document_title: Ice Age: Continental Drift

question_text: who plays the grandma in ice age continental drift

text: Ice Age: Continental Drift

text: Plot[edit]

text: While Scrat inadvertently causes the break up of Pangaea, Manny and Ellie are forced to deal with the trials and tribulations of their teenage daughter Peaches, who has trouble fitting in with her peers. Ellie tries to support her daughter, but Manny becomes exceedingly over-protective. Meanwhile, Sid's family returns, but only long enough to drop off the elderly Granny before abandoning them both. Shortly after, a continental break-up separates Manny from The Herd. Trapped on a moving chunk of ice with Sid, Granny, and Diego, Manny has no choice but to ride out the current. Meanwhile, a giant land shift encroaches on Ellie, Peaches, and those remaining on land, causing them to make their way towards a land bridge.

text: Meanwhile, Scrat, in a subplot, finds an acorn that has a treasure map on it that directs him towards an island. After violent weather pushes them further away from land, Manny's group is captured by a band of pirates sailing on a floating iceberg led by a Gigantopithecus, Captain Gutt, who attempts to press them into his crew. When they refuse, Gutt tries to execute them, leading to their escape, which inadvertently cause the ship and food supplies to sink. Gutt's first mate, a female sabretooth named Shira, joins them after she is left for dead.

text: The Herd washes ashore on Switchback Cove, which gives a current back to their home. Manny coordinates a plan using a group of hyrax to steal a new iceberg ship that Gutt is planning to use, and they are able to escape using the ship, Shira staying with Gutt. Gutt forms another ship and plans to seek revenge on Manny.

text: After narrowly escaping a pack of sirens, Manny, Sid, Diego, and Granny return home only to find the land bridge destroyed and that Gutt has beaten them and taken Ellie, Peaches, and the rest of The Herd hostage. A fight issues, as Granny's pet whale, Precious, arrives and fends off Gutt's crew. Manny defeats Gutt in a final duel on an ice floe and reunites with his family and friends. Gutt subsequently encounters a siren that assumes the shape of a female Gigantopithecus, and is eaten alive. With their home destroyed, Precious takes the entire crew, including Shira to a lush island where the hyraxes from earlier have already started rebuilding their civilization.

text: In the film's epilogue, Scrat discovers the island on the map, known as Scratlantis (a parody of Atlantis), but his uncontrollable urge to hunt acorns in the acorn-rich city inadvertently causes the entire island to sink when he unplugs an acorn drain holder; Scrat is then ejected into a newly created desert landscape, through which he screams as his tears boil from the heat.

text: Voice cast[edit]

text:
Ray Romano as Manny,[6] a Woolly Mammoth who is Ellie's husband and Peaches' overprotective father
John Leguizamo as Sid,[6] a lazy, but caring Ground Sloth
Denis Leary as Diego,[6] a Smilodon that is in love with Shira
Seann William Scott as Crash,[6] an opossum, Eddie's brother, and Ellie's close friend and adoptive brother
Josh Peck as Eddie,[6] an opossum, Crash's brother, and Ellie's close friend and adoptive brother
Peter Dinklage as Captain Gutt,[7] a Gigantopithecus. Jeremy Renner was originally announced to voice Gutt[6]
Wanda Sykes as Granny,[6][7] Sid's 80-year-old grandmother
Jennifer Lopez as Shira,[6][7] a Smilodon, and Gutt's first mate, until she is separated from her crew and falls in love with Diego
Queen Latifah as Ellie,[6] a Woolly Mammoth who is Manny's wife and Peaches' mother
Josh Gad as Louis,[8] a molehog and Peaches' best friend who has a crush on her
Keke Palmer as Peaches,[6] a teenage Woolly Mammoth and Manny and Ellie's daughter
Nick Frost as Flynn an elephant seal[7][8]
Aziz Ansari as Squint,[6][7] a rabbit (Palaeolagus) who is part of Gutt's crew
Drake as Ethan,[6] a mammoth that Peaches has a crush on
Nicki Minaj as Steffie,[8][9] a mammoth who is Ethan's girlfriend and makes fun of Peaches
Alan Tudyk as Milton,[8] Sid's father and Hunky Siren
Ester Dean as Sloth Siren and Gutt's Siren[10]
Kunal Nayyar as Gupta,[8] a Bengali Badger (Chamitataxus)
Rebel Wilson as Raz,[7][11] a kangaroo (Procoptodon)
Eddie "Piolín" Sotelo as Uncle Fungus, Sid's uncle
Joy Behar as Eunice, Sid's mother[8][12]
Alain Chabat as Silas,[7][8] a Blue-footed booby
Heather Morris as Katie,[8][13] one of Steffie's best friends
Chris Wedge as Scrat, a sabre-toothed squirrel[8]
Patrick Stewart as Ariscratle, a saber-toothed squirrel from Scratlantis[14]

text: Production[edit]

text: The first details of the sequel were announced on January 10, 2010, when The New York Times reported that Blue Sky was working on a fourth film and was in negotiations with the voice cast.[15] Fox later confirmed on May 5, 2010, that Ice Age: Continental Drift would be released on July 13, 2012.[16]

text: Soundtrack[edit]

text:
Ice Age: Continental Drift

Film score by John Powell

Released
July 10, 2012

Recorded
2012

Genre
Score

Length
57:57

Label
Varèse Sarabande

John Powell film scores chronology

Dr. Seuss' The Lorax
(2012)Dr. Seuss' The Lorax2012
Ice Age: Continental Drift
(2012)
Rio 2
(2014)Rio 22014

text: Ice Age: Continental Drift is the soundtrack of the film scored by John Powell and was released on July 10, 2012.[17]

text: Track listing[edit]

text:
No.
Title
Length

1.
"Morning Peaches"
2:22

2.
"Schism"
2:28

3.
"Storm"
3:50

4.
"No Exit Gutt"
5:37

5.
"Escape from Captivity"
3:02

6.
"New Loves"
4:50

7.
"Hyraxes / Prison Talk"
2:57

8.
"Diversion"
3:57

9.
"Pirating the Pirates"
4:37

10.
"Teen Cave"
4:42

11.
"Sirens"
2:35

12.
"Land Bridge Trap"
8:22

13.
"Herd Reunion"
3:08

14.
"Scrat's Fantasia"
5:30

Total length:
57:57

text: Featured in the film was "Chasing the Sun", performed by The Wanted[18] the film's first theme song, and the second theme song "We are (Family)" written by Ester Dean, performed by Keke Palmer.[19] Both songs play during the credits and are not available on the soundtrack. "Chasing The Sun" can be found on The Wanted's 2012 American debut extended play, The Wanted EP, while an alternate version of "We are (Family)" sung only by Keke Palmer is available for download.

text: In addition to the original score by John Powell, the film also features Beethoven's 9th Symphony. Powell explained his decision: "At the beginning of the film, the creation of the geographical world as we know it seemed just such an immense idea to musically convey, that I gave up entirely and used Beethoven's Ninth Symphony instead. With a bit of obscenely crass re-orchestration and blatantly cheap arranging tricks normally associated with strippers, we got it to fit the action perfectly. But the cost that I must now bear is having to live forever in hiding, since the "Beethoven Society" issued a "fatwa" on me."[20]

text: Release[edit]

text: Ice Age: Continental Drift had its premiere on June 20, 2012, at the CineEurope film distributors' trade fair in Barcelona.[21] It publicly premiered on June 27, 2012, in Belgium, Egypt, France, Switzerland, and Trinidad, and was released on July 13, 2012, in the USA.[22] The film is accompanied by the short animated film The Longest Daycare featuring Maggie Simpson.[23][24]

text: Marketing[edit]

text: As a promotion for Ice Age: Continental Drift, Fox released two 3-minute short segments from the film,[25] titled Scrat's Continental Crack-up and Scrat's Continental Crack-up: Part 2. The first part premiered as a theatrical release attached to Gulliver's Travels in 2010,[26] and it was released on-line on January 6, 2011, on iTunes Movie Trailers.[26] The second part was released on November 16, 2011, on iTunes,[27] and debuted in theatres with Alvin and the Chipmunks: Chipwrecked.[28] The first part shows how the Scrat's actions lead to split of the continents, while in the second part, Scrat's underwater pursuit of acorns leads him to a pirate ship.

text: The film was featured on Tommy Baldwin Racing's #10 car driven by Tomy Drissi for the 2012 NASCAR Sprint Cup Series Toyota/Save Mart 350 held on June 24, 2012.[29]

text: Home media[edit]

text: Ice Age: Continental Drift was released on DVD, Blu-ray, and Blu-ray 3D on December 11, 2012.[1]

text: Reception[edit]

text: Box office[edit]

text: Ice Age: Continental Drift earned $161,321,843 in North America, and $715,922,939 in other territories, for a worldwide total of $877,244,782.[3] Its worldwide opening weekend totaled $126.9 million.[30] Worldwide, it is the 47th-highest-grossing film of all time,[31] the fifth-highest-grossing film of 2012 (also, the highest-grossing animated film of that year),[32] and the second-highest-grossing film in the Ice Age series.[33] Overall, it is the eleventh-highest-grossing animated film of all time.

