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Long barrow

Long barrows are a style of monument constructed across Western Europe in the fifth and fourth millennia BCE, during the Early Neolithic period. Typically constructed from earth and either timber or stone, those using the latter material represent the oldest widespread tradition of stone construction in the world. Around 40,000 long barrows survive today.

The structures have a long earthen tumulus, or "barrow", that is flanked on two sides with linear ditches. These typically stretch for between 20 and 70 metres in length, although some exceptional examples are either longer or shorter than this. Some examples have a timber or stone chamber in one end of the tumulus. These monuments often contained human remains interred within their chambers, and as a result, are often interpreted as tombs, although there are some examples where this appears not to be the case. The choice of timber or stone may have arisen from the availability of local materials rather than cultural differences. Those that contained chambers inside of them are often termed chambered long barrows while those which lack chambers are instead called unchambered long barrows or earthen long barrows.

The earliest examples developed in Iberia and western France during the mid-fifth millennium BCE. The tradition then spread northwards, into the British Isles and then the Low Countries and southern Scandinavia. Each area developed its own variations of the long barrow tradition, often exhibiting their own architectural innovations. The purpose and meaning of the barrows remains an issue of debate among archaeologists. One argument is that they are religious sites, perhaps erected as part of a system of ancestor veneration or as a religion spread by missionaries or settlers. An alternative explanation views them primarily in economic terms, as territorial markers delineating the areas controlled by different communities as they transitioned toward farming.

Communities continued to use these long barrows long after their construction. In both the Roman period and the Early Middle Ages, many long barrows were reused as cemeteries. Since the sixteenth century they have attracted interest from antiquarians and archaeologists; it is from the excavations of the latter that our knowledge about them derives. Some have been reconstructed and have become tourist attractions or sacred sites used for rituals by modern Pagan and other religious groups.

Terminology and definition

Given their dispersal across Western Europe, long barrows have been given different names in the various different languages of this region. The term barrow is a southern English dialect word for an earthen tumulus, and was adopted as a scholarly term for such monuments by the 17th-century English antiquarian John Aubrey. Synonyms found in other parts of Britain included low in Cheshire, Staffordshire, and Derbyshire, tump in Gloucestershire and Hereford, howe in Northern England and Scotland, and cairn in Scotland. Another term to have achieved international usage has been dolmen, a Breton word meaning "table-stone"; this is typically used in reference to the stone chambers found in some, although not all, long barrows.

The historian Ronald Hutton suggested that such sites could also be termed "tomb-shrines" to reflect the fact that they appear to have often been used both to house the remains of the dead and to have been used in ritual activities. Some contain no burials while others have been found to contain the remains of up to fifty people.

Chambered and earthen
Early 20th-century archaeologists began to call these monuments chambered tombs. The archaeologists Roy and Lesley Adkins referred to these monuments as megalithic long barrows. In most cases, local stone was used where it was available. The decision as to whether a long barrow used wood or stone appears to have been based largely on the availability of resources.

The style of the chamber falls into two categories. One form, known as grottes sepulchrales artificielles in French archaeology, are dug into the earth. The second form, which is more widespread, are known as cryptes dolmeniques in French archaeology and involved the chamber being erected above ground. Many chambered long barrows contained side chambers within them, often producing a cruciform shape. Others had no such side alcoves; these are known as undifferentiated tombs.

Some long barrows do not contain chambers inside of them. John Thurnham termed these "unchambered" barrows, while the archaeologist Stuart Piggott favoured the term "earthen" barrows for them. Ian Kinnes instead used the term "non-megalithic barrows". These long barrows might have used timber because stone was not available. Some classificatory systems, such as that employed by the United Kingdom's National Monuments Record, do not distinguish between the different types of long barrow.

The archaeologist David Field noted that drawing typological distinctions on the basis of material used can mask important similarities between different long barrows. Also criticising the focus on classification, the archaeologists Lewis-Williams and Pearce believed that doing so distracted scholars from the task of explaining the meaning and purpose behind the monuments.

Design and architecture
Long barrows are single mounds, usually of earth, which are flanked by ditches. They are usually between 20 and 70 metres in length, although there are some exceptional examples at either end of this spectrum.

The construction of long barrows in the Early Neolithic would have required the co-operation of a number of different individuals and would have represented an important investment in time and resources. They were built without the use of metal tools.

There is often regional variation in style and material. In the north and west of Britain, for instance, long barrows often consist of stone mounds containing chambers inside of them, whereas in the south and east of Britain these long barrows are typically made of earth.

Many were altered and restyled over their long period of use. Ascertaining at what date a long barrow was constructed is difficult for archaeologists as a result of the various modifications that were made to the monument during the Early Neolithic. Similarly, both modifications and later damage can make it difficult to determine the nature of the original long barrow design.

Architecturally, there is much overlap between long barrows and other monument types from Neolithic Europe, such as the bank barrows, cursus monuments, long cairns, and mortuary enclosures. Bank barrows are stylistically similar to the long barrows but are considerably longer. Cursus monuments also exhibit parallel ditches, but also extend over much longer distances than the long barrows.

Enviro-archaeological studies have demonstrated that many of the long barrows were erected in wooded landscapes. In Britain, these chambered long barrows are typically located on prominent hills and slopes, in particular being located above rivers and inlets and overlooking valleys. In Britain, long barrows were also often constructed near to causewayed enclosures, a form of earthen monument.

Distribution and chronology

Across Europe, about 40,000 long barrows are known to survive from the Early Neolithic. They are found across much of Western Europe; stretching from southeast Spain up to southern Sweden and taking in the British Isles to the west. The long barrows are not the world's oldest known structures using stone—they are predated by Göbekli Tepe in modern Turkey—but they do represent the oldest widespread tradition of using stone in construction. The archaeologist Frances Lynch has described them as "the oldest built structures in Europe" to survive, while Field noted that they are the earliest monuments surviving in Britain. Although found across this large area, they can be subdivided into clear regionalised traditions based on architectural differences.

Excavation has revealed that some of the long barrows in the area of modern Spain, Portugal, and western France were erected in the mid-fifth millennium BCE, making these older than those long barrows further north. Although the general area in which the oldest long barrows were built is therefore known, archaeologists do not know exactly where the tradition started nor which long barrows are the very first ones to have been built. It therefore appears that the architectural tradition developed in this southern area of Western Europe before spreading north, along the Atlantic coast. The tradition had reached Britain by the first half of the fourth millennium BCE, either soon after farming or in some cases perhaps just before it. It later spread further north on mainland Europe, for instance arriving in the Netherlands in the second half of the fourth millennium BCE.

Later in the Neolithic, burial practices tended to place greater emphasis on the individual, suggesting a growing social hierarchy and a move away from collective burial. One of the last chambered tombs erected was Bryn Celli Ddu in Anglesey, Wales, built long after people stopped building them across most of Western Europe. The conscious anachronism of the monument led excavators to suggest that its construction was part of a deliberate attempt by people to restore older religious practices that were extinct elsewhere.

