The Book of Kings is a book in the Hebrew Bible, found as two books in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. It concludes the Deuteronomistic history, a history of ancient Israel also including the books of Joshua, Judges, and Samuel.
Jean-Baptiste Racine was a French dramatist, one of the three great playwrights of 17th-century France, along with Molière and Corneille as well as an important literary figure in the Western tradition and world literature. Racine was primarily a tragedian, producing such "examples of neoclassical perfection" as Phèdre, Andromaque, and Athalie. He did write one comedy, Les Plaideurs, and a muted tragedy, Esther for the young.
Madame Bovary, originally published as Madame Bovary: Provincial Manners, is a novel by French writer Gustave Flaubert, published in 1857. The eponymous character lives beyond her means in order to escape the banalities and emptiness of provincial life.
Athaliah was the daughter of either king Omri, or of King Ahab and Queen Jezebel of Israel; she was queen consort of Judah as the wife of King Jehoram, a descendant of King David, and was later queen regnant c. 841–835 BCE.
Jehoash, also known as Joash, Joas or Joás, was the eighth king of Judah, and the sole surviving son of Ahaziah after the massacre of the royal family ordered by his grandmother, Athaliah. His mother was Zibiah of Beersheba. Jehoash was 7 years old when he ascended to the throne, reigning for 40 years. He was succeeded by his son, Amaziah of Judah. He is said to have been righteous "all the days of Jehoiada the priest" but to have deviated from fidelity to Yahweh after Jehoiada's death.
Elisabeth Félix, better known only as Mademoiselle or Madame Rachel or simply Rachel, was a French actress. She became a prominent figure in French society, and was the mistress of, among others, Napoleon III and Prince Napoléon, both nephews of Napoleon I, and of Alexandre Colonna-Walewski, the illegitimate son of Napoleon I. Efforts by newspapers to publish pictures of her on her deathbed led to the introduction of privacy rights into French law.
Zadok, also spelled Ṣadok, Ṣadoc, Zadoq, Tzadok or Tsadoq, was a Kohen (priest), biblically recorded to be a descendant from Eleazar the son of Aaron. He was the High Priest of Israel during the reigns of David and Solomon. He aided King David during the revolt of his son Absalom, was subsequently instrumental in bringing Solomon to the throne and officiated at Solomon's coronation. After Solomon's building of the First Temple in Jerusalem, Zadok was the first High Priest to serve there.
Polyeucte is a drama in five acts by French writer Pierre Corneille. It was finished in December 1642 and debuted in October 1643. It is based on the life of the martyr Saint Polyeuctus (Polyeucte).
Athalia is an English-language oratorio composed by George Frideric Handel to a libretto by Samuel Humphreys based on the play Athalie by Jean Racine. The work was commissioned in 1733 for the Publick Act in Oxford – a commencement ceremony of the University of Oxford, which had offered Handel an honorary doctorate. The story is based on that of the Biblical queen Athaliah. Athalia, Handel's third oratorio in English, was completed on 7 June 1733, and first performed on 10 July 1733 at the Sheldonian Theatre in Oxford. The Bee reported that the performance was "performed with the utmost Applause, and is esteemed equal to the most celebrated of that Gentleman's Performances: there were 3700 Persons present".
Jehoiada in the Hebrew Bible, was a prominent priest in the kingdom of Judah during the reigns of Ahaziah, Athaliah, and Joash. Jehoiada became the brother-in-law of King Ahaziah as a result of his marriage with princess Jehosheba. Both Jehosheba and Ahaziah were children of King Jehoram of Judah. Ahaziah died a year after assuming the throne, which was then usurped by his mother Athaliah, who ordered the execution of all members of the royal family.
Madame Bovary is a 1949 American romantic drama, a film adaptation of the classic 1857 novel of the same name by Gustave Flaubert. It stars Jennifer Jones, James Mason, Van Heflin, Louis Jourdan, Alf Kjellin, Gene Lockhart, Frank Allenby and Gladys Cooper.
Esther is a play in three acts written in 1689 by the French dramatist, Jean Racine. It was premièred on January 26, 1689, performed by the pupils of the Maison royale de Saint-Louis, an educational institute for young girls of noble birth. The subject is taken from the biblical Book of Esther.
Jehosheba, or Josaba, is a figure in the Hebrew Bible. She was the daughter of King Jehoram of Judah, sister to King Ahaziah of Judah and wife of Jehoiada the priest. She was a daughter of Jehoram, but not necessarily of Athaliah. After the death of Ahaziah, his mother, Athaliah, made herself Queen of Judah and ordered the execution of all members of the royal family that could claim the throne. However, according to 2 Kings 11:2, Jehosheba saved from the massacre her infant nephew Jehoash, Ahaziah's son and Athaliah's grandson:
But Jehosheba, the daughter of king Joram, sister of Ahaziah, took Joash the son of Ahaziah, and stole him from among the king's sons which were slain; and they hid him, even him and his nurse, in the bedchamber from Athaliah, so that he was not slain.
Attalia is the ancient name of Antalya, a city on the Mediterranean coast of southwestern Turkey.
The King's Daughters is a 2000 period drama film directed by Patricia Mazuy. It was screened in the Un Certain Regard section at the 2000 Cannes Film Festival. It was adapted from the novel La maison d’Esther by Yves Dangerfield.
The Maison Royale de Saint-Louis was a boarding school for girls set up on 15 June 1686 at Saint-Cyr in France by King Louis XIV at the request of his second secret wife, Françoise d'Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon, who wanted a school for girls from impoverished noble families. The establishment lost its leading role on the deaths of Louis and then Maintenon, but it nevertheless marked an evolution in female education under the Ancien Régime. Its notable students included Maintenon's niece Marthe-Marguerite Le Valois de Villette de Mursay, marquise de Caylus, and Napoleon's sister Elisa Bonaparte, grand duchess of Tuscany.
2 Kings 11 is the eleventh chapter of the second part of the Books of Kings in the Hebrew Bible or the Second Book of Kings in the Old Testament of the Christian Bible. The book is a compilation of various annals recording the acts of the kings of Israel and Judah by a Deuteronomic compiler in the seventh century BCE, with a supplement added in the sixth century BCE. This chapter records the reign of Athaliah and Joash as the rulers of Judah.