text: In North America, the film earned $16.7 million on its opening day and $46.6 million on its opening weekend, which was the second-largest opening weekend in the Ice Age series, only behind The Meltdown ($68 million).[34] The film closed from theaters on February 7, 2013 with $161 million, thus standing as the lowest-grossing film in the series, until Ice Age: Collision Course would gross less than $100 million in 2016.[35]

text: Outside North America, it is the twelfth-highest-grossing film, the third-highest-grossing 2012 film and the second-highest-grossing film distributed by Fox. It set an all-time record among animated films, until Disney's Frozen surpassed it.[36] Ice Age 4 had a two-day (Wednesday–Thursday) opening of $11 million from 12 markets.[37] On its opening weekend (through Sunday), it earned first place with $80.3 million from 34 markets, opening #1 in all of them.[38][39] The film set an opening-day record in Nicaragua and a Thursday-opening record in Guatemala. In Peru, it earned the second-highest-grossing opening day and the highest for an animated film. It also set opening-day records for an animated film in Russia[40] and in Sweden[41] and achieved the second-highest-grossing opening day for an animated film in France ($4.5 million), Colombia, Argentina, and Chile.[37] The film set opening-weekend records for any film in Argentina (first surpassed by Iron Man 3),[42] Colombia, Peru, Central America, and Chile, and opening-weekend records for an animated film in Norway, Sweden (surpassed by Frozen),[43] Ecuador, and Bolivia.[44] Its largest opening weekends were recorded in Russia and the CIS ($16.9 million), China ($15.7 million),[45] and France and the Maghreb region ($12.8 million).[46] It is the second-highest-grossing film in Latin America with at least $181 million, only behind Marvel's The Avengers.[47]

text: Critical response[edit]

text: Review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reports that 37% of critics have given the film positive reviews, with a rating average of 5.1/10 based on 131 reviews. The consensus statement reads, "Ice Age: Continental Drift 3D has moments of charm and witty slapstick, but it often seems content to recycle ideas from the previous films."[48] Another review aggregator, Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 top reviews from mainstream critics, calculated a score of 49 based on 29 reviews, indicating "mixed or average reviews."[49] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A-" on an A+ to F scale.[50]

text: Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film two stars out of four and stated: "Watching this film was a cheerless exercise for me. The characters are manic and idiotic, the dialogue is rat-a-tat chatter, the action is entirely at the service of the 3-D, and the movie depends on bright colors, lots of noise and a few songs in between the whiplash moments."[51] Megan Lehmann of The Hollywood Reporter said: "It's familiar, drawn-out shtick, and the humor lacks the subtlety of the first and best Ice Age, but there are some visually inventive high points."[52] Simon Brew, writing for Den of Geek, gave a very positive four-star review, saying that "not only is Ice Age 4 arguably the best in the franchise yet, it's also, a little surprisingly perhaps (given that it's a fourth movie in a franchise, turned around on a strict cycle), turned out to be thoroughly, thoroughly entertaining family blockbuster."[53]

text: Video games[edit]

text: Ice Age Village is a mobile video game, developed by Gameloft, and was released on April 5, 2012 to iPhone, iPad and various Android devices.[54][55]

text: Ice Age: Continental Drift – Arctic Games, a video game based on the film, developed by Behaviour Interactive, published by Activision and was released on July 10, 2012[56] for Wii, Nintendo 3DS, Nintendo DS, and Xbox 360.[57]

text: Sequel[edit]

text: A sequel, titled Ice Age: Collision Course, was released on July 22, 2016.[5][58]


document_title: Ink sac

question_text: ink glands in cephalopods are used mainly for

root

text: Ink sac

text: An ink sac is an anatomical feature that is found in many cephalopod mollusks used to produce the defensive cephalopod ink. With the exception of nocturnal and very deep water cephalopods, all coeloids (squid, octopus and cuttlefish) which dwell in light conditions have an ink sac, which can be used to expel a cloud of dark ink in order to confuse predators.[1]

tag: p

text: The ink sac is a muscular bag which originated as an extension of the hind gut; it is a modified hypobranchial gland.[2] It lies beneath the gut and opens into the anus, into which its contents – almost pure melanin – can be squirted; its proximity to the base of the funnel means that the ink can be distributed by ejected water as the cephalopod uses its jet propulsion.[1] The ejected cloud of melanin is bound by mucus particles, so it forms a lump approximately the size and shape of the cephalopod, fixing the predator's attention while the mollusc itself makes a hasty escape.[1]

text: A general level of provocation is necessary to trigger an octopus to release its ink, as it is biologically costly to produce. Some species can even use their ink to stun or numb their predators.[citation needed]


document_title: Alpha-amylase

question_text: where do you find alpha amylase in your body

text: Alpha-amylase

text: In human physiology[edit]

text: Although found in many tissues, amylase is most prominent in pancreatic juice and saliva, each of which has its own isoform of human α-amylase. They behave differently on isoelectric focusing, and can also be separated in testing by using specific monoclonal antibodies. In humans, all amylase isoforms link to chromosome 1p21 (see AMY1A).

text: Salivary amylase (ptyalin)[edit]

text: Amylase is found in saliva and breaks starch into maltose and dextrin. This form of amylase is also called "ptyalin" /ˈtaɪəlɪn/[4] It will break large, insoluble starch molecules into soluble starches (amylodextrin, erythrodextrin, and achrodextrin) producing successively smaller starches and ultimately maltose. Ptyalin acts on linear α(1,4) glycosidic linkages, but compound hydrolysis requires an enzyme that acts on branched products. Salivary amylase is inactivated in the stomach by gastric acid. In gastric juice adjusted to pH 3.3, ptyalin was totally inactivated in 20 minutes at 37 °C. In contrast, 50% of amylase activity remained after 150 minutes of exposure to gastric juice at pH 4.3.[5] Both starch, the substrate for ptyalin, and the product (short chains of glucose) are able to partially protect it against inactivation by gastric acid. Ptyalin added to buffer at pH 3.0 underwent complete inactivation in 120 minutes; however, addition of starch at a 0.1% level resulted in 10% of the activity remaining, and similar addition of starch to a 1.0% level resulted in about 40% of the activity remaining at 120 minutes.[6]

text: Optimum conditions for ptyalin[edit]

text: Genetic variation in human salivary amylase[edit]

text: The salivary amylase gene has undergone duplication during evolution, and DNA hybridization studies indicate many individuals have multiple tandem repeats of the gene. The number of gene copies correlates with the levels of salivary amylase, as measured by protein blot assays using antibodies to human amylase. Gene copy number is associated with apparent evolutionary exposure to high-starch diets.[8] For example, a Japanese individual had 14 copies of the amylase gene (one allele with 10 copies, and a second allele with four copies). The Japanese diet has traditionally contained large amounts of rice starch. In contrast, a Biaka individual carried six copies (three copies on each allele). The Biaka are rainforest hunter-gatherers who have traditionally consumed a low-starch diet. Perry and colleagues speculated the increased copy number of the salivary amylase gene may have enhanced survival coincident to a shift to a starchy diet during human evolution.

text: Pancreatic amylase[edit]

text: Pancreatic α-amylase randomly cleaves the α(1-4) glycosidic linkages of amylose to yield dextrin, maltose, or maltotriose. It adopts a double displacement mechanism with retention of anomeric configuration.

text: In pathology[edit]

text: The test for amylase is easier to perform than that for lipase, making it the primary test used to detect and monitor pancreatitis. Medical laboratories will usually measure either pancreatic amylase or total amylase. If only pancreatic amylase is measured, an increase will not be noted with mumps or other salivary gland trauma.

text: However, because of the small amount present, timing is critical when sampling blood for this measurement. Blood should be taken soon after a bout of pancreatitis pain, otherwise it is excreted rapidly by the kidneys.

text: Salivary α-amylase has been used as a biomarker for stress[9][10] and as a surrogate marker of sympathetic nervous system (SNS) activity[11] that does not require a blood draw.

text: Interpretation[edit]

text: Increased plasma levels in humans are found in:

text:
Salivary trauma (including anaesthetic intubation)
Mumps – due to inflammation of the salivary glands
Pancreatitis – because of damage to the cells that produce amylase
Renal failure – due to reduced excretion

tag: ul

text: Total amylase readings of over 10 times the upper limit of normal (ULN) are suggestive of pancreatitis. Five to 10 times the ULN may indicate ileus or duodenal disease or renal failure, and lower elevations are commonly found in salivary gland disease.

text: Genes[edit]

text:
salivary – AMY1A, AMY1B, AMY1C
pancreatic – AMY2A, AMY2B

text: In grain[edit]

text: α-Amylase activity in grain is measured by, for instance, the Hagberg-Perten Falling Number, a test to assess sprout damages,[12] or the Phadebas method.

text: Industrial use[edit]

text: α-Amylase is used in ethanol production to break starches in grains into fermentable sugars.

text: The first step in the production of high-fructose corn syrup is the treatment of cornstarch with α-amylase, producing shorter chains of sugars oligosaccharides.