Hutton suggested that this tradition "defines the Early Neolithic of Western Europe" more than any other, while the archaeologist David Field described them as "among the best known and easily recognised archaeological monuments in the [British] landscape." For the archaeologist Caroline Malone, the long barrows are "some of the most impressive and aesthetically distinctive constructions of prehistoric Britain". Her fellow archaeologist Frances Lynch stated that these long barrows "can still inspire awe, wonder and curiosity even in modern populations familiar with Gothic cathedrals and towering skyscrapers."

Regional variation
In the area of southern Spain, Portugal, southwestern France, and Brittany, the long barrows typically include large stone chambers. In Britain, earthen long barrows predominate across much of the southern and eastern parts of the island. Around 300 earthen long barrows are known from across the eastern side of Britain, from Aberdeenshire in the north down to the South Downs in the south, with two projections westward into Dorset and Galloway. Excavation has suggested that these earthen long barrows were likely constructed between 3800 and 3000 BCE.

Another prominent regional tradition in Britain is the Cotswold-Severn Group found in the west of the island. These are typically chambered long barrows, and contained human bone in comparatively large quantities, averaging between 40 and 50 people in each.

The long barrows found in the Netherlands and northern Germany also used stone in their construction where it was available. The examples of long barrows found in parts of Poland are also typically earthen rather than megalithic. Further north, in Denmark and southern Sweden, the long barrows typically used stone in their construction.

Function
The purpose and meaning of Early Neolithic long barrows are not known, though archaeologists can make suggestions on the basis of recurring patterns that can be observed within the tradition. Archaeologists have not, however, agreed upon the most likely meaning and purpose of these monuments, with various different interpretations being put forward. Lynch suggested that the long barrows likely had "broad religious and social roles" for the communities who built and used them, comparing them in this way to the churches of medieval and modern Europe.

Funerary spaces
Many of the long barrows were used as tombs in which to place the remains of deceased individuals. For this reason, archaeologists like Malone have referred to them as "houses of the dead". Conversely, many of the long barrows do not appear to have been used as tombs; various examples that have been excavated by archaeologists have shown no evidence of having had human remains deposited there. The archaeologists David Lewis-Williams and David Peace, however, noted that these long barrows were more than tombs, also being "religious and social foci", suggesting that they were places where the dead were visited by the living and where people maintained relationships with the deceased.

In some cases, the bones deposited in the chamber may have been old when placed there. In other instances, they may have been placed into the chamber long after the long barrow was built. In some instances, collections of bone originally included in the chamber might have been removed and replaced during the Early Neolithic itself.

The human remains placed in long barrows often included a mix of men, women, and children. The bones of various individuals were often mixed together. This may have reflected a desire to obliterate distinctions of wealth and status among the deceased. Not all of those who died in the Early Neolithic were buried in these long barrows, although it remains unknown what criteria were used to determine whose remains were interred there and whose were not. Large sections of the Early Neolithic population were not buried in them, although how their bodily remains are dealt with is not clear. It is possible that they were left in the open air.

It is also not known where the act of excarnation took place prior to the deposition of bones within the chambers. Some human bones have been found in the ditches of causewayed enclosures, a form of Early Neolithic earthen monument, while evidence for the Early Neolithic outdoor exposure of corpses has also been found at Hambledon Hill. The postholes found in front of many long barrows may also have represented the bases of platforms on which excarnation took place.

When entering the chambers to either add or remove new material, individuals would likely have been exposed to the smell of decaying corpses. It is unknown if entering this area was therefore seen by Early Neolithic Europeans as an ordeal to be overcome or an honourable job to be selected for.

In some chambers, human remains were arranged and organised according to the type of bone or the age and sex of the individual that they came from, factors that determined which chamber they were placed in. Lynch noted that "the bulk of our surviving evidence suggests that collectivity became and remained the norm until the late neolithic".

Comparatively rarely, grave goods have been found interred alongside human bone inside the long barrows. Where these have been found, archaeologists have typically interpreted them as the remains of funerary ceremonies or of feasts. The choice of grave goods included reflects regional variation. In the Cotswold-Severn Group in southwestern England, cattle bones were commonly found within the chambers, where they had often been treated in a manner akin to the human remains.

Sometimes human remains were deposited in the chambers over many centuries. For instance, at West Kennet Long Barrow in Wiltshire, southern England, the earliest depositions of human remains were radiocarbon dated to the early-to-mid fourth millennium BCE, while a later deposition of human remains was found to belong to the Beaker culture, thus indicating a date in the final centuries of the third millennium BCE; this meant that human remains had been placed into the chamber intermittently over a period of 1500 years. This indicates that some chambered long barrows remained in sporadic use until the Late Neolithic.

In various cases, archaeologists have found specific bones absent from the assemblages within the chambers. For instance, at Fussell's Lodge in Wiltshire, southern England, a number of skeletal assemblages were found to be missing not just small bones but also long bones and skulls. It is therefore possible that some bones were deliberately removed from the chambers in the Early Neolithic for use in ritualistic activities.

Origins of the design
The source of inspiration for the design of the chambered long barrows remains unclear. Suggestions that have proved popular among archaeologists is that they were inspired either by natural rock formations or by the shape of wooden houses. It has been suggested that their design was based on the wooden long houses found in central Europe during the Early Neolithic, however there is a gap of seven centuries between the last known long houses and the first known chambered long barrows.

Religious sites
According to one possible explanation, the long barrows served as markers of place that were connected to Early Neolithic ideas about cosmology and spirituality, and accordingly were centres of ritual activity mediated by the dead. The inclusion of human remains has been used to argue that these long barrows were involved in a form of ancestor veneration. Malone suggested that the prominence of these barrows suggested that ancestors were deemed far more important to Early Neolithic people than their Mesolithic forebears. In the early twentieth century, this interpretation of the long barrows as religious sites was often connected to the idea that they were the holy sites of a new religion spread by either settlers or missionaries. This explanation has been less popular with archaeologists since the 1970s.

Adopting an approach based in cognitive archaeology, Lewis-Williams and Pearce argued that the chambered long barrows "reflected and at the same time constituted... a culturally specific expression of the neurologically generated tiered cosmos", a cosmos mediated by a system of symbols. They suggested that the entrances to the chambers were viewed as transitional zones where sacrificial rituals took place, and that they were possibly spaces for the transformation of the dead using fire.

Territorial markers
A second explanation is that these long barrows were intrinsically connected to the transition to farming, representing a new way of looking at the land. In this interpretation, the long barrows served as territorial markers, dividing up the land, signifying that it was occupied and controlled by a particular community, and thus warning away rival groups. In defending this interpretation, Malone noted that each "tomb-territory" typically had access to a range of soils and landscape types in its vicinity, suggesting that it could have represented a viable territorial area for a particular community. Also supporting this interpretation is the fact that the distribution of chambered long barrows on some Scottish islands shows patterns that closely mirror modern land divisions between farms and crofts. This interpretation also draws ethnographic parallels from recorded communities around the world, who have also used monuments to demarcate territory.

