finishing in seventh place and $6.5 million in the 10 days after release. After the opening weekend, Commonwealth Theaters reported that some venues took between just $300–$400, considered at the time to be poor. Jeff Love, city manager of the theater chain, believed it may have been due to a bad release time, suggesting that "they should have released it when people didn't have anything to do. It should have been before people got out and started going on vacation". Love went on to suggest that the perception of it being a children's film was another problem". It ultimately grossed $11,137,801 in North America.


title: Return to Oz

text: The film received mixed reviews. The film critics aggregator Rotten Tomatoes records 56% positive reviews based on 36 reviews, its critical consensus reads, ""Return to Oz" taps into the darker side of L. Frank Baum's book series with an intermittently dazzling adventure that never quite recaptures the magic of its classic predecessor." Those who were familiar with the Oz books praised its faithfulness to the source material of L. Frank Baum such as author and critic Harlan Ellison who said, “It ain’t Judy Garland. It ain’t hip-hop. But it’s in the tradition of the original Oz books.”


title: Return to Oz

text: However, many critics described its tone and overall content as slightly too dark and intense for young children. "Children are sure to be startled by its bleakness," said "The New York Times"' Janet Maslin. Ian Nathan of "Empire Magazine" gave the film three out of five stars, saying: "This is not so much a sequel but an homage and not a good one." Canadian film critic Jay Scott felt the protagonists were too creepy and weird for viewers to relate or sympathize with: "Dorothy's friends are as weird as her enemies, which is faithful to the original Oz books but turns out not to be a virtue on film, where the eerie has a tendency to remain eerie no matter how often we're told it's not." "It's bleak, creepy, and occasionally terrifying," added Dave Kehr of the "Chicago Reader". Amelie Gillette of "The A.V. Club" frequently refers to its dark nature as unsuitable for its intended audience of young children although it had been one of her favorite movies growing up. Other reviews described the movie as "a horror show flying under the banner of family entertainment."


title: Return to Oz

text: Neil Gaiman reviewed "Return to Oz" for "Imagine" magazine, and stated that "Terrifying and visionary, funny and exciting, Return to Oz is one of the very best fantasy films I've ever seen."


title: Return to Oz

text: By the time of the film's release, the only surviving cast member from the 1939 film was Ray Bolger, who said in an interview that although he had no desire to watch the film, he noted that "they have a beautiful young lady as Dorothy and what I've seen of the film looks intriguing. It might be interesting for today's young people to see another version of the story.


title: Return to Oz

text: The film was banned for a very short period of time in Ingham County, Michigan, due to reports of protests over its "restricted" rules at the Ingham County Library near Lansing. At the time, the library decided not to bring its sale to the film because it couldn't comply with the school board that "G-rated films were only allowed to be shown only." The ban was lifted soon afterward.


title: Return to Oz

text: The film received an Academy Award nomination for Best Visual Effects, but lost to "Cocoon". The nomination was given to Will Vinton, Ian Wingrove, Zoran Perisic and Michael Lloyd. Fairuza Balk and Emma Ridley were nominated for Young Artist Awards and multiple Youthies. It received two Saturn Award nominations for Best Fantasy Film (losing to "Ladyhawke") and Best Younger Actor for Fairuza Balk (who lost to Barret Oliver for "D.A.R.Y.L.").


title: Odoacer

text: Odoacer ( ; – 15 March 493 AD), also spelled Odovacer or Odovacar, was a soldier and statesman of barbarian background, who deposed the child emperor Romulus Augustulus and became Rex/Dux (476–493). Odoacer's overthrow of Romulus Augustulus is traditionally seen as marking the end of the Western Roman Empire as well as Ancient Rome.


title: Odoacer

text: Though the real power in Italy was in his hands, he represented himself as the client of the emperor in Constantinople, Zeno. Odoacer often used the Roman honorific patrician, granted by Zeno, but was referred to as a king () or duke () in many documents, so is not clear which was his actual charge. He himself used the title of king in the only surviving official document that emanated from his chancery, and it was also used by the consul Basilius. Odoacer introduced few important changes into the administrative system of Italy. He had the support of the Roman Senate and was able to distribute land to his followers without much opposition. Unrest among his warriors led to violence in 477–478, but no such disturbances occurred during the later period of his reign. Although Odoacer was an Arian Christian, he rarely intervened in the affairs of the Trinitarian state church of the Roman Empire.