text: An α-amylase called "Termamyl", sourced from Bacillus licheniformis, is also used in some detergents, especially dishwashing and starch-removing detergents.[13]

text: See amylase for more uses of the amylase family in general.

text: Potential for medical use[edit]

text: α-Amylase has exhibited efficacy in degrading polymicrobial bacterial biofilms by hydrolyzing the α(1-4) glycosidic linkages within the structural, matrix exopolysaccharides of the extracellular polymeric substance (EPS).[14][15]

text: Buffer inhibition[edit]

text: The tris molecule is reported to inhibit a number of bacterial α-amylases,[16][17] so they should not be used in tris buffer.

text: Determination[edit]

text: Several methods are available for determination of α-amylase activity, and different industries tend to rely on different methods. The starch iodine test, a development of the iodine test, is based on colour change, as α-amylase degrades starch and is commonly used in many applications. A similar but industrially produced test is the Phadebas amylase test, which is used as a qualitative and quantitative test within many industries, such as detergents, various flour, grain, and malt foods, and forensic biology.

text: Domain architecture[edit]

text: α-Amylases contain a number of distinct protein domains. The catalytic domain has a structure consisting of an eight-stranded alpha/beta barrel that contains the active site, interrupted by a ~70-amino acid calcium-binding domain protruding between beta strand 3 and alpha helix 3, and a carboxyl-terminal Greek key beta-barrel domain.[18] Several alpha-amylases contain a beta-sheet domain, usually at the C terminus. This domain is organised as a five-stranded antiparallel beta-sheet.[19][20] Several alpha-amylases contain an all-beta domain, usually at the C terminus.[21]


document_title: Moai

question_text: what was the purpose of the easter island statues

text: Moai

text: Description[edit]

text: The moai are monolithic statues, their minimalist style related to forms found throughout Polynesia. Moai are carved in relatively flat planes, the faces bearing proud but enigmatic expressions. The human figures would be outlined in the rock wall first, then chipped away until only the image was left.[11] The over-large heads (a three-to-five ratio between the head and the trunk, a sculptural trait that demonstrates the Polynesian belief in the sanctity of the chiefly head) have heavy brows and elongated noses with a distinctive fish-hook-shaped curl of the nostrils. The lips protrude in a thin pout. Like the nose, the ears are elongated and oblong in form. The jaw lines stand out against the truncated neck. The torsos are heavy, and, sometimes, the clavicles are subtly outlined in stone. The arms are carved in bas relief and rest against the body in various positions, hands and long slender fingers resting along the crests of the hips, meeting at the hami (loincloth), with the thumbs sometimes pointing towards the navel. Generally, the anatomical features of the backs are not detailed, but sometimes bear a ring and girdle motif on the buttocks and lower back. Except for one kneeling moai, the statues do not have clearly visible legs.

text: Though moai are whole-body statues, they are erroneously referred to as "Easter Island heads" in some popular literature. This is partly because of the disproportionate size of most moai heads, and partly because many of the iconic images for the island showing upright moai are the statues on the slopes of Rano Raraku, many of which are buried to their shoulders. Some of the "heads" at Rano Raraku have been excavated and their bodies seen, and observed to have markings that had been protected from erosion by their burial.

text: The average height of the moai is about 4 m (13 ft), with the average width at the base around 1.6 m (5.2 ft). These massive creations usually weigh in at around 12.5 tonnes (13.8 tons) each.

text: All but 53 of the more than 900 moai known to date were carved from tuff (a compressed volcanic ash) from Rano Raraku, where 394 moai in varying states of completion are still visible today. There are also 13 moai carved from basalt, 22 from trachyte and 17 from fragile red scoria.[12] At the end of carving, the builders would rub the statue with pumice.

text: Characteristics[edit]

text: Easter Island statues are known for their large, broad noses and strong chins, along with rectangle-shaped ears and deep eye slits. Their bodies are normally squatting, with their arms resting in different positions and are without legs. The majority of the ahu are found along the coast and face inland towards the community.  There are some inland ahu such as Ahu Akivi. These moai face the community but given the small size of the island, also appear to face the coast.[13]

text: Eyes[edit]

text: In 1979, Sergio Rapu Haoa and a team of archaeologists discovered that the hemispherical or deep elliptical eye sockets were designed to hold coral eyes with either black obsidian or red scoria pupils.[14] The discovery was made by collecting and reassembling broken fragments of white coral that were found at the various sites. Subsequently, previously uncategorized finds in the Easter Island museum were re-examined and recategorized as eye fragments. It is thought that the moai with carved eye sockets were probably allocated to the ahu and ceremonial sites, suggesting that a selective Rapa Nui hierarchy was attributed to the moai design until its demise with the advent of the Birdman religion, Tangata Manu.

text: Symbolism[edit]

text:
Many archaeologists suggest that "[the] statues were thus symbols of authority and power, both religious and political. But they were not only symbols. To the people who erected and used them, they were actual repositories of sacred spirit. Carved stone and wooden objects in ancient Polynesian religions, when properly fashioned and ritually prepared, were believed to be charged by a magical spiritual essence called mana."[citation needed]
Archaeologists believe that the statues were a representation of the ancient Polynesians' ancestors. The moai statues face away from the ocean and towards the villages as if to watch over the people. The exception is the seven Ahu Akivi which face out to sea to help travelers find the island. There is a legend that says there were seven men who waited for their king to arrive.[15]

text: Pukao topknots and headdresses[edit]

text: The more recent moai had pukao on their heads, which represent the topknot of the chieftains. According to local tradition, the mana was preserved in the hair. The pukao were carved out of red scoria, a very light rock from a quarry at Puna Pau. Red itself is considered a sacred color in Polynesia. The added pukao suggest a further status to the moai.[16]

text: Markings (post stone working)[edit]

text: When first carved, the surface of the moai was polished smooth by rubbing with pumice. Unfortunately, the easily worked tuff from which most moai were carved is also easily eroded, and, today, the best place to see the surface detail is on the few moai carved from basalt or in photographs and other archaeological records of moai surfaces protected by burials.

text: Those moai that are less eroded typically have designs carved on their backs and posteriors. The Routledge expedition of 1914 established a cultural link[17] between these designs and the island's traditional tattooing, which had been repressed by missionaries a half-century earlier. Until modern DNA analysis of the islanders and their ancestors, this was key scientific evidence that the moai had been carved by the Rapa Nui and not by a separate group from South America.

text: At least some of the moai were painted; Hoa Hakananai'a was decorated with maroon and white paint until 1868, when it was removed from the island. It is now housed in the British Museum, London.

text: History[edit]

text: The statues were carved by the Polynesian colonizers of the island, mostly between circa 1250 A.D. and 1500 A.D.[1] In addition to representing deceased ancestors, the moai, once they were erected on ahu, may also have been regarded as the embodiment of powerful living or former chiefs and important lineage status symbols.  Each moai presented a status: "The larger the statue placed upon an ahu, the more mana the chief who commissioned it had."[16] The competition for grandest statue was ever prevalent in the culture of the Easter Islanders. The proof stems from the varying sizes of moai.[16]

text: Completed statues were moved to ahu mostly on the coast, then erected, sometimes with red stone cylinders (pukao) on their heads. Moai must have been extremely expensive to craft and transport; not only would the actual carving of each statue require effort and resources, but the finished product was then hauled to its final location and erected.

text: The quarries in Rano Raraku appear to have been abandoned abruptly, with a litter of stone tools and many completed moai outside the quarry awaiting transport and almost as many incomplete statues still in situ as were installed on ahu. In the nineteenth century, this led to conjecture that the island was the remnant of a sunken continent and that most completed moai were under the sea. That idea has long been debunked, and now it is understood that:

text:
Some statues were rock carvings and never intended to be completed.
Some were incomplete because, when inclusions were encountered, the carvers would abandon a partial statue and start a new one[18] (tuff is a soft rock with occasional lumps of much harder rock included in it).
Some completed statues at Rano Raraku were placed there permanently and not parked temporarily awaiting removal.[19]
Some were indeed incomplete when the statue-building era came to an end.

text: Craftsmen[edit]

text: It is not known exactly which group in the communities were responsible for carving statues.  Oral traditions suggest that the moai were either carved by a distinguished class of professional carvers who were comparable in status to high-ranking members of other Polynesian craft guilds, or, alternatively, by members of each clan. The oral histories show that the Rano Raraku quarry was subdivided into different territories for each clan.

text: Transportation[edit]

text: This section may require cleanup to meet Wikipedia's quality standards. The specific problem is: the section is not chronological with its exploration of different theories and the ongoing debate. Please help improve this section if you can. (June 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

tag: table

text: Since the island was largely treeless by the time the Europeans first visited, the movement of the statues was a mystery for a long time; pollen analysis has now established that the island was almost totally forested until 1200 A.D. The tree pollen disappeared from the record by 1650.