This idea became popular among archaeologists in the 1980s and 1990s, and—in downplaying religion while emphasising an economic explanation for these monuments—it was influenced by Marxist ideas then popular in the European archaeological establishment. In the early twenty-first century, archaeologists began to challenge this idea, as evidence emerged that much of Early Neolithic Britain was forested and its inhabitants were likely pastoralists rather than agriculturalists. Accordingly, communities in Britain would have been semi-nomadic, with little need for territorial demarcation or clear markings of land ownership. Also, this explanation fails to explain why the chambered long barrows should be clustered in certain areas rather than being evenly distributed throughout the landscape.

Later history
Many of the chambered long barrows have not remained intact, having been damaged and broken up during the millennia. In some cases, most of the chamber has been removed, leaving only the three-stone dolmen.

Iron Age and Roman use

During the first half of the first millennium BCE, many British long barrows saw renewed human activity. At Julliberrie's Grave in Kent, southeast England, three inhumations were buried at the southern edge of the ditch around the long barrow. The barrow at Wayland's Smithy in Oxfordshire, also in southeast England, saw a cemetery established around the long barrow, with at least 46 skeletons buried in 42 graves, many having been decapitated. 17 Romano-British burials were discovered at Wor Barrow in Dorset, eight of which were missing their heads.

The deposition of coins around long barrows also appears to have been quite common in Roman Britain, and these may have been placed by these monuments as offerings. A hoard of Constantinian coins was for instance placed in a pot around Julliberrie's Grave. A solitary coin from the reign of Allectus was found in the ditch around the long barrow at Skendleby I.

Antiquarian and archaeological investigation
The first serious study of chambered long barrows took place in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, when the mounds that covered chambers were removed by agriculture. By the nineteenth century, antiquarians and archaeologists had come to recognise this style of monument as a form of tomb. In the latter nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, archaeologists like V. Gordon Childe held to the cultural diffusionist view that such Western European monuments had been based on tombs originally produced in parts of the eastern Mediterranean region, suggesting that their ultimate origin was either in Egypt or in Crete. In this view, the tradition was seen as having spread westward as part of some form of "megalithic religion".

A seminal study of the long barrows authored by the Welsh archaeologist Glyn Daniel was published in 1958 as The Megalith Builders of Western Europe. In 1950, Daniel stated that about a tenth of known chambered long barrows in Britain had been excavated, while regional field studies helped to list them. Few of the earlier excavations recorded or retained any human remains found in the chamber. From the 1960s onward, archaeological research increasingly focused on examining regional groups of long barrows rather than the wider architectural tradition. From this decade onward, the meticulous excavation of various long barrows also led to the widespread recognition that long barrows were often multi-phase monuments which had been changed over time.

Up until the 1970s, archaeologists widely believed that the long barrows of Western Europe were based on Near Eastern models.

Archaeological investigation of long barrows has been hindered by the misidentification of other features. Long barrows have been confused with coniger mounds and rabbit warrens, sometimes termed pillow mounds, which can take on a similar shape. Rifle butts can also sometimes take on shapes similar to those of long barrows. Later landscaping has also led to misidentification; the two mounds at Stoke Park in Bristol, southwest England were for instance thought to be long barrows until an excavation in the 1950s revealed that they post-dated the Middle Ages, and thus must have been created by more recent landscaping projects. In areas which were previously impacted by glaciation, moraine deposits on valley floors have sometimes been mistaken for long barrows. At Dunham New Park in Cheshire, northwest England, for instance, a mound was initially believed to be a long barrow and only later assessed as a natural feature. Damage sustained by Neolithic long barrows can also lead to them being mistaken for other types of monuments, such as the oval barrows and round barrows which are usually of later date.

Aerial photography has proven useful in identifying many more examples that are barely visible on the ground. Geophysical surveys have been found to be helpful to explore sites that are unavailable for excavation.

Recent activity
Long barrows such as West Kennet Long Barrow in Wiltshire have become tourist attractions. At Wayland's Smithy in Oxfordshire, visitors have lodged coins into cracks in the site's stones since at least the 1960s, while at the Coldrum Long Barrow in Kent, a rag tree has been established overhanging the barrow.

Many modern Pagans view West Kennet Long Barrow as a "temple" and use it for their rituals. Some see it as a place of the ancestors where they can engage in "vision quests" and other neo-shamanic practices. Others have seen it as a womb of the Great Goddess, and as a sort of living entity. The winter solstice has been a particularly popular occasion for Pagans to visit.

In 2015 the first long barrow in thousands of years, the Long Barrow at All Cannings, inspired by those built in the Neolithic era, was built on land just outside the village of All Cannings in Wiltshire. This was followed soon after by others, such as Soulton Long Barrow near Wem, Shropshire.

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List of drowning victims

This is a list of drowning victims in chronological order. The reasons for drowning are diverse and range from suicide, to accidents or murders.

Antiquity

 * Tiberinus Silvius, ninth Latin king of Alba Longa, drowned in the Tiber, which was named after him.
 * Hippasus of Metapontum, a student of the mathematician Pythagoras, who, by some accounts, was drowned by his fellow Pythagoreans for the imprudence of discovering irrational numbers.
 * Qu Yuan of China in 278 BC. Committed ritual suicide as a form of protest against the corruption of the era, a sacrifice still commemorated today during the Duan Wu or Dragon Boat Festival.
 * Pharaoh Ptolemy XIII of Egypt, drowned in the Nile in 47 BC.
 * Antinous (born circa 111), lover of Roman Emperor Hadrian, drowned in the Nile in 130; the grieving emperor commissioned hundreds of statues of the youth and spread them around the Empire.
 * Cao E, a Han dynasty girl venerated for her filial piety. In 143, Cao Xu accidentally fell into the Shun River. in an act of filial piety, she decided to find her father in the river. After five days, she and her father were both found dead in the river from drowning. Eight years later, a temple was built in Shangyu dedicated to the memory of Cao E and her sacrifice for filial piety. The Shun River was renamed Cao'e River in her honor.
 * Maxentius, Roman Emperor, drowned in the Tiber during the chaos of the Battle of the Milvian Bridge on October 28, 312.
 * Yuan Zhao, briefly an emperor of the Northern Wei, thrown together with Empress Dowager Hu into the Yellow River to drown
 * Shabib ibn Yazid al-Shaybani, (697/98), a rebel in Umayyad Caliphate, was defeated by Umayyad Army. As he attempted to escape his Syrian pursuers (the Umayyad army), he drowned in the Dujayl Canal while trying to cross it. This occurred either in early 697 or in 697/98.
 * Li Bai, Chinese poet, in 762. It is, however, suggested that he died of excessive drinking or mercury poisoning.