title: Odoacer

text: Likely of East Germanic descent, Odoacer was a military leader in Italy who led the revolt of Herulian, Rugian, and Scirian soldiers that deposed Romulus Augustulus on 4 September AD 476. (Eleven-year-old Augustulus had been declared Western Roman Emperor by his father Orestes, the rebellious general of the army in Italy, less than a year before, but had been unable to gain allegiance or recognition beyond central Italy.) With the backing of the Roman Senate, Odoacer thenceforth ruled Italy autonomously, paying lip service to the authority of Julius Nepos, the previous Western emperor, and Zeno, the emperor of the East. Upon Nepos's murder in 480 Odoacer invaded Dalmatia, to punish the murderers. He did so, executing the conspirators, but within two years also conquered the region and incorporated it into his domain.


title: Odoacer

text: When Illus, master of soldiers of the Eastern Empire, asked for Odoacer's help in 484 in his struggle to depose Zeno, Odoacer invaded Zeno's westernmost provinces. The emperor responded first by inciting the Rugii of present-day Austria to attack Italy. During the winter of 487–488 Odoacer crossed the Danube and defeated the Rugii in their own territory. Zeno also appointed the Ostrogoth Theodoric the Great, who was menacing the borders of the Eastern Empire, to be king of Italy, turning one troublesome ally against another. Theodoric invaded Italy in 489 and by August 490 had captured almost the entire peninsula, forcing Odoacer to take refuge in Ravenna. The city surrendered on 5 March 493. Theodoric invited Odoacer to a banquet of reconciliation; instead of forging an alliance, Theodoric killed the unsuspecting king.


title: Odoacer

text: Except for the fact that he was not considered Roman, Odoacer's precise ethnic origins are not known. Some scholars believe his origins lie in the multi-ethnic empire of Attila. Most scholars consider him to be at least partly of Germanic descent, while others argue he was entirely Germanic. Early medieval sources such as Theophanes called him a Goth. Likewise, the 6th century chronicler Marcellinus Comes called him "king of the Goths" ("Odoacer rex Gothorum").


title: Odoacer

text: Jordanes associated him with several of the East Germanic tribes of the Middle Danube who had arrived there during the time of Attila's empire, including the Sciri, Heruli, and Rugii. Notability, in several passages he associated him with the Turcilingi, which is a people, or perhaps a dynasty, that is mentioned by no other historical source. Their affiliations are unclear but they may have been Gothic, Hunnic or even precursors of the Thuringii. While in one passage in his "Getica", Jordanes describes Odoacer as king of the Turcilingi ("Torcilingorum rex") with Scirian and Heruli followers, in another passage (LVII.291), Jordanes mentions Italy during Odoacer's reign being under the tyranny of Turcilingi and Rogii. In his "Romana", the same author defines Odoacer as a descendant of the Rugii (or of a person named Rogus, "Odoacer genere Rogus") with Turcilingi, Scirian and Heruli followers. It has been pointed out that Attila had an uncle of the name Rogus and suggested that Odoacer may have been his descendant.


title: Odoacer

text: In a fragment from a history of Priscus, reproduced by John of Antioch, Odoacer is described as a man of the Sciri, the son of Edeco, and brother of Hunuulf who killed Armatus in the eastern Roman empire.


title: Odoacer

text: Much later, a memorial plate from 1521 found in the catacombe Chapel of St Maximus in Petersfriedhof—the burial site of St Peter's Abbey in Salzburg (Austria)—mentions Odoacer as King of "Rhutenes" or "Rhutenians" (), who invaded Noricum in 477. Due to its very late date of 1521 and several anachronistic elements, the content of that plate is considered nothing more than a legend. In spite of that, the plate has become a popular "source" for several theorists that try to connect Odoacer with ancient Celtic Ruthenes, and also with later Slavic Ruthenians. As noted by professor Paul R. Magocsi, those theories should be regarded as "inventive tales" of "creative" writers and nothing more.