text: It is not known exactly how the moai were moved across the island.  Earlier researchers assumed that the process almost certainly required human energy, ropes, and possibly wooden sledges (sleds) and/or rollers, as well as leveled tracks across the island (the Easter Island roads). Another theory suggests that the moai were placed on top of logs and were rolled to their destinations.[20] If that theory is correct it would take 50-150 people to move the moai.[citation needed]  The most recent study demonstrates from the evidence in the archaeological record that the statues were harnessed with ropes from two sides and made to "walk" by tilting them from side to side while pulling forward.[4][6][21][22] They would also use a chant, whilst 'walking' the moai. Coordination and cohesion was essential, so they developed a chant in which the rhythm helped them pull at the precise moment necessary.[23][better source needed]

text: Oral histories recount how various people used divine power to command the statues to walk. The earliest accounts say a king named Tuu Ku Ihu moved them with the help of the god Makemake, while later stories tell of a woman who lived alone on the mountain ordering them about at her will. Scholars currently support the theory that the main method was that the moai were "walked" upright (some assume by a rocking process), as laying it prone on a sledge (the method used by the Easter Islanders to move stone in the 1860s) would have required an estimated 1500 people to move the largest moai that had been successfully erected. In 1998, Jo Anne Van Tilburg suggested fewer than half that number could do it by placing the sledge on lubricated rollers. In 1999, she supervised an experiment to move a nine-tonne moai. They attempted to load a replica on a sledge built in the shape of an A frame that was placed on rollers. A total of 60 people pulled on several ropes in two attempts to tow the moai. The first attempt failed when the rollers jammed up. The second attempt succeeded when they embedded tracks in the ground. This was on flat ground and used eucalyptus wood rather than the native palm trees that would have lived on the island.[24]

text: In 1986, Pavel Pavel, Thor Heyerdahl and the Kon Tiki Museum experimented with a five-tonne moai and a nine-tonne moai. With a rope around the head of the statue and another around the base, using eight workers for the smaller statue and 16 for the larger, they "walked" the moai forward by swiveling and rocking it from side to side; however, the experiment was ended early due to damage to the statue bases from chipping. Despite the early end to the experiment, Thor Heyerdahl estimated that this method for a 20-tonne statue over Easter Island terrain would allow 320 feet (100 m) per day. Other scholars concluded that it was probably not the way the moai were moved due to the reported damage to the base caused by the "shuffling" motion.[24][25]

text: Around the same time, archaeologist Charles Love experimented with a 10-tonne replica. His first experiment found rocking the statue to walk it was too unstable over more than a few hundred yards. He then found that placing the statue upright on two sled runners atop log rollers, 25 men were able to move the statue 150 feet (46 m) in two minutes. In 2003, further research indicated this method could explain supposedly regularly spaced post holes (his research on this claim has not yet been published) where the statues were moved over rough ground. He suggested the holes contained upright posts on either side of the path so that as the statue passed between them, they were used as cantilevers for poles to help push the statue up a slope without the requirement of extra people pulling on the ropes and similarly to slow it on the downward slope. The poles could also act as a brake when needed.[26]

text: Based on detailed studies of the statues found along prehistoric roads, archaeologists Terry Hunt and Carl Lipo have shown that the pattern of breakage, form and position of statues is consistent with an "upright" hypothesis for transportation.[4] Hunt and Lipo argue that when the statues were carved at a quarry, the sculptors left their bases wide and curved along the front edge. They showed that statues along the road have a center of mass that causes the statue to lean forward. As the statue tilts forward, it rocks sideways along its curved front edge and takes a "step."  Large flakes are seen broken off of the sides of the bases. They argue that once the statue was "walked" down the road and installed in the landscape, the wide and curved base was carved down.[27]   All of this evidence points to an upright transportation practice.

text: Recent experimental recreations have proven that it is fully possible that the moai were literally walked from their quarries to their final positions by ingenious use of ropes. Teams of workers would have worked to rock the moai back and forth, creating the walking motion and holding the moai upright.[21][28] If correct, it can be inferred that the fallen road moai were the result of the teams of balancers being unable to keep the statue upright, and it was presumably not possible to lift the statues again once knocked over.[29] However, the debate continues.[30]

text: Birdman cult[edit]

text: Originally, Easter Islanders had a paramount chief or single leader.[citation needed] Through the years the power levels veered from sole chiefs to a warrior class, known as "matatoa". The therianthropic figure of a half bird and half man was the symbol of the matatoa; the distinct character connected the sacred site of Orongo. The new cult prompted battles of tribes over worship of ancestry. Creating the moai was one way the islanders would honor their ancestors; during the height of the birdman cult there is evidence which suggests that the construction of moai stopped.

text: "One of the most fascinating sights at Orongo are the hundreds of petroglyphs carved with birdman and Makemake images. Carved into solid basalt, they have resisted ages of harsh weather. It has been suggested that the images represent birdman competition winners. Over 480 birdman petroglyphs have been found on the island, mostly around Orongo."[31] Orongo, the site of the cult's festivities, was a dangerous landscape which consisted of a "narrow ridge between a 1,000 foot drop into the ocean on one side and a deep crater on the other". Considered the sacred spot of Orongo, Mata Ngarau was the location where birdman priests prayed and chanted for a successful egg hunt. "The purpose of the birdman contest was to obtain the first egg of the season from the offshore islet Motu Nui. Contestants descended the sheer cliffs of Orongo and swam to Motu Nui where they awaited the coming of the birds. Having procured an egg, the contestant swam back and presented it to his sponsor, who then was declared birdman for that year, an important status position."[32]

text: Moai Kavakava[edit]

text: These figures are much smaller than the better-known stone moai. They are made of wood and have a small, slender aspect, giving them a sad appearance. These figures are believed to have been made after the civilization on Rapa Nui began to collapse, which is why they seem to have a more emaciated appearance to them.[33]

text: 1722–1868 Toppling of the Moai[edit]

text: At some point after the 1722 Roggeveen visit, all of the moai that had been erected on ahus were toppled, with the last standing statues reported in 1838 by Abel Aubert Dupetit Thouars, and no upright statues by 1868,[34] apart from the partially buried ones on the outer slopes of Rano Raraku.

text: Oral histories include one account of a clan pushing down a single moai in the night but others refer to the "earth shaking" and other indications that at least some of them fell down through earthquakes.[35] Some of the moai toppled forward such that their faces were hidden and often fell in such a way that their necks broke; others fell off of the back of their platforms.[35] Today, about 50 moai have been re-erected on their ahus or at museums elsewhere.[36]

text: The Rapa Nui people were then devastated by the slave trade that began at the island in 1862. Within only a time span of one year the individuals that remained on the island were sick, injured, and lacking leadership. The survivors of the slave raids had new company from landing missionaries. The society was vulnerable and the converting process of Christianity did not take long. Native Easter Islanders lost their identity as first their style of clothing and soon their tattoos and body paint were banned by the new Christian proscriptions. The history of their ancestors was destroyed: artwork, buildings, sacred objects; leaving little record of the islanders' former lives. They were then subjected to forceful removal from their native lands and made to reside on a much smaller portion of the island while the rest was used for farming.[31] "Eventually all pure Rapa Nui blood died out. Annexation with Chile brought new influences, and today there are only a few individuals left with ties to the original population."[31][better source needed]

text: Removal[edit]

text: Eleven or more moai have been removed from the island and transported to locations around the world, including six out of the thirteen moai that were carved from basalt.

text: Preservation and restoration[edit]

text: From 1955 through 1978, an American archaeologist, William Mulloy, undertook extensive investigation of the production, transportation and erection of Easter Island's monumental statuary. Mulloy's Rapa Nui projects include the investigation of the Akivi-Vaiteka Complex and the physical restoration of Ahu Akivi (1960); the investigation and restoration of Ahu Ko Te Riku and Ahu Vai Uri and the Tahai Ceremonial Complex (1970); the investigation and restoration of two ahu at Hanga Kio'e (1972); the investigation and restoration of the ceremonial village at Orongo (1974) and numerous other archaeological surveys throughout the island.

text: The Rapa Nui National Park and the moai are included in the 1972 UN convention concerning the protection of the world's cultural and natural heritage and consequently on the 1994 list of UNESCO World Heritage sites.

text: The moai have been mapped by a number of groups over the years including efforts by Father Sebastian Englert and Chilean researchers.[37][38]  The EISP (Easter Island Statue Project) conducted research and documentation on many of the moai on Rapa Nui and the artifacts held in museums overseas. The purpose of the project is to understand the figures' original use, context, and meaning, with the results being provided to the Rapa Nui families and the island's public agencies that are responsible for conservation and preservation of the moai. Other studies include work by Britton Shepardson[39] and Terry L. Hunt and Carl P. Lipo.[40]

text: In 2008, a Finnish tourist chipped a piece off the ear of one moai. The tourist was fined $17,000 in damages and was banned from the island for three years.[41][42]

text:
Tukuturi at Rano Raraku is the only kneeling moai and one of the few made of red scoria.