Middle Ages

 * William Adelin (born 1103) and his half-sister Matilda FitzEdith, countess of Perches (born circa 1090), children of King Henry I of England, drowned in the Channel on 25 November 1120 in the White Ship wreck.
 * Kilij Arslan died trying to escape across the Khabur river, having lost the battle that took place near the river.
 * Empress Zhu is believed to have committed suicide by drowning herself in 1127 after the Jingkang Incident because she was a victim of sexual abuse.
 * Taira no Koremori is believed to have committed suicide on May 10, 1184, after defeated at the Battle of Kurikara.
 * Emperor Antoku, Taira no Tokiko, Tomomori, Noritsune and many other members of the Taira clan committed suicide on April 25, 1185, after defeated at the Battle of Dan-no-ura.
 * Friedrich I Barbarossa, Duke of Swabia and Holy Roman Emperor, drowned in the Göksu River (Cilicia) on 6 June 1190 during the Third Crusade, leaving an unstable alliance between Richard I of England and Philip II of France.
 * Henry of Antioch, the son of Bohemund IV of Antioch, drowned at sea in June 1276.
 * King Magnus IV of Sweden and Norway (as Magnus VII), 1316 – 1374.
 * Zhao Bing and Lu Xiufu committed suicide after defeated at Battle of Yamen, and Southern Song fell, on March 19, 1279.
 * Saint John of Nepomuk, martyred by drowning in 1393.

Renaissance

 * Henry Holland, 3rd Duke of Exeter, Constable of the Tower of London, 1430 – 1475
 * George, Duke of Clarence (born 1449), executed for treason against his brother king Edward IV of England on 1478, by drowning in a barrel of Malmsey wine; or so the legend says, because modern assessments favour the traditional decapitation instead
 * Bartolomeu Dias, a Portuguese explorer who sailed around the Cape of Good Hope. Drowned not far from the Cape of Good Hope in 1500
 * King Louis II of Hungary in the Csele Brook, on escape from the catastrophic Battle of Mohács (1526). Heavy cavalry armor impeded his ability to swim.
 * Felix Manz, co-founder of the Swiss Anabaptists, was drowned in 1527 in the Limmat in Zürich by the Zürich Reformed state church
 * Robert Parsons, English composer, fell into the then swollen River Trent at Newark-on-Trent in Nottinghamshire and was drowned.
 * Francisco Rodrigues Lobo (b. 1580), a Portuguese poet and writer of Sephardi Jewish origin, drowned on 4 November 1621
 * Alexander Whitaker, the "Apostle of Virginia" drowned while fording the James River in Virginia. He was the first English-speaking Clergyman in the New World.

18th century

 * John William Friso of Orange-Nassau, stadholder of the Low Countries, in 1711
 * Miguel de Bragança (b. 1699), bastard son of King Peter II of Portugal, in the Tagus River on 13 January 1724
 * Peter Artedi, a disciple of Linnaeus, considered the father of Ichthyology, fell by accident in a channel of Amsterdam in 1735
 * 172 passengers of shipwrecked vessel Le Saint Géran at Île D'Ambre off the coast of Isle de France (Mauritius) on 18 August 1744.

19th century

 * Percy Bysshe Shelley, influential English Romantic poet, in a sudden storm while sailing off Livorno on 8 July 1822.
 * Charles Clement Johnston, U.S. Representative from Virginia, drowned in the Potomac River near Alexandria, Virginia in 1832.
 * Lucas Barrett, English naturalist and geologist in 1862.
 * Gonçalves Dias, a Brazilian Romantic poet, playwright, ethnographer, lawyer and linguist, in 1864.
 * Constantine W. Buckley, former Speaker of the Texas House of Representatives, drowned in the Brazos River near Columbia, Texas on 19 December 1865.
 * William Collinson Sawyer 1st Bishop of Grafton and Armidale died on Sunday, 15 March 1868 when the boat he was travelling in sank on the Clarence River.
 * Richard Kirwan, English cricketer and Anglican clergyman, drowned while bathing in the sea off Sidmouth on 2 September 1872.
 * Julius Krohn (b. 1835), founder of the scientific study of folklore, and influential journalist, author and translator. Ethnically German but active in Finland. Drowned in a freak sailing accident in 1888.
 * L'Inconnue de la Seine, an unknown woman allegedly found dead in the river Seine in the late 1880s. Her death mask was reproduced and displayed in artists' studios.

1900s

 * Consort Zhen (born 1876), consort of Guangxu Emperor, thrown into a well by Empress Dowager Cixi, August 15, 1900.
 * Isadore Rush (born ?), American actress. Drowned off the beach at San Diego, Hotel Del Coronado November 1904.
 * Grace Brown (born 1886), American garment industry worker. She drowned in New York's Big Moose Lake on June 11, 1906, after she fell out of a boat being rowed by her boyfriend, Chester Gillette, nephew of her employer. Witnesses said Gillette had struck her on the head with a tennis racket before she went into the water; he claimed she had jumped out. After a murder trial that drew national attention, Gillette was convicted and sentenced to death; he was executed two years later. The case inspired Theodore Dreiser's novel An American Tragedy.
 * Ernst Schultz (born 1879), Danish sprinter. Drowned while swimming in Roskilde Fjord, 20 June 1906.

1910s

 * Sir W. S. Gilbert (b. 1836), British humorist, librettist of the Gilbert and Sullivan operas, drowned on 29 May 1911 while going to the rescue of two other swimmers in the lake at his home. He may have died from a heart attack rather than by drowning.
 * Michel Tamarati (born 1858), a Georgian Catholic priest and historian, died while trying to rescue a drowning man in a stormy sea near Santa Marinella, Italy, on September 16, 1911.
 * John Jacob Astor IV (born 1864) drowned in the Titanic disaster in 1912.
 * Benjamin Guggenheim (born 1865) drowned in the Titanic disaster in 1912.
 * Isidor Straus and wife Ida Straus, drowned in the Titanic disaster.
 * Grigori Rasputin (died 1916), Russian mystic and Imperial adviser. The aristocratic faction tried to kill him using several methods, including, after poison, several gunshots; this is believed to be the main cause of his death, but after his body was thrown in the Neva River (and later recovered), many tend to believe that drowning was the final cause of his death. For others, attributing death to drowning means adding to a legend.
 * Enrique Granados drowned after jumping out of a lifeboat to rescue his wife following the torpedoing of their ship by the German navy during World War I in 1916.
 * Tom Thomson, Canadian painter who died in a canoeing accident in Algonquin Provincial Park in 1917.

1920s

 * William Wilton (born 1865), Scottish football manager (Rangers F.C.), drowned in a boating accident at Gourock, Scotland in 1920.
 * Little Lord Fauntleroy (murder victim), an unidentified child found in Waukesha, Wisconsin, on March 8, 1921. He had been hit in the head with a blunt instrument and was thrown into a quarry, which resulted in his death.
 * Pavel Urysohn (born 1898), Russian mathematician and topologist, drowned on 17 August 1924 while on holiday in France.
 * Sacadura Cabral died on 15 November 1924 after his airplane disappeared over the English Channel, along with his co-pilot Mechanical Corporal José Correia. As no bodies were found, it is not known whether they actually drowned.
 * Ida Vihuri (born 1882), Finnish politician, died on 7 September 1929 in the shipwreck of SS Kuru.