title: Odoacer

text: Many historians, such as medieval scholar Michael Frasetto, accept that Odoacer was of Scirian heritage. Scholars are still to some extent divided about the evidence for Odoacer's father being a Hun, and also about the identity of the Turcilingi. There is some doubt about whether the name has been reported correctly by Jordanes, and whether they, and even the Sciri, were Germanic. Historian Bruce Macbain notes that the "ancient sources exhibit considerable confusion over Odovacer's tribal affiliation", but in point of fact none of them calls Odoacer a Hun. Historian Penny MacGeorge argues that Odoacer was likely half-Scirian and half-Thuringian. Historian Patrick Amory explains that "Odoacer is called a Scirian, a Rugian, a Goth or a Thuringian in sources; his father is called a Hun, his mother a Scirian. Odoacer's father Edeco was associated first with the Huns under Attila, and then with a group called Sciri, an ethnographic name that appears intermittently in fifth-century sources." This line of reasoning is also picked up on by historian Erik Jensen, who avows that Odoacer was born to a Gothic mother and that his father Edeco was a Hun.


title: Odoacer

text: The origin of the name Odoacer, which may give indications as to his tribal affiliation, is debated. One suggestion is that Odoacer is derived from the Germanic "*Audawakraz" (Gothic "*Audawakrs"), from "aud-" "wealth" and "wakr-" "vigilant" or, combined, "watcher of the wealth." This form finds a cognate in another Germanic language, the titular "Eadwacer" of the Old English poem "Wulf and Eadwacer" (where Old English renders the earlier Germanic sound "au-" as "ea-"). On the other hand, historians Robert L. Reynolds and Robert S. Lopez explored the possibility that the name Odoacer was not Germanic, making several arguments that his ethnic background might lie elsewhere. One of these is that his name, "Odoacer", for which they claimed an etymology in Germanic languages had not been convincingly found, could be a form of the Turkish "Ot-toghar" ("grass-born" or "fire-born"), or the shorter form "Ot-ghar" ("herder"). Reynolds and Lopez's thesis was criticized by Otto J. Maenschen-Helfen, who pointed out the speciousness of their etymological analysis, since names between Germans and Huns were being used reciprocally. Moreover, there is an often ignored fragment in the "Suda" that was almost certainly written by the well-informed contemporary, Malchus, who identified Odoacer as a Thuringian. Finally, a passage from Eugippius' "Life of Saint Severinus" indicated that Odoacer was so tall that he had to bend down to pass through the doorway, which Macbain consider another strong argument that he was unlikely to have been a Hun, since they were not known to be tall.


title: Odoacer

text: Possibly the earliest recorded incident involving Odoacer is from a fragment of a chronicle preserved in the "History of the Franks" of Gregory of Tours. Two different chapters of his work mention military leaders with Odoacer's name, using two different spellings and involving two different regions.


title: Odoacer

text: The earliest supposed recorded event which is more certainly about Odoacer the future king, was shortly before he arrived in Italy. Eugippius, in his "Life of Saint Severinus", records how a group of barbarians on their way to Italy had stopped to pay their respects to the holy man. Odoacer, at the time "a young man, of tall figure, clad in poor clothes", learned from Severinus that he would one day become famous. Despite the fact that Odoacer was an Arian Christian and Severinus was Catholic, the latter left a deep impression on him. When Odoacer took his leave, Severinus made one final comment which proved prophetic: "Go to Italy, go, now covered with mean hides; soon you will make rich gifts to many."


title: Odoacer

text: By 470, Odoacer had become an officer in what remained of the Roman Army. Although Jordanes writes of Odoacer as invading Italy "as leader of the Sciri, the Heruli and allies of various races", modern writers describe him as being part of the Roman military establishment, based on John of Antioch's statement that Odoacer was on the side of Ricimer at the beginning of his battle with the emperor Anthemius in 472. In his capacity as a soldier suddenly pitted against Anthemius, since he had switched sides to join with Ricimer, Odoacer had "hastened the emperor's downfall."