Early European drawing of moai, in the lower half of a 1770 Spanish map of Easter Island

text: Unicode character[edit]

text: In 2010, Moai was included as an emoji in Unicode version 6.0 under the code point U+1F5FF and is represented as such:

text: In operating systems that did not come with fonts that natively support all codepoints of Unicode 6.0 or greater, the Symbola font by George Douros is available, 'free for any use' as per Douros.

text: The official unicode name for the emoji is spelled "Moyai". This is the name of a statue near Shibuya Station in Tokyo, which is inspired by Moai from the Easter Island but looks distinct. This has caused inconsistent drawings to be adopted for this emoji by various companies with proprietary emoji images.[43]


document_title: Rocky II

question_text: who played apollo creed's wife in rocky 2

question_tokens: who played apollo creed 's wife in rocky 2

text: Rocky II

text: Plot[edit]

text: On New Year's Day in 1976, boxing heavyweight champion Apollo Creed has successfully defended his title in a split decision against challenger Rocky Balboa. He and Rocky are taken to the same hospital. Apollo challenges Rocky to a rematch, but Rocky declines and retires from professional boxing. His girlfriend, Adrian, supports his choice, and so do his doctors, who reveal that he will require surgery for a detached retina, a condition that could lead to permanent blindness. In a private moment, Rocky goes to see a recuperating Apollo, and wants a truthful response if Apollo gave his all in the fight, to which Creed agrees. After Rocky is released from the hospital, he enjoys the benefits of his life's changes: Rocky's new fame attracts an agent who sees Rocky as a potential endorsement and sponsorship goldmine, and his sudden wealth encourages him to propose to Adrian. She happily accepts, and they marry in a small ceremony. Soon after, Adrian reveals that she is pregnant.

text: Meanwhile, fueled by hate mail, Apollo becomes obsessed with the idea that a rematch is the only way to prove that Rocky's performance was simply a fluke. Determined to rectify his boxing career's only blemish, Apollo ignores all pleas by his friends and family to forget the fight, and move on to other potential opponents, and instead demands his team do whatever necessary to goad Rocky out of his hiatus and have a rematch with him.

text: Rocky, at first, seems unaffected by Apollo's smear campaign, but his inexperience with money causes him to run into financial problems. After several unsuccessful attempts to find employment, Rocky visits Mickey Goldmill, his trainer and manager, at his gym to talk about the possibility of returning to boxing. At first, Mickey declines, concerned about Rocky's health, but he soon accepts after Apollo publicly insults Rocky. Adrian confronts Rocky about the danger of returning to boxing and reminds him of the risk to his eyesight. Rocky argues that he knows nothing else, so this is the only way he can provide. Adrian, furious at Rocky for breaking his promise, refuses to support him.

text: Rocky and Mickey begin training, but Rocky's mind is not fully set due to Adrian's disapproval. Adrian's brother, Paulie, confronts his sister about not supporting her husband, but she faints during the confrontation, and is rushed to the hospital, where she goes into labor. Despite being premature, the baby is healthy, but Adrian falls into a coma. Rocky blames himself for what happened, refusing to leave Adrian's bedside until she wakes up, and will not go to see his new baby until they can see it together. When Adrian comes out of her coma, she finds Rocky by her bedside, and the couple are shown their new baby, a boy, which they name Rocky Jr. Adrian gives her blessing to the rematch, and Rocky quickly gets into shape for the match. When he makes the same training run that he did before, ending at the stairway by the Philadelphia Museum of Art, he is now followed by a crowd of hundreds of children, some of whom followed him with his consent near the start of his run.

text: The night of the match arrives, and Apollo has made a public goal of beating Rocky in no more than two rounds to prove the first match going the full fifteen rounds was a fluke. This match is not nearly as close this time as Rocky, fighting right-handed to protect his eye instead of his natural southpaw, is knocked down twice by Creed and outclassed for much of the fight. By the fifteenth round, Creed is well ahead on points and only needs to stay away from Balboa to win the fight by decision. Creed, not wanting the fight to end like it did the first time, ignores his trainer's pleas, and decides to carry on alone. In the final round, Rocky switches back to his natural stance, and in dramatic fashion, both men, exhausted, trade punches until they knock each other down. If neither got up, it would be a draw with Creed retaining the title. Rocky gets back up at the count of nine while Apollo collapses from fatigue, giving Rocky the win by knockout, and making him the new world champion. Rocky then gives an impassioned speech to the crowd and holds the belt over his head with a message for his wife, who is watching the fight on TV: "Yo, Adrian, I did it!"

text: Cast[edit]

text:
Sylvester Stallone as Rocky Balboa, "The Italian Stallion": the underdog who was given one chance at attaining the Heavy Weight Champion title from Apollo Creed in the first film. Due to the public's belief that it was very possible that Rocky would have won, he gets a second shot at the title in this film.
Talia Shire as Adrian Balboa: Rocky's love interest-turned-wife. During labor, with their first son, she enters a coma for a large portion of the film.
Burt Young as Paulie Pennino: Rocky's best-friend-turned-brother-in-law
Carl Weathers as Apollo Creed: Current Heavyweight Champion of the world who gave Rocky a shot at the title in the first film, during which he won by split-decision. Because of the close outcome of the fight the general public believes that Apollo did not necessarily win, and thus he gives Rocky a second chance in a rematch.
Burgess Meredith as Mickey Goldmill: Rocky's friend, manager and trainer; a former bantamweight fighter from the 1920s and the owner of the local boxing gym.
Tony Burton as Tony "Duke" Evers: Apollo's father-figure, friend, trainer, and manager.
Sylvia Meals as Mary Anne Creed: Apollo Creed's wife.
Seargeoh Stallone as Robert "Rocky" Balboa, Jr.: Rocky and Adrian's newborn child. Seargeoh appeared in the film uncredited.
Joe Spinell as Tony Gazzo: Loan shark and Rocky's former employer.
Paul J. Micale as Father Carmine: Rocky's priest.

text: Jeff Temkin portrays the ring announcer. Appearing as themselves are referee Lou Filippo and commentators Brent Musburger, Stu Nahan and Bill Baldwin. LeRoy Neiman makes an uncredited non-speaking cameo appearance during the training scenes in the film; he is shown drawing a picture of Apollo while he is training.

text: Production[edit]

text: After the enormous success of the first Rocky, the producers were anxious to make a sequel. Stallone again wrote the script, originally titled Rocky II: Redemption, but John G. Avildsen declined to direct again because he was busy with pre-production on Saturday Night Fever. Stallone wanted the job and waged as big a campaign as he had for the lead role in the previous film.  United Artists executives were reluctant to give the actor the directing reins because, while he had previously directed the drama Paradise Alley, it was not a success. However, producers Irwin Winkler and Robert Chartoff understood how much of the success of the first Rocky had come from Stallone's enormous input and lobbied hard to get him the job.

text: The story development of involving Rocky surprising Creed by switching to fighting right-handed was not in the original script and only came about because of an accident onset.  While getting in shape for the film, Stallone was bench pressing and ripped his left pectoral muscle and needed surgery. Therefore, he could not fight with his left hand.

text: The film's ending fight sequence also posed a challenge because at the time Talia Shire was busy making the drama Old Boyfriends and couldn't be on the set.  So Stallone came up with the idea of having her watch the fight from home because of the new baby.  Adrian's scenes were actually filmed some months later, toward the end of the shoot.

text: An estimated 800 school children were used as extras in the scene in which Rocky runs through Philadelphia.[3]

text: Music[edit]

text:
Rocky II
Soundtrack album by Bill ContiReleased
1979Length
35:04Label
United Artists Records – LP EMI Manhattan Records – CD

text: Just as in the previous installment, Bill Conti composed the film's music. A soundtrack album containing Conti's score was released on August 25, 1979, and charted on the Billboard 200 for five consecutive weeks.[4]

text:
"Redemption" – 2:34
"Gonna Fly Now" – 2:35
"Conquest" – 4:42
"Vigil" – 6:31
"All of My Life" – 3:56
"Overture" – 8:38
"Two Kinds of Love" – 2:37
"All of My Life" – 2:27

tag: ol

text:
Bill Conti – piano (1)
Mike Lang – piano (8)
David Duke – horn solo (4)
Frank Stallone – vocals (7)
DeEtta Little, Nelson Pigford – vocals (5)

text: Chart positions[edit]

text:
Chart (1979)

Peakposition

US Billboard 200[5]

147

text: Reaction[edit]

text: Critical response[edit]

text: Rocky II holds a 74% approval rating on the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes; out of 27 reviews, the average rating is 6.5/10. The site's consensus reads: "Rocky II is a movie that dares you to root again for the ultimate underdog – and succeeds due to an infectiously powerful climax."[6] The film won Best Picture at the American Movie Awards[7] and won the People's Choice Award for Favorite Motion Picture.[8]  Dre Rivas of Film.com included it in his list of top ten films of 1979.[9]

text: Box office[edit]

text: Rocky II finished in the top three highest-grossing films of 1979, in both the North American market and worldwide. The film grossed $6,390,537 during its opening weekend, $85,182,160 at the U.S. box office, and $200,182,160 overall.[10]

text: Rocky II returned to UA 75% of Rocky's rentals in the United States and Canada ($42 million vs. $56 million[11]) when the rule of thumb at the time was that a sequel would only do 30% to 40% of the business of its predecessor.[12]

text: Other media[edit]

text: Novelization[edit]

text: A novelization was published by Ballantine Books in 1979. Sylvester Stallone was credited as the author.  The book is a first-person narrative told by Rocky himself.[13]


document_title: Nimrod

question_text: who is the founder of babylon as recorded in the bible

text: Nimrod

text: Biblical account[edit]

text: The first biblical mention of Nimrod is in the Table of Nations.[3] He is described as the son of Cush, grandson of Ham, and great-grandson of Noah; and as "a mighty one in the earth" and "a mighty hunter before the Lord". This is repeated in the First Book of Chronicles 1:10, and the "Land of Nimrod" used as a synonym for Assyria or Mesopotamia, is mentioned in the Book of Micah 5:6:

text: And they shall waste the land of Assyria with the sword, and the land of Nimrod in the entrances thereof: thus shall he deliver us from the Assyrian, when he cometh into our land, and when he treadeth within our borders.

