Oxford Allusions S-Z
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randomness on December 7, 2011
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Terms | Definitions |
|---|---|
 Sadduccee | Jewish sect at the time of Christ who accepted only written law, not oral tradition, denied angels and demons and resurection. So they were people who refused to believe things readily believed by others. |
| Marquis de Sade | a French writer and soldier frequently imprisoned for sexual offences. while in prison he wrote a lot of sexually explicit books. word "sadism" derives from his name. |
| Samson | in the bible, the book of Judges relates how this Israel leader, known for his great strength , fell in love with Delilah. She seduced him into telling her his strength came from his hair, which she had shaved off in the night, then delivered him to the Philistines |
| Sandman | in children's stories, he is the man who makes children sleepy by sprinkling sand in their eyes. |
| Sarah | wife of Abraham who remained childless for many years. God promised her she would bear a child to Abraham and she did at the age of 90: Isaac |
| Satan | Lucifer, the devil, etc, who defied God |
| Satyr | Greek: lustful woodland spirits with a Dionysian spirit. back end of a goat. |
| scapegoat | in the bible, it was a real goat that was sent into the wilderness after a priest symbolically set all of the town's sins on it so that the sins would be taken away. Today means any person who takes the blame for someone else's guilt |
| Scaramouche | a stock character in old Italian farce, portrayed as a cowardly braggart.Usually represented as a Spanish don, wearing a black constume |
| Scheherazade | Narrator of the Arabian Nights, the King's wife.she tells stories every night to keep king interested, so that he wouldn't execute her |
| Sennacherib | king of Assyria, devoting much iof his reign to suppressing revolts in various poarts of his empire. he sacked Babylon in 689. he invaded palestine, and his army was destroyed by an angel of death |
| Sermon on the mount | in Bible, it is the long sermon given by Jesus to his disciples on a mountain, recorded in Matthew, which he preached love, humility, charity. includes Beatitudes |
| Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego | bible relates a famious episode during Nebuchanezzer's reign, in which the king set up a golden idol adn commanded ppl to worship it. when 3 jews refused to do so, he ordered them to be thrown in a furnace but they came out unharmed |
| queen of Sheba | in the bible, having heard about the famous Solomon, she went to visit him taking with her a huge caravan. she can be used to typify a woman or girl, who is concious of her own superiority. |
| Shylock | the Jewish moneylender in Shake's the Merchant of Venice. he lends the sum of 3000 ducats to the merchant antonio on condition that if the sumn wasnt paid, he would forfeit a pound of his flesh. |
| Siberia | northern Russia notedfor its severe winters, traditionally used as a place of banishment and exile |
| Sibyl | prophetess in ancient Greece, they included the Cumaeean -- who guided Aeneas through the underworld. tehy gave their prophecies in an ecstatic state, when they were believed to be possessed by a god, and tehir utterances were often ambiguous and riddle-like. |
| Siegfried | Germanic legend, he was a prince of the Netherlands, and teh hero of th first part of Nibelahablah. |
| Silenus | Greek: an old woodland spirit, who was a teacher of Dionysus. represented as a fat and jolly man, riding an ass, covered in flowers |
| Sinbad | a sailor, the hero of one of the tales in the Arabian Nights. a rich young man in Baghdad who undtertakes 7 sea voyages which he has fantastic adventures |
| Socrates | Greek philosopher concerned with the search for truth and reason in questions of morality and ethics. his method was based on debating moral issues with those around him. his pupil Plato wrote what he said. he was charged with impiety and corrupting the young, and condemend to die by hemlock. |
| Solomon | son of David and Bathsheba, king of ancient Israel.famed for his wisdom and justice. the whole "Dividing the baby in half" rule was from him. |
| Spartan | inhabitants of an ancient Greek city state in southern Pelopopnnese.. they were known for their austerity and self-discipline and their toughness in enduring pain and hardship. |
| St Stephen | the first Christian martyr, stone to death in Jerusalem |
| Styx | this river in the Underworld is the main river of Hades, across which the souls of the dead are ferried by Charon |
| Sun King | another name for King Louis XIV whose palace, Versailles, was richly furnished, surrounded himself with wealth. |
| Sycorax | Shake's The Tempest, a witch, the mother of Caliban, who enchanted the island and imprisoned the spirit Ariel for disobedience. |
| Tantalus | Greek: King of Phrygia who was punished for his misdeeds including killing his son Pelops and offering jos cooked flesh to the gods. he wa condemned in Hades to stand up to his chin in water which recceded whenever he tried to drink it and under branches of fruit which drew back when he tried to reach them |
| Tartarus | the lowest region of Hades, which was reserved for the punishment of the wicked for their misdeeds, |
| Thespis | a Greek dramatic poet of the 6th century and is generally regarded as the founder of Greek tragedy, having introduced the role of the actor in adition to the traditional chorus. |
| Thor | Scandinavian mythology, he was the son of Odin and Frigga, the god of Thunder and War. also god of weather, agriculture, and home. man of enormous strength armed with a hammer called Mjollnir, which returns to his hand after he throws it |