title: Odoacer

text: When Orestes was in 475 appointed "Magister militum" and patrician by the Western Roman Emperor Julius Nepos, Odoacer became head of the Germanic "foederati" of Italy (the ScirianHerulic "foederati"). Under the command of Orestes were significant contingents of Germanic peoples made up mostly of Rugii and Heruli tribesmen. Before the end of that year Orestes had rebelled and driven Nepos from Italy. Orestes then proclaimed his young son Romulus the new emperor as Romulus Augustus, called "Augustulus" (31 October). At this time, Odoacer was a soldier rising through the ranks. However, Nepos reorganized his court in Salona, Dalmatia and received homage and affirmation from the remaining fragments of the Western Empire beyond Italy and, most importantly, from Constantinople, which refused to accept Augustulus, Zeno having branded him and his father as traitors and usurpers.


title: Odoacer

text: About this time the "foederati", who had been quartered in Italy all of these years, had grown weary of this arrangement. In the words of J. B. Bury, "They desired to have roof-trees and lands of their own, and they petitioned Orestes to reward them for their services, by granting them lands and settling them permanently in Italy". Orestes refused their petition, and they turned to Odoacer to lead their revolt against Orestes. Orestes was killed at Placentia along with his brother Paulus outside Ravenna. The Germanic "foederati," the Scirians and the Heruli, as well as a large segment of the Italic Roman army, then proclaimed Odoacer "rex" ("king") on 23 August 476. Odoacer then advanced to Ravenna and captured the city, compelling the young emperor Romulus to abdicate on 4 September. According to the "Anonymus Valesianus", Odoacer was moved by Romulus's youth and his beauty to not only spare his life but give him a pension of 6,000 "solidi" and sent him to Campania to live with his relatives.


title: Odoacer

text: Following Romulus Augustus's deposition, according to the historian Malchus, upon hearing of the accession of Zeno to the throne, the Senate in Rome sent an embassy to the Eastern Emperor and bestowed upon him the Western imperial insignia. The message was clear: the West no longer required a separate Emperor, for "one monarch sufficed [to rule] the world". In response, Zeno accepted their gifts and this essentially brought to end any puppet emperors in the West, with Nepos banished and Anthemius dead. The Eastern Emperor then conferred upon Odoacer the title of Patrician and granted him legal authority to govern Italy in the name of Rome, as "dux Italiae". Zeno also suggested that Odoacer should receive Nepos back as Emperor in the West, "if he truly wished to act with justice." Although he accepted the title of Patrician and "Dux" from Zeno, Odoacer did not invite Julius Nepos to return to Rome, and the latter remained in Dalmatia until his death. Odoacer was careful to observe form, however, and made a pretence of acting on Nepos's authority, even issuing coins with both his image and that of Zeno. Following Nepos's murder in 480, who was killed while waiting in Dalmatia, Zeno became sole Emperor.


title: Odoacer

text: Bury, however, disagrees that Odoacer's assumption of power marked the fall of the Western Roman Empire:


title: Odoacer

text: In 476, Odoacer was proclaimed rex by his soldiers and "dux Italiae" by emperor Zeno, initiating a new era over Roman lands. According to Jordanes, at the beginning of his reign he "slew Count Bracila at Ravenna that he might inspire a fear of himself among the Romans." He took many military actions to strengthen his control over Italy and its neighboring areas. He achieved a solid diplomatic coup by inducing the Vandal king Gaiseric to cede Sicily to him. Noting that "Odovacar seized power in August of 476, Gaiseric died in January 477, and the sea usually became closed to navigation around the beginning of November", F.M. Clover dates this cession to September or October 476. When Julius Nepos was murdered by two of his retainers in his country house near Salona (9 May 480), Odoacer assumed the duty of pursuing and executing the assassins, and at the same time established his own rule in Dalmatia.