text: Genesis says that the "beginning of his kingdom" (reshit mamlakto) were the towns of "Babel, Erech, Akkad and Calneh in the land of Shinar" (Mesopotamia) (Gen 10:10)—understood variously to imply that he either founded these cities, ruled over them, or both. Owing to an ambiguity in the original Hebrew text, it is unclear whether it is he or Ashur who additionally built Nineveh, Resen, Rehoboth-Ir and Calah (both interpretations are reflected in various English versions). Sir Walter Raleigh devoted several pages in his History of the World (c. 1616) to reciting past scholarship regarding the question of whether it had been Nimrod or Ashur who built the cities in Assyria.[4]

text: Traditions and legends[edit]

text: In Hebrew and Christian tradition, Nimrod is considered the leader of those who built the Tower of Babel in the land of Shinar,[5] though the Bible never actually states this. Nimrod's kingdom included the cities of Babel, Erech, Accad, and perhaps Calneh, in Shinar (Ge 10:10).[6] Flavius Josephus believed that it was likely under his direction that the building of Babel and its tower began; in addition to Josephus, this is also the view found in the Talmud (Chullin 89a, Pesahim 94b, Erubin 53a, Avodah Zarah 53b), and later midrash such as Genesis Rabba. Several of these early Judaic sources also assert that the king Amraphel, who wars with Abraham later in Genesis, is none other than Nimrod himself.

text: Since Accad (Babylonian Akkad) was destroyed and lost with the destruction of its Empire in the period 2200–2154 BCE (long chronology), the stories mentioning Nimrod seem to recall the late Early Bronze Age. The association with Erech (Babylonian Uruk), a city that lost its prime importance around 2,000 BCE as a result of struggles between Isin, Larsa and Elam, also attests the early provenance of the stories of Nimrod. According to some modern-day theorists, their placement in the Bible suggests a Babylonian origin—possibly inserted during the Babylonian captivity.[7]

text: Judaic interpreters as early as Philo and Yochanan ben Zakai (1st century AD) interpreted "a mighty hunter before the Lord" (Heb. : לפני יהוה, lit. "in the face of the Lord") as signifying "in opposition to the Lord"; a similar interpretation is found in Pseudo-Philo, as well as later in Symmachus. Some rabbinic commentators have also connected the name Nimrod with a Hebrew word meaning 'rebel'. In Pseudo-Philo (dated ca. AD 70), Nimrod is made leader of the Hamites, while Joktan as leader of the Semites, and Fenech as leader of the Japhethites, are also associated with the building of the Tower.[8] Versions of this story are again picked up in later works such as Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius (7th century AD).

text: The Book of Jubilees mentions the name of "Nebrod" (the Greek form of Nimrod) only as being the father of Azurad, the wife of Eber and mother of Peleg (8:7). This account would thus make him an ancestor of Abraham, and hence of all Hebrews.

text: Josephus wrote:

text: Now it was Nimrod who excited them to such an affront and contempt of God. He was the grandson of Ham, the son of Noah, a bold man, and of great strength of hand. He persuaded them not to ascribe it to God, as if it were through his means they were happy, but to believe that it was their own courage which procured that happiness. He also gradually changed the government into tyranny, seeing no other way of turning men from the fear of God, but to bring them into a constant dependence on his power. He also said he would be revenged on God, if he should have a mind to drown the world again; for that he would build a tower too high for the waters to reach. And that he would avenge himself on God for destroying their forefathers.

text: Now the multitude were very ready to follow the determination of Nimrod, and to esteem it a piece of cowardice to submit to God; and they built a tower, neither sparing any pains, nor being in any degree negligent about the work: and, by reason of the multitude of hands employed in it, it grew very high, sooner than any one could expect; but the thickness of it was so great, and it was so strongly built, that thereby its great height seemed, upon the view, to be less than it really was. It was built of burnt brick, cemented together with mortar, made of bitumen, that it might not be liable to admit water. When God saw that they acted so madly, he did not resolve to destroy them utterly, since they were not grown wiser by the destruction of the former sinners; but he caused a tumult among them, by producing in them diverse languages, and causing that, through the multitude of those languages, they should not be able to understand one another. The place wherein they built the tower is now called Babylon, because of the confusion of that language which they readily understood before; for the Hebrews mean by the word Babel, confusion ...

text: An early Arabic work known as Kitab al-Magall or the Book of Rolls (part of Clementine literature) states that Nimrod built the towns of Hadâniûn, Ellasar, Seleucia, Ctesiphon, Rûhîn, Atrapatene, Telalôn, and others, that he began his reign as king over earth when Reu was 163, and that he reigned for 69 years, building Nisibis, Raha (Edessa) and Harran when Peleg was 50. It further adds that Nimrod "saw in the sky a piece of black cloth and a crown." He called upon Sasan the weaver and commanded him to make him a crown like it, which he set jewels on and wore. He was allegedly the first king to wear a crown. "For this reason people who knew nothing about it, said that a crown came down to him from heaven." Later, the book describes how Nimrod established fire worship and idolatry, then received instruction in divination for three years from Bouniter, the fourth son of Noah.[9]

text: In the Recognitions (R 4.29), one version of the Clementines, Nimrod is equated with the legendary Assyrian king Ninus, who first appears in the Greek historian Ctesias as the founder of Nineveh. However, in another version, the Homilies (H 9:4–6), Nimrod is made to be the same as Zoroaster.

text: The Syriac Cave of Treasures (ca. 350) contains an account of Nimrod very similar to that in the Kitab al-Magall, except that Nisibis, Edessa and Harran are said to be built by Nimrod when Reu was 50, and that he began his reign as the first king when Reu was 130. In this version, the weaver is called Sisan, and the fourth son of Noah is called Yonton.

text: Jerome, writing ca. 390, explains in Hebrew Questions on Genesis that after Nimrod reigned in Babel, "he also reigned in Arach [Erech], that is, in Edissa; and in Achad [Accad], which is now called Nisibis; and in Chalanne [Calneh], which was later called Seleucia after King Seleucus when its name had been changed, and which is now in actual fact called Ctesiphon." However, this traditional identification of the cities built by Nimrod in Genesis is no longer accepted by modern scholars, who consider them to be located in Sumer, not Syria.

text: The Ge'ez Conflict of Adam and Eve with Satan (ca. 5th century) also contains a version similar to that in the Cave of Treasures, but the crown maker is called Santal, and the name of Noah's fourth son who instructs Nimrod is Barvin.

text: However, Ephrem the Syrian (306–373) relates a contradictory view, that Nimrod was righteous and opposed the builders of the Tower. Similarly, Targum Pseudo-Jonathan (date uncertain) mentions a Jewish tradition that Nimrod left Shinar in southern Mesopotamia and fled to Assyria in northern Mesopotamia, because he refused to take part in building the Tower—for which God rewarded him with the four cities in Assyria, to substitute for the ones in Babel.

text: Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer (c. 833) relates the Jewish traditions that Nimrod inherited the garments of Adam and Eve from his father Cush, and that these made him invincible. Nimrod's party then defeated the Japhethites to assume universal rulership. Later, Esau (grandson of Abraham), ambushed, beheaded, and robbed Nimrod. These stories later reappear in other sources including the 16th century Sefer haYashar, which adds that Nimrod had a son named Mardon who was even more wicked.[10]

text: In the History of the Prophets and Kings by the 9th century Muslim historian al-Tabari, Nimrod has the tower built in Babil, Allah destroys it, and the language of mankind, formerly Syriac, is then confused into 72 languages. Another Muslim historian of the 13th century, Abu al-Fida, relates the same story, adding that the patriarch Eber (an ancestor of Abraham) was allowed to keep the original tongue, Hebrew in this case, because he would not partake in the building. The 10th-century Muslim historian Masudi recounts a legend making the Nimrod who built the tower to be the son of Mash, the son of Aram, son of Shem, adding that he reigned 500 years over the Nabateans. Later, Masudi lists Nimrod as the first king of Babylon, and states that he dug great canals and reigned 60 years. Still elsewhere, he mentions another king Nimrod, son of Canaan, as the one who introduced astrology and attempted to kill Abraham.

text: In Armenian legend, the ancestor of the Armenian people, Hayk, defeated Nimrod (sometimes equated with Bel) in a battle near Lake Van.