1930s

 * J. W. H. T. Douglas, (1882–1930), cricketer, died unsuccessfully trying to rescue his father after a collision at sea.
 * Starr Faithfull (1906–1931), American socialite, drowned near Long Beach, New York in June 1931; whether her death was homicide, suicide or accident was never determined.
 * Bertie Johnston, Australian politician, drowned at Black Rock, Victoria in 1932.
 * Hart Crane, poet; suicide in the Caribbean in April 1932.
 * Eugene James (1913–1933), Kentucky Derby-winning American jockey drowned in Lake Michigan while swimming at Chicago's Oak Street Beach.
 * Oskar Kumpu (1889–1935), Finnish Olympic wrestler and Red Army officer, drowned while swimming in the Olonka River in the Soviet Union.
 * Jiro Sato (1908–1934), Japanese tennis player, committed suicide in the Strait of Malacca on April 5, 1934.
 * James Murray, (1901–1936), actor, found drowned in the Hudson River, possible suicide.
 * Alfonsina Storni, (1892–1935), Argentine poet, committed suicide in Mar del Plata, Argentina.
 * Michalina Isaakowa (1880–1937), Polish amateur entomologist, traveler and writer drowned in Peru.

1940s

 * Virginia Woolf (born 1882), British writer, committed suicide on 28 March 1941.
 * Osamu Dazai (born 1909), Japanese writer, committed shinjū in the Tamagawa Aqueduct on June 13, 1948.

1950s

 * Arky Vaughan (born 1912), baseball Hall of Famer, drowned after falling from his fishing boat on 30 August 1952.
 * Susan Martin (1945–1958) and Virginia Martin (1947–1958) died by drowning in the Columbia River in unexplained circumstances when they, along with their mother, father, and older sister, disappeared in December 1958.

1960s

 * Victor Prather (born 1926), U.S. Navy flight surgeon, drowned on May 4, 1961, after the landing of the Strato-Lab V balloon flight, which set a new manned balloon altitude record.
 * David Kenyon Webster of the 101st Airborne Division (Band of Brothers) was lost at sea, September 9, 1961, while shark fishing. Presumed drowned.
 * Klara Dan von Neumann (born 1911), pioneer in computer science, drowned on 10 November 1963 in La Jolla, California.
 * Johnny Burnette, pop singer known for hits such as "You're Sixteen", drowned after a boating accident on August 14, 1964.
 * On 9 July 1964: drowning of 8 members of para-military branch Special Mobile Force (SMF) at Bras D’Eau, Poste Lafayette in Mauritius (Sergeant Nadal, constables Célestin, Sandoo, Bazire, Dahary, Dornford, Virasamy and civilian Hervé Couronne).
 * Lao She (born 1899), Chinese novelist and dramatist. Experienced mistreatment when the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, committed suicide by drowning himself in Beijing's Taiping Lake on 24 August 1966.
 * Prince Frederick of Prussia (born 1911), died in 1966 at Reinhartshausen, Germany, after drowning in the Rhine.
 * Eric Fleming, actor best known for his role in the CBS series Rawhide, drowned on 28 September 1966, in a remote river in Peru's back country while filming the made-for-TV movie "Selva Alta" ("High Jungle") for MGM.
 * Harold Holt, serving Prime Minister of Australia, presumed to have drowned on 17 December 1967.
 * Brian Jones (born 1942), original guitarist of The Rolling Stones, drowned in Hartfield, Sussex, England, in his own swimming pool on 3 July 1969. Classified as "death by misadventure".
 * Mary Jo Kopechne (born 1940), drowned in Ted Kennedy's Oldsmobile Delta 88 in a car accident off of Chappaquiddick Island in mid-July 1969.

1970s

 * Albert Ayler, jazz musician, suspected suicide November 1970.
 * George Duncan (born 1930), Australian law lecturer, drowned in Adelaide's River Torrens after being thrown in by a group of men believed to have been police officers charged with enforcing vice laws, particularly gay cruising on the riverbanks. No suspects have ever been identified in the case, but outrage over it led South Australia to become the first Australian state to fully decriminalize homosexuality three years later.
 * Cengaver Katrancı (born 1964), a Turkish boy, who lived in West Berlin. He is one of the youngest victims of the Berlin Wall's existence. Drowned in the Spree on October 30, 1972.
 * István Kertész, orchestral conductor, accident, 16 April 1973.
 * Josef Mengele (born 1911), war criminal and leader of the Nazi human experimentation programme, drowned while swimming off the Brazilian coast in 1979.
 * Horatio Strother (born 1930), American historian and educator who accidentally drowned while swimming in Hidden Lake in Haddam, Connecticut, in 1974.

1980s

 * John Crabbe Cunningham (born 1927), Scottish climber, mountain instructor and member of the Creag Dhu mountaineering club, drowned at South Stack, Anglesey, Wales in January 1980, when attempting to rescue a female pupil who fell into the sea while Coasteering
 * Natalie Wood (born 1938), actress, drowned in a yachting accident in 1981 off of Santa Catalina Island; the accident raised several suspicions and murder was considered and the case was reopened in 2011 and is now categorized as suspicious with husband Robert Wagner named as a person of interest.
 * Joe Delaney (born 1958), Running back for the Kansas City Chiefs, accidentally drowned in 1983 while trying to save three children who were screaming for help.
 * Dennis Wilson (born 1944), one of the members of the Beach Boys, drowned in 1983 at Marina del Rey, California, while diving after drinking.
 * Jessica Savitch (born 1947), NBC and PBS news broadcaster and reporter, drowned in 1983 when the car in which she was riding went off the road during a heavy rainstorm into a canal, sank upside down in mud and filled with water.
 * Grégory Villemin (born 1980), French child, was found drowned, bound and gagged in France's Vologne River 7 km from his home in Lépanges-sur-Vologne on October 16, 1984. It was later found that the water in his lungs did not match the river, suggesting he had been killed elsewhere. The ensuing homicide investigation and trials captivated the country; no one has been convicted in the case.
 * Hans Neij (born 1921), a Swedish Air Force major general serving as defence attaché in Washington, D.C. and Ottawa drowned during a holiday stay at Fort Walton Beach, Florida on 24 April 1985.
 * Fernando Pereira, Dutch photographer drowned when French agents sank the Greenpeace ship Rainbow Warrior, July 10, 1985.
 * Carol Wayne, American actress who drowned under mysterious circumstances in Manzanillo, Mexico in 1985.
 * Uwe Barschel, German politician who was found dead under mysterious circumstances on 11 October 1987 when his clothed body was discovered in a full bathtub at Hotel Beau-Rivage in Geneva.
 * Jerry Anderson, former NFL football player who drowned while saving a boy who had fallen into a flooded creek in 1989.