title: Odoacer

text: As Bury points out, "It is highly important to observe that Odovacar established his political power with the co-operation of the Roman Senate, and this body seems to have given him their loyal support throughout his reign, so far as our meagre sources permit us to draw inferences." He regularly nominated members of the Senate to the Consulate and other prestigious offices: "Basilius, Decius, Venantius, and Manlius Boethius held the consulship and were either Prefects of Rome or Praetorian Prefects; Symmachus and Sividius were consuls and Prefects of Rome; another senator of old family, Cassiodorus, was appointed a minister of finance." A. H. M. Jones also notes that under Odoacer the Senate acquired "enhanced prestige and influence" in order to counter any desires for restoration of Imperial rule. As the most tangible example of this renewed prestige, for the first time since the mid-3rd century copper coins were issued with the legend "S(enatus) C(onsulto)". Jones describes these coins as "fine big copper pieces", which were "a great improvement on the miserable little "nummi" hitherto current", and not only were they copied by the Vandals in Africa, but they formed the basis of the currency reform by Anastasius in the Eastern Empire.


title: Odoacer

text: Although Odoacer was an Arian Christian, his relations with the Chalcedonian church hierarchy were remarkably good. As G.M. Cook notes in her introduction to Magnus Felix Ennodius' "Life of Saint Epiphanius", he showed great esteem for Bishop Epiphanius: in response to the bishop's petition, Odoacer granted the inhabitants of Liguria a five-year immunity from taxes, and again granted his requests for relief from abuses by the praetorian prefect. The biography of Pope Felix III in the "Liber Pontificalis" openly states that the pontiff's tenure occurred during Odoacer's reign without any complaints about the king being registered.


title: Odoacer

text: In 487/488, Odoacer led his army to victory against the Rugians in Noricum, taking their king Feletheus into captivity; when word that Feletheus' son, Fredericus, had returned to his people, Odoacer sent his brother Onoulphus with an army back to Noricum against him. Onoulphus found it necessary to evacuate the remaining Romans and resettled them in Italy. The remaining Rugians fled and took refuge with the Ostrogoths; the abandoned province was settled by the Lombards by 493.


title: Odoacer

text: As Odoacer's position improved, Zeno, the Eastern Emperor, increasingly saw him as a rival. Odoacer exchanged messages with Illus, who had been in open revolt against Zeno since 484. Switching allegiances, Zeno subsequently sought to destroy Odoacer and then promised Theodoric the Great and his Ostrogoths the Italian peninsula if they were to defeat and remove Odoacer. As both Herwig Wolfram and Peter Heather point out, Theodoric had his own reasons to agree to this offer: "Theodoric had enough experience to know (or at least suspect) that Zeno would not, in the long term, tolerate his independent power. When Theodoric rebelled in 485, we are told, he had in mind Zeno's treatment of Armatus. Armatus defected from Basilicus to Zeno in 476, and was made senior imperial general for life. Within a year, Zeno had him assassinated."


title: Odoacer

text: In 489, Theodoric led the Ostrogoths across the Julian Alps and into Italy. On 28 August, Odoacer met him at the Isonzo, only to be defeated. He withdrew to Verona, reaching its outskirts on 27 September, where he immediately set up a fortified camp. Theodoric followed him and three days later defeated him again. While Odoacer took refuge in Ravenna, Theodoric continued across Italy to Mediolanum, where the majority of Odoacer's army, including his chief general Tufa, surrendered to the Ostrogothic king. Theodoric had no reason to doubt Tufa's loyalty and dispatched his new general to Ravenna with a band of elite soldiers. Herwig Wolfram observes, "[b]ut Tufa changed sides, the Gothic elite force entrusted to his command was destroyed, and Theodoric suffered his first serious defeat on Italian soil." Theodoric recoiled by seeking safety in Ticinum. Odoacer emerged from Ravenna and started to besiege his rival. While both were fully engaged, the Burgundians seized the opportunity to plunder and devastated Liguria. Many Romans were taken into captivity, and did not regain their freedom until Theodoric ransomed them three years later.


title: Odoacer

text: The following summer, the Visigothic king Alaric II demonstrated what Wolfram calls "one of the rare displays of Gothic solidarity" and sent military aid to help his kinsman, forcing Odoacer to raise his siege. Theodoric emerged from Ticinum, and on 11 August 490, the armies of the two kings clashed on the Adda River. Odoacer again was defeated and forced back into Ravenna, where Theodoric besieged him. Ravenna proved to be invulnerable, surrounded by marshes and estuaries and easily supplied by small boats from its hinterlands, as Procopius later pointed out in his "History". Further, Tufa remained at large in the strategic valley of the Adige near Trent, and received unexpected reinforcements when dissent amongst Theodoric's ranks led to sizable desertions. That same year, the Vandals took their turn to strike while both sides were fully engaged and invaded Sicily. While Theodoric was engaged with them, his ally Fredericus, king of the Rugians, began to oppress the inhabitants of Pavia, whom the latter's forces had been garrisoned to protect. Once Theodoric intervened in person in late August, 491, his punitive acts drove Fredericus to desert with his followers to Tufa.