text: In the Hungarian legend of the Enchanted Stag (more commonly known as the White Stag [Fehér Szarvas] or Silver Stag), King Nimród (aka Ménrót and often described as "Nimród the Giant" or "the giant Nimród", descendant of one of Noah's "most wicked" sons, Kam (references abound in traditions, legends, several religions and historical sources to persons and nations bearing the name of Kam or Kám, and overwhelmingly, the connotations are negative), is the first person referred to as forefather of the Hungarians. He, along with his entire nation, is also the giant responsible for the building of the Tower of Babel—construction of which was supposedly started by him 201 years after the event of the Great Flood (see biblical story of Noah's Ark). After the catastrophic failure (through God's will) of that most ambitious endeavour and in the midst of the ensuing linguistic cacophony, Nimród the giant moved to the land of Evilát, where his wife, Enéh gave birth to twin brothers Hunor and Magyar (aka Magor). Father and sons were, all three of them, prodigious hunters, but Nimród especially is the archetypal, consummate, legendary hunter and archer. Both the Huns' and Magyars' historically attested skill with the recurve bow and arrow are attributed to Nimród. (Simon Kézai, personal "court priest" of King László Kún, in his Gesta Hungarorum, 1282-85. This tradition can also be found in over twenty other medieval Hungarian chronicles, as well as a German one, according to Dr Antal Endrey in an article published in 1979).

text: The twin sons of King Nimród, Hunor and Magor, each with 100 warriors, followed the White Stag through the Meotis Marsh, where they lost sight of the magnificent animal. Hunor and Magor found the two daughters of King Dul of the Alans, together with their handmaidens, whom they kidnapped. Hungarian legends held Hunor and Magyar (aka Magor) to be ancestors of the Huns and the Magyars (Hungarians), respectively. According to the Miholjanec legend, Stephen V of Hungary had in front of his tent a golden plate with the inscription: "Attila, the son of Bendeuci, grandson of the great Nimrod, born at Engedi: By the Grace of God King of the Huns, Medes, Goths, Dacians, the horrors of the world and the scourge of God."

text: Nimrod figures in some very early versions of the history of Freemasonry, where he was said to have been one of the fraternity's founders. According to the Encyclopedia of Freemasonry: The legend of the Craft in the Old Constitutions refers to Nimrod as one of the founders of Masonry. Thus in the York MS., No. 1, we read: "At ye making of ye toure of Babell there was a Masonrie first much esteemed of, and the King of Babilon yt called Nimrod was a Mason himself and loved well Masons." However, he does not figure in the current rituals.

text: The demon Nyyrikki, figuring in the Finnish Kalevala as a helper of Lemminkäinen, is associated with Nimrod by some researchers and linguists.[11]

text: Evil Nimrod vs. the righteous Abraham[edit]

text: A confrontation between Nimrod and Abraham is said to have taken place, according to several Jewish and Islamic traditions. Some stories bring them both together in a cataclysmic collision, seen as a symbol of the confrontation between Good and Evil, and/or as a symbol of monotheism against polytheism. On the other hand, some Jewish traditions say only that the two men met and had a discussion.[1]

text: According to K. van der Toorn; P. W. van der Horst, this tradition is first attested in the writings of Pseudo-Philo.[12] The story is also found in the Talmud, and in rabbinical writings in the Middle Ages.[13]

text: In some versions (as in Flavius Josephus), Nimrod is a man who sets his will against that of God. In others, he proclaims himself a god and is worshipped as such by his subjects, sometimes with his consort Semiramis worshipped as a goddess at his side. (See also Ninus.)

text: A portent in the stars tells Nimrod and his astrologers of the impending birth of Abraham, who would put an end to idolatry. Nimrod therefore orders the killing of all newborn babies. However, Abraham's mother escapes into the fields and gives birth secretly. At a young age, Abraham recognizes God and starts worshiping Him. He confronts Nimrod and tells him face-to-face to cease his idolatry, whereupon Nimrod orders him burned at the stake. In some versions, Nimrod has his subjects gather wood for four whole years, so as to burn Abraham in the biggest bonfire the world had ever seen. Yet when the fire is lit, Abraham walks out unscathed.

text: In some versions, Nimrod then challenges Abraham to battle. When Nimrod appears at the head of enormous armies, Abraham produces an army of gnats which destroys Nimrod's army. Some accounts have a gnat or mosquito enter Nimrod's brain and drive him out of his mind (a divine retribution which Jewish tradition also assigned to the Roman Emperor Titus, destroyer of the Temple in Jerusalem).

text: In some versions, Nimrod repents and accepts God, offering numerous sacrifices that God rejects (as with Cain). Other versions have Nimrod give to Abraham, as a conciliatory gift, the giant slave Eliezer, whom some accounts describe as Nimrod's own son. (The Bible also mentions Eliezer as Abraham's majordomo, though not making any connection between him and Nimrod.)

text: Still other versions have Nimrod persisting in his rebellion against God, or resuming it. Indeed, Abraham's crucial act of leaving Mesopotamia and settling in Canaan is sometimes interpreted as an escape from Nimrod's revenge. Accounts considered canonical place the building of the Tower many generations before Abraham's birth (as in the Bible, also Jubilees); however in others, it is a later rebellion after Nimrod failed in his confrontation with Abraham. In still other versions, Nimrod does not give up after the Tower fails, but goes on to try storming Heaven in person, in a chariot driven by birds.

text: The story attributes to Abraham elements from the story of Moses' birth (the cruel king killing innocent babies, with the midwives ordered to kill them) and from the careers of Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego who emerged unscathed from the fire. Nimrod is thus given attributes of two archetypal cruel and persecuting kings - Nebuchadnezzar and Pharaoh. Some Jewish traditions also identified him with Cyrus, whose birth according to Herodotus was accompanied by portents, which made his grandfather try to kill him.

text: A confrontation is also found in the Qur'an, between a king, not mentioned by name, and the Prophet Ibrahim (Arabic for "Abraham"). Muslim commentators assign Nimrod as the king based on Jewish sources. In Ibrahim's confrontation with the king, the former argues that Allah (God) is the one who gives life and gives death. The king responds by bringing out two people sentenced to death. He releases one and kills the other, as a poor attempt at making a point that he also brings life and death. Ibrahim refutes him by stating that Allah brings the Sun up from the East, and so he asks the king to bring it from the West. The king is then perplexed and angered.

text: Whether or not conceived as having ultimately repented, Nimrod remained in Jewish and Islamic tradition an emblematic evil person, an archetype of an idolater and a tyrannical king. In rabbinical writings up to the present, he is almost invariably referred to as "Nimrod the Evil" (Hebrew: נמרוד הרשע).

text: Nimrod is mentioned by name in several places in the Baha'i scriptures, including the Kitáb-i-Íqán, the primary theological work of the Baha'i religion. There it is said that Nimrod "dreamed a dream" which his soothsayers interpreted as signifying the birth of a new star in heaven. A herald is then said to have appeared in the land announcing "the coming of Abraham."[14] Nimrod is also mentioned in one of the earliest writings of the Báb (the herald of the Baha'i Faith). Citing examples of God's power, he asks: "Has He not, in past days, caused Abraham, in spite of His seeming helplessness, to triumph over the forces of Nimrod?"[15]

text: The story of Abraham's confrontation with Nimrod did not remain within the confines of learned writings and religious treatises, but also conspicuously influenced popular culture. A notable example is "Quando el Rey Nimrod" ("When King Nimrod"), one of the most well-known folksongs in Ladino (the Judeo-Spanish language), apparently written during the reign of King Alfonso X of Castile. Beginning with the words: "When King Nimrod went out to the fields/ Looked at the heavens and at the stars/He saw a holy light in the Jewish quarter/A sign that Abraham, our father, was about to be born", the song gives a poetic account of the persecutions perpetrated by the cruel Nimrod and the miraculous birth and deeds of the savior Abraham. (Full original text and an English translation appear in the Ladino Wikipedia article.)[16][17][18]

text: Islamic narrative[edit]

text: According to the Islamic narrative, Abraham seems to have a series of discussions with Nimrod.[19] The Quran states, "Have you not considered him who had an argument with Abraham about his Lord, because God had given him the kingdom (i.e. he was prideful)?"[20] Abraham says, "My Lord is He Who gives life and causes death." The king answers, "I give life and cause death",[20] and brings forth two men sentenced to death. He frees one and condemns the other.[21] Then Abraham says, "Indeed, God brings up the sun from the east, so bring it up from the west."[20] This causes the king to exile him, and he left for Levant.[22] Although Nimrod's name is not stated in the Quran, it has been held by Islamic scholars that the "king" mentioned was him. According to Mujahid, "Four people gained control over the earth, east and west, two believers and two disbelievers. The two believers were Solomon and Dhul Qarnayn, and the two disbelievers were Nebuchadnezzar and Nimrod. No one but they gained power over it."[23]

text: Text of the Midrash Rabba version[edit]

text: The following version of the Abraham vs. Nimrod confrontation appears in the Midrash Rabba, a major compilation of Jewish Scriptural exegesis. The part relating to Genesis, in which this appears (Chapter 38, 13), is considered to date from the sixth century.