1990s

 * Jim Hodder, (born 1947), American drummer who drowned in his pool in 1990.
 * Robert Maxwell, newspaper magnate, disappeared from his yacht under mysterious circumstances in 1991, body later recovered off the coast of Tenerife, Canary Islands.
 * Will Sinnott, bass player and keyboardist for The Shamen, who drowned while swimming in the Canary Islands in 1991.
 * Kiyoshi Nishimura, Japanese film maker, committed suicide on November 17, 1993.
 * Tom Mees, longtime sportscaster for ESPN, drowned while trying to rescue his 4-year-old daughter in a neighbor's swimming pool, in 1996. The daughter survived.
 * David Chan Yuk-cheung (Chinese: 陈毓祥, born 1950), a leader of Baodiao movement in Hong Kong, drowned in the sea during a protest in 1996.
 * Jeff Buckley (born 1966), singer-songwriter, drowned in the Wolf River in Memphis, Tennessee in 1997.
 * Mae Boren Axton, songwriter known as "The Queen Mother of Nashville" and mother of singer Hoyt Axton, drowned in her hot tub at her home in Hendersonville, Tennessee, in 1997, after an apparent heart attack.
 * Nerine Kidd Shatner (Born July 13, 1959) actress/model and the third wife of William Shatner drowned while swimming alone in the couple's pool.

2000s

 * Linda Andersen (born 1959), forcibly drowned in her bathtub by her two daughters in Mississauga, Ontario, on January 18, 2003.
 * Riley Fox (born 2001), American child, was found drowned in a creek near Wilmington, Illinois on June 6, 2004, shortly after she had been reported missing. Her father was initially suspected of killing her and spent eight months in jail before evidence cleared him and charges were dropped; he would later successfully sue the local sheriff's office for violations of his civil rights. A paroled convict living nearby was later convicted after his own confession and sentenced to life without parole.He later died in prison.
 * Spalding Gray (born 1941), monologuist and actor (Swimming to Cambodia), drowned in a suspected suicide in New York City's East River in 2004.
 * Geetha Angara (born 1961), drowned in a water tank at a treatment plant where she worked as a chemist in Totowa, New Jersey, on February 8, 2005. Although the possibility has been raised that the drowning was accidental, police are investigating the death as a homicide, either by intent or negligence, but no suspects had been identified.
 * Tom Rogers (born 1918), creator of Charlie the Tuna for StarKist, drowned in his son's swimming pool while swimming alone, in Charlottesville, VA on June 24, 2005. He was 87 years old.
 * Wim Duisenberg (born 1935), Dutch banker who later became the first president of the European Central Bank, drowned in his swimming pool at Faucon in eastern France, on October 31, 2005. He may have died of a heart attack rather than by drowning.
 * Édouard Michelin (born 1963), French businessman, drowned while fishing near the island of Sein in northwest France, in 2006.
 * Barbara Precht, pulled from the Ohio River on 29 November 2006. Her body was not identified until November 2014. She died from drowning due to unknown circumstances.
 * Rafael Donato (born 1938), distinguished Filipino educator and university president, accidentally drowned off the coast of Morong, Bataan, in the Philippines in 2006.
 * Marquise Hill (born 1982), Defensive End for the New England Patriots, accidentally drowned in Lake Pontchartrain in New Orleans after a jet ski accident on 27 May 2007.
 * Jeremy Blake (born 1971), American digital artist and painter, drowned on or around July 17, 2007 in the Atlantic Ocean in an apparent suicide (although some suspect he was murdered by Scientologists) after being reported missing off Rockaway Beach, Queens, New York. His body was found in the water off Sea Girt, New Jersey on July 22, 2007.
 * Seth Tobias (born 1963), American hedge fund manager, drowned on September 4, 2007, while under the influence of drugs and alcohol in his swimming pool in Jupiter, Florida
 * Kari Blackburn (born 1954), BBC World Service executive, drowned (suicide) at sea at Felixstowe, Suffolk, England in 2007.
 * Katoucha Niane (born 1960), French model, drowned in the Seine in 2008.
 * Pit Martin (born 1943), Canadian ice hockey player, drowned after his snowmobile fell through thin ice in Quebec in 2008.
 * Ophélie Bretnacher, a French student, drowned in the Danube between December 2008 and February 2009.

2010s

 * Dawn Brancheau, SeaWorld trainer, killed during a killer whale show and suffered a blunt trauma on February 24, 2010.
 * Toshiharu Ikeda, Japanese film director and screenwriter, committed suicide in December 2010.
 * Marie-France Pisier, French actress, found dead in her swimming pool April 2011.
 * Nandana, the 8-year-old daughter of Indian singer K. S. Chithra, drowned after falling into a swimming pool in Dubai, April 2011.
 * Whitney Houston, American singer, found dead in her bathtub following a barbiturate overdose, February 2012.
 * Rodney King, American construction worker, victim of police brutality, found dead in his swimming pool with alcohol, marijuana and cocaine in his system, June 2012.
 * Elisa Lam (born 1991), Canadian tourist in Los Angeles, found in the water tank atop the hotel where she was staying on February 19, 2013.
 * David Bird, American journalist, found in a river near his home 14 months after he was last seen alive in early 2014.
 * Alan Kurdi (born 2012), Syrian child, drowned in the Mediterranean off the Turkish coast on September 2, 2015, while his family was trying to enter Greece and seek refugee status from their country's civil war. A photograph of Kurdi's body lying lifeless on the shore sparked global outrage over the plight of Syrian refugees.
 * Santiago Maldonado, drowned while trying to cross río Chubut while escaping from the federal law enforcement.
 * Sally Brampton, English journalist, writer and magazine editor, committed suicide by walking into the sea at St Leonards on 10 May 2016.
 * Maria Ladenburger, died of drowning in the German river Dreisam on October, 16th 2016 after being sexually assaulted.
 * Vladimir Cvijan, died of drowning in the Danube in Belgrade, Serbia on 5 January 2018. His death was kept hidden from the public for 3 years, until it was revealed in March 2021.
 * Dolores O’Riordan, Irish musician and vocalist for the Cranberries died of drowning caused by alcohol poisoning in her bathtub at the London Hilton on Park Lane hotel on 15 January 2018.
 * Sridevi, veteran Indian actress, died aged 54 on 24 February 2018 after drowning in the bathtub of her room in a hotel in Dubai, where she had gone to attend a marriage. Initially, the cause of her death was known as a heart attack, but it was later confirmed to be drowning. It is believed that she was under the influence of alcohol when she died.
 * Eric Geboers, age 55, a 5-time Belgian world champion motocross racer, died on 6 May 2018, while trying to save his drowning dog.
 * Ray Emery, Canadian ice hockey goaltender, drowned in Hamilton Harbour on July 15, 2018.
 * Florijana Ismaili, Swiss Footballer, drowned in Lake Como in July 2019.
 * Chan Yin-lam (born 2004), drowned in the ocean off Hong Kong September 19, 2019. Her death was ruled a suicide; conspiracy theories circulated that she had actually been killed by the police over her participation in the ongoing protests.