title: Odoacer

text: By this time, however, Odoacer appeared to have lost all hope of victory. A large-scale sortie he sent out of Ravenna on the night of 9/10 July 491 ended in failure, during which his commander-in-chief, Livilia, along with the best of his Herulian soldiers were killed. On 29 August 492, the Goths were about to assemble enough ships at Rimini to set up an effective blockade of Ravenna. Despite these decisive losses, the war dragged on until 25 February 493 when John, bishop of Ravenna, was able to negotiate a treaty between Theodoric and Odoacer to occupy Ravenna together and share joint rule. After a three-year siege, Theodoric entered the city on 5 March. Odoacer died ten days later, slain by Theodoric while they shared a meal. Theodoric had plotted to have a group of his followers kill him while the two kings were feasting together in the imperial palace of Honorius "Ad Laurentum" ("At the Laurel Grove"); when this plan went astray, Theodoric drew his sword and struck him on the collarbone. In response to Odoacer's dying question, "Where is God?" Theodoric cried, "This is what you did to my friends." Theodoric was said to have stood over the body of his dead rival and exclaimed, "The man has no bones in his body."


title: Odoacer

text: Not only did Theodoric slay Odoacer, he thereafter had the betrayed king's loyal followers hunted down and killed as well, an event which left him as the master of Italy. Odoacer's wife Sunigilda was stoned to death, and his brother Onoulphus was killed by archers while seeking refuge in a church. Theodoric exiled Odoacer's son Thela to Gaul, but when he attempted to return to Italy Theodoric had him killed. Despite the tragic ending of his domain, followers, and family, Odoacer left an important legacy, in that, he had laid the foundations for a great kingdom in Italy for Theodoric to exploit.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: Remembrance of Earth's Past () is a science fiction series by Chinese writer Liu Cixin. The series is also popularly referred to by the title of its first novel, "The Three-Body Problem" (). The series details humanity's discovery of and preparation for an alien invasion force from the planet Trisolaris.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: Sophons are eleven-dimensional protons generated with Trisolaran particle accelerators. Placed into 2-dimensional space, they are embedded in circuitry to create a supercomputer, and when viewed in 3 dimensional space are typically the size of a proton though they can switch dimensions to change sizes in 3-dimensional space. They can visually record anything and thus their secondary purpose is to act as surveillance devices, beaming the information they gather back to another sophon instantaneously via quantum entanglement. Their primary purpose for their Trisolaran manufacturers is to disrupt Earth's particle accelerators, capable of straying into the paths of fired particles and scrambling the results of experiments before re-assembling, effectively blocking advancement of the science. Since they can move through three-dimensional space at the speed of light, a single sophon is capable of disrupting all of Earth's particle accelerators.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: Trisolaran space probes are covered in a strong interaction force material. Due to this material, they are stronger than any material in the solar system and thus are impervious to any physical attack. Their propulsion system is capable of moving in any direction in 3D space. Seemingly unaffected by inertia, they can make sudden impossible turns, and their primary method of attack is to simply smash through objects.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: Simplified in a demonstration as a piece of soap attached to a paper boat on water, with the soap reducing the water tension at its end, and the water tension disparity propelling the boat. Traveling through previous paths slows the boat down due to decreased surface tension. Curvature Propulsion is a method of light speed travel that utilizes the same concept, via reducing the speed of light it is possible to drag a ship through space at light speed, while its wake is a reduced light-speed region of space.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: Humanity by the time of the Dark Forest has developed cryogenic technology, capable of preserving a human life, unaging, for hundreds of years barring certain genetic disorders. Initially, it is viewed as a sign of inequality before it is fully developed, viewed as a way for the rich to simply skip through the centuries to eras of more advanced technology, peace, and human development. With the advent of the Trisolaran invasion, however, it becomes a near-worthless technology in terms of demand, as people prefer to die naturally in a world still free from Trisolaris rather than skip ahead to doomsday. Because of this, only researchers and certain high-value staff make use of cryogenics to skip through time.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: The study of theoretical interactions between cosmic civilizations. This area of study is first proposed by the character Ye Wenjie in conversation with future Wallfacer Luo Ji. Ye Wenjie proposes two axioms of cosmic sociology: "First: Survival is the primary need of civilization. Second: Civilization continuously grows and expands, but the total matter in the universe remains constant." After becoming a Wallfacer, Luo Ji uses the axioms provided by Ye Wenjie to invent the dark forest theory of the universe and the idea of dark forest deterrence to stop the Trisolaran invasion.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: "The Three-Body Problem" () is a postponed Chinese science fiction 3D film, adapted from "The Three-Body Problem", directed by Fanfan Zhang, and starring Feng Shaofeng and Zhang Jingchu.