| Thoth | Egyptian mythology, the god of the moon, wisdom, writing, and the sceinces. usually represented with teh head of an Ibis. |
| Three Musketeers | Athos, Porthos, Aramis, and also D'Artagnan. |
| Timbuktu | a town in northern Mali, thought of as a very far away place. |
| Titan | the older gods of Greek mythology who preceded the Olympians and were teh children of Uranus (Heaven) and Gaia (Earth). they rebelled against and overthrew Uranus and were in turn defeated by their own children, the Olympians, led by Zeus.=person of very great strength and size |
| Titian | a Venetian painter and one of the greatest artists of the high Rennaisance. known for his mythological works, like Bacchus and Ariadne, and Diana Surprised by Actaeon. brilliant colors, esp. reds and blues |
| Sweeney Todd | a fictional barber who murdered his customers with a razor and then had his lover serve up the remains in a meat pie. he was the central character in several plays by Pitt. The Demon Barber of Fleet Street |
| Topsy | mischevious little black slave girl in Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin, who has been kept in complete ignorance by her owners, and knows nothing about her family. |
| Toulouse-Lautrec | a French painter and lithographer. his reputation largely rests on ciolour lithographs from the 1890s depicting scenes of Parisian low life, actors, musicians, etc. famous Moulin Rouge series of posters. |
| Tree of Knowledge | book of Genesis, it grew in the Garden of Eden and bore forbidden fruit that eve was tempted by the serpent to eat |
| Tristam and Iseult | He is sent to seek the hand of ___ on behalf of his uncle King Mark of Cornwall. during the voyage, they mistakenly drink a love potion meant for Mark and __ on their wedding night. they fall in love but dont end up together, long complicated story about a white or black flag, when his wife lies to him he dies in hopelessness. subject of wagner's opera. |
| triton | the son of Poseidon and Amphitrite, in greek mythology. half man, half fish, with fish tail |
| Troilus and Cressida | characters from Greek mythology, mentioned in the Iliad although not as lovers. also in Chaucer, and Shake. A son of Trojan king Priam falls for this girl, and she is presuaded to start a love affair with him by her uncle. she is then required to move to teh greek camp bc her father has defected to the gGreeks or as part of the war negotiations. once there she betrays them by falling in love with the Greek comander diomedes |
| ugly duckling | hans Christian Anderson's fairytale about a cygnet in a brood of ducklings that is mocked by the others for his appearance. he runs away, struggles through the winter, then encounters 3 swans and realizes he too has become a swan. |
| Uriah | __ the Hittite was an officer in David's army the husband of bathsheba. David slept with her, got her pregnant, and sent her husband off to war to get killed so he could be with her. |
| Valkyrie | in Scandinavian mythology they (Choosers of the Slain) were Odin's 12 handmaidens who hovered over battlefields and selected the most valiant warriors to die in battle, and carry them to Valhalla, the hall of heroes. |
| valley of the shadow of death | from Psalm 23, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, and Tennyson's "Charge of the Light Brigade" |
| Vandal | a Germanic people that overran part of Roman Europe in the 4th and 5th centuries. their name=mass invasion and wanton destruction |
| Van Dyck | Flemish painter famous for his portraits of the English aristocracy and royalty, including Charles 1 |
| Van gogh | Dutch post-impressionist painter that cut off his own ear after a temper tantrum. bright colors, thick, frenzied, swirling brushwork=passionate intensity to his paintings. |
| Venus | Roman goddess of beauty, fertility, sexual love. =Aphrodite. |
| Venus de Milo | classical marble statue of the goddess Aphrodite, now in the louvre in paris. it is missing its arms, and was discovered on teh Greek island Melos in 1820. |
| Volpone | MC in Ben Jonsons commedy of the same name, about a childlesss man taht lures potential heirs to his bedside, where he pretends to die immediately. his sidekick persuades the suitors that an expensive gift will prove heirship. sidekick was going to blackmail him tho, so rather than do that, __ turned himself into police |
| Voltaire | pseudonym of a French writer, dramatist, and poet. leading figure of teh Enlightenment. name-mocking scepticism |
| Vulcan | Roman god of Fire and metalworking; corresponds with Greek god Hephaestus.he's ugly, but married to the most beautiful goddess, Aphrodite |
| wandering jew | in medieval legend, the __ was a man condemned to roam the earth until the day of judgement, as punishment for taunting Christ on teh way to teh Crucifixion, urging him to go faster. |
| whore of Babylon | refered to in teh Book of Revelation, she is a woman sitting on a scarlet beast with 7 heads and 10 horns |
| wolf in sheep's clothing | one of Aesop's fables about how a wolf decides to disguise himself as a sheep to get an easy meal. phrase-anyone who uses an outward appearance of friendship to conceal underlying hostility or cruelty |
| wreck of Hesperus | title of a poem by HW Longfellow which tells of the destruction of a schooner that was caught in a storm and wrecked on teh reef of HOrman's Woe, off the coast of Massachusetts |
| Zarathustra | another name for Zoroaster, a Persian prophet and founder of Zoroastrianism. Nietsche's book Thus Spoke Z__ chronicles the wanderings and teachings of him and develops the idea that humans are transitions between apes and Supermen. |
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