2020s

 * On May 17, 2020, Shad Gaspard and his son were among a group of swimmers caught in a strong rip current in the Venice Beach neighborhood of Los Angeles. Gaspard told the lifeguards to save his son before saving himself but disappeared underwater soon after. His son was safely rescued.
 * On 8 July 2020, Alex Pullin (also known as 'Chumpy'), an Australian Olympic snowboarder, drowned after a spearfishing accident at Palm Beach, Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia.
 * Also on 8 July 2020, actress and singer Naya Rivera drowned in Lake Piru, Ventura County, California, after saving her son. After being declared a missing person and a subsequent search and rescue mission, her body was found on 13 July 2020.
 * On 26 November 2021, the Norwegian YouTuber Apetor drowned at Jakobs dam, a lake west of Kongsberg, Norway. He was rescued by divers and flown by air ambulance to Ullevål University Hospital in Oslo, though he was unable to be resuscitated and died on the 27th.
 * On November 5, 2022, American singer Aaron Carter drowned in a bathtub at his California home after inhaling difluoroethane and taking alprazolam.
 * On October 28, 2023, American actor Matthew Perry died of an apparent drowning in his hot tub at his Pacific Palisades home at the age of 54.

title: List of drowning victims


text:
John Laws

Richard John Sinclair Laws CBE (born 8 August 1935) is an Australian radio announcer. For 50 years, until 2007, he was the host of an Australian morning radio program combining music with interviews, opinion, live advertising readings and listener talkback. His distinctive voice earned him the nickname "the Golden Tonsils". Although officially retired between 2007 and 2011, he returned in February 2011 to host a morning program on 2SM and the Super Radio Network.

Career
Best known as a talkback radio broadcaster, Laws is one of Australia's highest-paid radio personalities and has been involved with Australian talkback radio broadcasting much longer than any other presenter. Although regularly commentating on topical news, Laws did not regard himself a journalist but as an entertainer and salesman. He is nonetheless one of the few commercial radio personalities whose interviews with state and federal political leaders are considered to have a significant influence of the course of politics in New South Wales especially, and Australia in general. He has also often appeared as a television show host and enjoyed a long recording career.

Laws' radio show was syndicated throughout Australia for many years and was consistently one of the most popular and influential programs in the Australian media. Laws is also a familiar voice for generations of Australians through his large and varied body of work as a voice-over artist for commercials, and as a celebrity endorser of commercial products, notably Valvoline motor oil, with his popular catchphrase "Valvoline, you know what I mean" and Oral-B toothbrushes (the slogan "Oral-B, the toothbrush more dentists use.")

Early life
Born in Wau, Papua New Guinea, to Australian parents, Laws contracted polio twice – once as a child, and again as a young man. He was educated at Mosman Preparatory School and Knox Grammar School in Sydney, New South Wales.

Early career
He began his radio career in 1953 at 3BO in Bendigo before working at several rural radio stations and joining 2UE in 1957, the first of four terms at that Sydney radio station, during which time he became one of the first Australian disc jockeys to play rock 'n' roll music (along with Bob Rogers, Tony Withers and Stan Rofe). Laws pioneered the practice (soon taken up by Rofe) of using contacts in the airline industry to supply him with the latest international pop releases, giving him an edge at a time when Australian releases of many British and American pop records might be delayed for months.

Laws left 2UE in 1959, and moved to the Hunter Valley, where he ran a farm. In 1962 he moved back to Sydney, where he joined 2GB, remaining with the station for two years before he rejoined 2UE in 1964. His stint at 2UE continued until 1969, at which point he contracted to 2UW, where he was to remain for almost 10 years. He returned to 2UE in 1979, this time for another five years. He then moved to 2GB after a highly publicized bid for his services, but returned to the 2UE fold when the station was number eight in the ratings. The return of Laws was the primary cause of the station becoming number one in Sydney for many years. Laws' radio program was syndicated nationwide, and was especially popular in rural areas. Capital city stations taking Laws include 4BC in Brisbane, 2CC in Canberra, 7HOFM in Hobart and Mix 104.9 in Darwin.

In 1983, Communications lecturer Glen Lewis wrote of Laws:

He sets the agenda by complaining vigorously about something, lays down the line for the day, then accepts calls which mostly reflect his own viewpoint... he mostly gets the restatement of cliched views [from callers]... Technically, he foregrounds minority group negative stereotyping in his show. Informally, he specialises in moral crusades against the unrespectable weak – the unemployed, prisoners, homosexuals, anti-nuclear demonstrators – in the name of the upright citizen and honest taxpayer.

Television
Though best known as a radio host, Laws has often worked as a television host and panelist. His early 1960s show Startime assisted in introducing mainstream Australia to Edna Everage at which time Laws claimed Everage was "a very close friend of mine". Laws told columnist Valda Marshall in 1970 that he was 'not basically a TV star' and didn't 'feel altogether happy with the medium'. He was a judge on Australia's New Faces in 1969 and took over as host from Noel Ferrier on the panel advice show Beauty and the Beast in 1970. He also appeared on television in 1970 in an acting role in the children's drama Skippy. Laws quit Beauty and the Beast in 1971; a spokesman for the station which produced the show, Channel 7, claimed Laws had asked for a higher salary. In May 1971, he began hosting a daytime show called His and Hers. In 1982, he hosted a revived Beauty and the Beast for Network 10. In 1998, John Laws – In One Lifetime premiered on Network Ten and LAWS on Foxtel. While LAWS continued until 2000, John Laws – In One Lifetime was dropped after two episodes, although the remaining five episodes that were commissioned by Network 10 were aired later that year.

21st century
In 2002, station colleague and arch-rival Alan Jones moved from 2UE to 2GB, and soon took that station to the top talk position in Sydney. Laws announced on 25 June 2007 that after 55 years on the air he would retire at the end of the year. However, he was pre-empted by other media agencies, who broke the story at 9:00 am. Laws made the announcement at about 9:10 am, saying that he had planned to make the announcement at about 9:45 am.Laws' last broadcast was on 30 November 2007, one week after the federal election. He began as always, "Hello world, I'm John Laws" and signed off with his usual quote, "you...be kind to each other." He then left the 2UE building in Sydney in his Rolls-Royce Phantom surrounded by hordes of cameramen.

In 2004 Laws and rival talk-back host Alan Jones were accused of taking payment to make favourable comments on products and services under the guise of merely expressing personal opinion, after entering into deals with Telstra. The ABA subsequently found that Laws' deal constituted cash for comment but Jones' did not. Laws, apparently angered by what he saw as inequitable treatment, launched stinging attacks on Jones and the ABA's head, David Flint. In an appearance on the ABC's Enough Rope, Laws accused Jones of placing pressure on Prime Minister John Howard to keep Flint as head of the ABA, and made comments that many viewers took to imply a sexual relationship between Jones and Flint, and broadly hinted that Jones, like Flint, was homosexual.

On 7 May 2009, Laws made a statement on the 20th anniversary special edition of the ABC's Media Watch program, in which he exhibited no remorse for his role in the Cash-for-Comment scandal, instead implying that the whistleblower (Media Watch) was the wrongdoer and that the people involved were only jealous of his success.