text:
נטלו ומסרו לנמרוד. אמר לו: עבוד לאש. אמר לו אברהם: ואעבוד למים, שמכבים את האש? אמר לו נמרוד: עבוד למים! אמר לו: אם כך, אעבוד לענן, שנושא את המים? אמר לו: עבוד לענן! אמר לו: אם כך, אעבוד לרוח, שמפזרת עננים? אמר לו: עבוד לרוח! אמר לו: ונעבוד לבן אדם, שסובל הרוחות? אמר לו: מילים אתה מכביר, אני איני משתחוה אלא לאוּר - הרי אני משליכך בתוכו, ויבא אלוה שאתה משתחוה לו ויצילך הימנו! היה שם הרן עומד. אמר: מה נפשך, אם ינצח אברהם - אומַר 'משל אברהם אני', ואם ינצח נמרוד - אומַר 'משל נמרוד אני'. כיון שירד אברהם לכבשן האש וניצול, אמרו לו: משל מי אתה? אמר להם: משל אברהם אני! נטלוהו והשליכוהו לאור, ונחמרו בני מעיו ויצא ומת על פני תרח אביו. וכך נאמר: וימת הרן על פני תרח אביו. (בראשית רבה ל"ח, יג)

(...) He [Abraham] was given over to Nimrod. [Nimrod] told him: Worship the Fire! Abraham said to him: Shall I then worship the water, which puts off the fire! Nimrod told him: Worship the water! [Abraham] said to him: If so, shall I worship the cloud, which carries the water? [Nimrod] told him: Worship the cloud! [Abraham] said to him: If so, shall I worship the wind, which scatters the clouds? [Nimrod] said to him: Worship the wind! [Abraham] said to him: And shall we worship the human, who withstands the wind? Said [Nimrod] to him: You pile words upon words, I bow to none but the fire—in it shall I throw you, and let the God to whom you bow come and save you from it!
Haran [Abraham's brother] was standing there. He said [to himself]: what shall I do? If Abraham wins, I shall say: "I am of Abraham's [followers]", if Nimrod wins I shall say "I am of Nimrod's [followers]". When Abraham went into the furnace and survived, Haran was asked: "Whose [follower] are you?" and he answered: "I am Abraham's!". [Then] they took him and threw him into the furnace, and his belly opened and he died and predeceased Terach, his father.
[The Bible, Genesis 11:28, mentions Haran predeceasing Terach, but gives no details.]

text: Historical interpretations[edit]

text: Historians, Orientalists, Assyriologists and mythographers have long tried to find links between Nimrod and real historically attested figures in Mesopotamia.

text: Since the city of Akkad was destroyed and lost with the destruction of its Empire in the period 2200–2154 BC (long chronology), the stories mentioning Nimrod seem to recall the late Early Bronze Age. The association with Erech (Sumero-Akkadian Uruk), a city that lost its prime importance around 2,000 BC as a result of struggles between Isin, Ur, Larsa and Elam, also attests the early provenance of the stories of Nimrod.[7] Several Mesopotamian ruins were given Nimrod's name by 8th-century AD Arabs, including the ruins of the Assyrian city of Kalhu (the biblical Calah), built by Shalmaneser I (1274–1244 BC)[3] (see Nimrud). A number of attempts to connect him with historical figures have been made.

text: The Christian Bishop Eusebius of Caesarea as early as the early 4th century, noting that the Babylonian historian Berossus in the 3rd century BC had stated that the first king after the flood was Euechoios of Chaldea, identified him with Nimrod. George Syncellus (c. 800) also had access to Berossus, and he too identified Euechoios with the biblical Nimrod. More recently, Sumerologists have suggested additionally connecting both this Euechoios, and the king of Babylon and grandfather of Gilgamos who appears in the oldest copies of Aelian (c. 200 AD) as Euechoros, with the name of the founder of Uruk known from cuneiform sources as Enmerkar.[24]

text: In 1920, J.D. Prince also suggested a possible link between the Lord (Ni) of Marad and Nimrod. He mentioned how Dr. Kraeling was now inclined to connect Nimrod historically with Lugal-Banda, a mythological king mentioned in Poebel, Historical Texts, 1914, whose seat was at the city Marad.[25] This is supported by Theodore Jacobson in 1989, writing on "Lugalbanda and Ninsuna".[26]

text: According to Ronald Hendel the name Nimrod is probably a polemical distortion of the god Ninurta, a prominent god in Mesopotamian religion who had cult centers in a number of Assyrian cities such as Kalhu, and also in Babylon, and was a patron god of a number of Assyrian kings.[27] Nimrod's imperial ventures described in Genesis may be based on the conquests of the Assyrian king Tukulti-Ninurta I (Dalley et al., 1998, p. 67). Julian Jaynes also indicates Tukulti-Ninurta I (a powerful king of the Middle Assyrian Empire) as the origin for Nimrod.[28] Alexander Hislop, in his tract The Two Babylons decided that Nimrod was to be identified with Ninus (also unattested in Mesopotamian king lists), who according to Greek legend was a Mesopotamian king and husband of Semiramis, with a whole host of deities throughout the Mediterranean world, and with the Persian Zoroaster. The identification with Ninus follows that of the Clementine Recognitions; the one with Zoroaster, that of the Clementine Homilies, both works part of Clementine literature.[29] There was a historical Assyrian queen Shammuramat in the 9th century, the wife of Shamshi-Adad V, whom some speculations have identified with Semiramis, while others make her a later namesake of a much earlier Semiramis.

text: In David Rohl's theory, Enmerkar, the Sumerian founder of Uruk, was the original inspiration for Nimrod, because the story of Enmerkar and the Lord of Aratta (see:[30]) bears a few similarities to the legend of Nimrod and the Tower of Babel, and because the -KAR in Enmerkar means "hunter". Additionally, Enmerkar is said to have had ziggurats built in both Uruk and Eridu, which Rohl postulates was the site of the original Babel.

text: George Rawlinson believed Nimrod was Belus (like Nimrod and Ninus a king not attested in Mesopotamian annals, but claimed by the later Greeks to have been a king of Assyria) based on the fact Babylonian and Assyrian inscriptions bear the names Bel-Nibru.[31] The word Nibru in the Akkadian language of Assyria and Babylonia comes from a root meaning to 'pursue' or to make 'one flee', and as Rawlinson pointed out not only does this closely resemble Nimrod’s name but it also perfectly fits the description of Nimrod in Genesis 10: 9 as a great hunter. The Belus-Nimrod equation or link is also found in many old works such as Moses of Chorene and the Book of the Bee.[32] Nibru, in the Sumerian language, was the original name of the city of Nippur.

text: Joseph Poplicha wrote in 1929 about the identification of Nimrod in the first dynasty or Uruk[33]

text: Yigal Levin (2002) suggests that Nimrod was a recollection of Sargon of Akkad and of his grandson Naram-Sin, with the name "Nimrod" derived from the latter. He argues that:

text: The biblical Nimrod, then, is not a total counterpart of any one historical character. He is rather the composite Hebrew equivalent of the Sargonid dynasty: the first, mighty king to rule after the flood. Later influence modified the legend in the Mesopotamian tradition, adding such details as the hero’s name, his territory and some of his deeds, and most important his title, “King of Kish”. The later editors of the Book of Genesis dropped much of the story and mistakenly identified the Mesopotamian Kish with the Hamitic Cush.[34]

text: Literature[edit]

text:
In the Divine Comedy by Dante Alighieri (written 1308–21), Nimrod is portrayed as a giant (which was common in the Medieval period). With the giants Ephialtes, Antaeus, Briareus, Tityos, and Typhon, he stands in chains on the outer edge of Hell's Circle of Treachery. His only line is "Raphèl mai amècche zabì almi", words whose unintelligibility emphasizes his guilt for the confusion of languages after the tower of Babel.[35]
In The End of Satan by Victor Hugo (written 1854–1855), Nemrod is the sword symbol of war, attempting to reach the skies after having destroyed the earth. This unfinished text tries to compare biblical text and historical events, making out of the taking of the Bastille a nearly religious theme.
In The Matlock Paper by Robert Ludlum (written 1973), the protagonist, James Barbour Matlock, an English professor in his 30s, is recruited by the Department of Justice to investigate a drug smuggling ring led by a mysterious figure named "Nimrod".
In the Kate Daniels series by Ilona Andrews (written 2007–present), the protagonist, Kate Daniels, is the last daughter of an immortal who was originally known as Nimrod, builder of towers.
In the film "The Bible: In The Beginning" (1966), Nimrod is portrayed by the actor Stephen Boyd.

text: Idiom[edit]

text: In modern American English, the term is now commonly used to mean a dimwitted or a stupid person, a usage first recorded in 1932 and popularized by the cartoon character Bugs Bunny, who sarcastically refers to the hunter Elmer Fudd as "nimrod",[36][37] as an ironic connection between "mighty hunter" and "poor little Nimrod", i.e. Fudd.[38]