title: Remembrance of Earth's Past

text: A series based on the trilogy has been ordered by Netflix, with David Benioff, D. B. Weiss, and Alexander Woo set to write and executive produce.


title: Ehren McGhehey

text: Kenneth Ehren McGhehey Jr. (born November 29, 1976), also known as Danger Ehren, is an American stunt performer, actor and former professional snowboarder. He is best known as one of the cast members of the reality stunt franchise "Jackass".


title: Ehren McGhehey

text: McGhehey was born and raised in McMinnville, Oregon to father Kenneth and mother Linda. He grew up in a mortuary as both his parents were morticians. He is the youngest of three children (in birth order: Lesley, Stacey, and Ehren). He started skateboarding at the age of 12. After graduating from McMinnville High School in 1995, he became a professional snowboarder. He later retired from snowboarding due to breaking his neck and got a job at a skate shop in Portland, Oregon. There, he filmed some of his ideas and stunts on a small scale.


title: Ehren McGhehey

text: McGhehey joined "Jackass" after his good friend Dave England asked director Jeff Tremaine to put him on the team. He later appeared in all three seasons and four "Jackass" films. His motto when performing stunts on the show was "Safety First". McGhehey is often referred to by his nickname "Danger Ehren" by fellow "Jackass" cast and crew, not least due to his tendency to injure himself and lose teeth in the pursuit of stunts.


title: Ehren McGhehey

text: He's the butt of many jokes by the "Jackass" crew, most notably in the infamous "Terror Taxi" skit from "Jackass Number Two", one of Johnny Knoxville's favorites. In a stunt where McGhehey played a terrorist passenger in a taxicab, he unknowingly wore a "pube beard" made up from the shaved pubic hair of his co-stars and crew members. In a podcast with Steve-O, McGhehey suggested some of those jokes amounted to bullying, and that some of it happened off-camera.


title: Peggy Carter (Marvel Cinematic Universe)

text: Margaret "Peggy" Carter is a fictional character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) media franchise portrayed by Hayley Atwell, based on the Marvel Comics character of the same name. Carter is depicted as a British MI6 agent and member of the Strategic Scientific Reserve who became the love interest of Steve Rogers during World War II. Following the war, she goes on to become one of the founders of S.H.I.E.L.D., eventually serving as the Director. Atwell has received critical praise for her depiction of the character.


text: , the character has appeared in five films, as well as the short film "Agent Carter" (2013), the second season of "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.", and her own television series "Agent Carter" (2015–2016).


text: Alternate versions of the character named Captain Carter appear in the animated series "What If...?" (2021–present) and the film "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" (2022). "What If...?" Carter receives the Super Soldier Serum instead of Rogers, and is later recruited by the Watcher to join the Guardians of the Multiverse in the battle against an alternate version of Ultron. "Multiverse of Madness" Captain Carter, also a supersoldier, is a member of the Illuminati from a reality called Earth-838.


text: The character debuted in a single panel (and unnamed) as a wartime love interest of Captain America in "Tales of Suspense" #75 (March 1966), and then receiving a name in #77 (May 1966). She was created by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby.