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Deluge

Deluge

The Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th ed. | 2008 | Copyright

Deluge , in the Bible, the overwhelming flood that covered the earth and destroyed every living thing except the family of Noah and the creatures in his ark . Archaeology has yielded little trace of the biblical flood, but some oceanographers and geophysicists have speculated that the actual deluge occurred in the Black Sea region some 7,600 years ago, when rising sea levels in the Mediterranean (due to melting glaciers) flooded into the Black Sea and inundated the surrounding coast.

Many archaeologists and historians, however, do not believe that the inundation of the ancient Black Sea coast is the origin of the flood story, regarding the periodic flooding of the Tigris and Euphrates as a more likely model for the tale. Flood stories resembling the biblical story are found in the folklore of many races—Native Americans, Fiji Islanders, and Australian aborigines. The earliest known of these stories is Sumerian, one form being found in the record of Berossus (3d cent. BC), another on a tablet of the Gilgamesh epic of at least 2000 BC See Deucalion and Ur .

Bibliography: See N. Cohn, Noah's Flood: The Genesis Story in Western Thought (1996); W. Ryan and W. Pitman, Noah's Flood (1999).

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deluge

The Oxford Pocket Dictionary of Current English | 2009 | Copyright

del·uge / ˈdel(y)oōj/ • n. a severe flood. ∎  (the Deluge) the biblical Flood (recorded in Genesis 6–8). ∎  a heavy fall of rain. ∎ fig. a great quantity of something arriving at the same time: a deluge of complaints. • v. [tr.] (usu. be deluged) inundate with a great quantity of something: he has been deluged with offers of work. ∎  flood.

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deluge

The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology | 1996 | | Copyright

deluge sb. XIV. — (O)F. déluge, alt. of earlier diluvie — L. dīluvium, rel. to lavere, lavāre wash.
Hence deluge vb. XVII.
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T. F. HOAD. "deluge." The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. 1996. Encyclopedia.com. 10 Feb. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>.

T. F. HOAD. "deluge." The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. 1996. Encyclopedia.com. (February 10, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O27-deluge.html

T. F. HOAD. "deluge." The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology. 1996. Retrieved February 10, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O27-deluge.html

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Deluge

A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology | 2004 | | Copyright

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JAMES MacKILLOP. "Deluge." A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. 2004. Encyclopedia.com. 10 Feb. 2012 <http://www.encyclopedia.com>.

JAMES MacKILLOP. "Deluge." A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. 2004. Encyclopedia.com. (February 10, 2012). http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O70-Deluge.html

JAMES MacKILLOP. "Deluge." A Dictionary of Celtic Mythology. 2004. Retrieved February 10, 2012 from Encyclopedia.com: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O70-Deluge.html

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