In November 2004, Laws and 2UE colleague Steve Price were found guilty of vilifying homosexuals after an on-air discussion about a gay couple appearing in the reality TV show The Block. They described the couple as "young poofs". Laws had previously apologised for another incident in which he called gay TV personality Carson Kressley, of Queer Eye for the Straight Guy fame, a "pillow-biter" and a "pompous little pansy prig".

In October 2007, West Coast Eagles player Adam Selwood commenced legal proceedings against Laws over comments made about him regarding a mid-year incident involving Fremantle Football Club player Des Headland. On 17 July 2007, Laws' gold-plated microphone was stolen. The Sennheiser was presented to him by his radio station 2UE management in 2003 to commemorate his 50 years on the air and is said to be worth $10,000. "I'm very upset about it – it's been a part of my life" he told the Daily Telegraph. Laws subsequently switched to another gold plated microphone; a Rode NT2-A presented to him for his 40th anniversary. He promised charges would not be laid if the Sennheiser was returned.

In December 2007, during a long lunch at Sydney's Otto Ristorante to farewell his former personal assistant, Laws was informed of the presence of rival broadcasters Derryn Hinch and Bob Rogers at another table nearby. He went over to their table and immediately spouted forth a tirade of invective, calling them 'the two most despicable cunts' he'd ever met in the industry. Hinch and Rogers traded insults with Laws, insisting Hinch was a 'hypocrite' and a 'failed alcoholic'. Hinch replied that that must mean Laws was a 'successful one' and that if Laws was not in fact an alcoholic then he was a 'bloody good actor'. Eventually 2UE colleague Mike Carlton convinced Laws to return to his table and Hinch and Rogers were left to laugh off the altercation.

In August 2009, Laws revealed on Vega (now known as Smooth FM) that he missed radio and that he was interested in returning to the airwaves. This was followed five months later by an announcement by Laws' manager, revealing that Laws had entered into negotiations with a number of radio stations, including 2SM. Nevertheless, the suggestions that Laws would be returning from retirement in 2010 ended shortly thereafter, when 2UE management revealed that their contract with Laws precluded him from competing with their station until December 2010. Laws' management confirmed in November 2010 that he would be returning to radio, following the expiry of the no-compete clause that prevented him from signing with a new network.

On 19 March 2013, Laws interviewed a female listener, who described a history of sexual abuse between the ages of six and sixteen. Laws proceeded to ask the woman if the abuse was in some way her fault and whether she had been provocative. The following day Laws said on air that women who dressed provocatively were once viewed as "rape bait".

In 2015, Laws referred to a male victim of child sexual assault as a "wet blanket" and told him to "brighten up".

In March 2020, Laws addressed on air an email received from a listener which was critical of both Laws and various items of content broadcast on the show. In his response, Laws told the listener "for goodness sake, say something constructive, like you're going to kill yourself." The incident was later investigated by the Australian Communications and Media Authority, who in March 2021 released a report finding Laws had breached two provisions of the Commercial Radio Code of Practice in broadcasting this statement. It also found 2HD (licensee of 2SM) had breached a provision of the same code relating to complaints handling.

He currently presents the John Laws Morning Show on 2SM and the Super Radio Network.

Cultural influence
In 1996 a portrait of John Laws by artist Paul Newton won the Packing Room award at the Archibald Prize. The portrait was hung in Laws' production office at 2UE.

Former Australian Prime Minister Paul Keating called him the "broadcaster of the century" at Laws 40th anniversary dinner. At the ARIA Music Awards of 2008 he was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award.

He is mentioned in the song "Who Can Stand in the Way?" by Australian group Midnight Oil on their album Red Sails in the Sunset and the song "This Train Will be Taking No Passengers" from Augie March's second album Strange Bird. and the song Crooks and Crimescenes by Inner-west Sydney rap group Spit Syndicate.

Poetry and non-fiction
Laws has authored numerous books, many of them poetry collections. He claimed in 1970 that he had been reading Rod McKuen's poems on air but at one point, realising he had left his copy of McKuen's book at home, he instead read a poem of his own and "it seemed to go over pretty well." The working title for his first book was Poems that Came to Me in the Night When No-one Else Would. His Book of Irreverent Logic and his Book of Uncommon Sense were republished together in 1996 as A John Laws Limited Edition. His most recent work is a memoir. His books include:

 * In love is an expensive place to die : poems (Paul Hamlyn, 1971)
 * Results of Love (Hamlyn, 1972)
 * Calendar Collection (Summit, 1978)
 * Just You and Me Together, Love: Poems (Hamlyn, 1978)
 * Somewhere Remembering (Angus and Robertson, 1984)
 * John Laws' Book of Irreverent Logic (Pan Australia, 1994)
 * John Laws' Book of Uncommon Sense (Pan Macmillan, 1995)
 * John Laws' Barbecue Cook Book (Pan Macmillan, 1996)
 * It Doesn't End There: Great Australian Stories With a Twist (with Christopher Stewart) (Pan Macmillan, 2006)
 * There's Always More to the Story (with Christopher Stewart) (Pan Macmillan, 2006)
 * Lawsie : well ... you wanted to know (New Holland, 2017)

Film

 * Ned Kelly (1970) – Kennedy
 * Nickel Queen (1971) – Claude Fitzherbert
 * The Magic Pudding (2000) – Rumpus Bumpus

Television

 * Startime (1962–63) as Host
 * New Faces (1969) as Judge
 * Beauty and the Beast (1970–71, 1982) as Host
 * ''Skippy' (1970)
 * His and Hers (1971) as Host
 * John Laws – In One Lifetime (1998) as Host
 * LAWS (1998–2000) as Host

Discography
Laws recorded nine singles between 1959 and 1962, including many songs he wrote himself. He recorded eight solo albums in the 1970s. His first three LPs and the seventh, You've Never Been Trucked Like This Before, are primarily covers of country and middle of the road hits; the fourth, The Mind and the Music, was made up of original Laws songs. In Love is an Expensive Place to Die is an album of Laws' poetry set to music. You Must Remember This is a collection of standards from the forties with one song co-written by Laws.

Additionally, Laws appears recorded as part of the cast of Side By Side By Sondheim (RCA Red Seal, 1977) and reading his poems to accompaniment by the Henry Mancini Orchestra on an album entitled Just You and Me Together, Love (RCA, 1977). A Tribute to the ANZACS (Southland, 2000) is a 'musical documentary' narrated by Laws.

Australian Record Awards

 * 1975
 * Let Him Roll
 * Country Music Album of the Year
 * Won
 * }
 * }

Mo Awards
The Australian Entertainment Mo Awards (commonly known informally as the Mo Awards), were annual Australian entertainment industry awards. They recognise achievements in live entertainment in Australia from 1975 to 2016. (wins only)
 * 1998
 * John Laws
 * John Campbell Fellowship Award
 * Won
 * Won

title: John Laws


text:
Killjoy (Shihad album)

Killjoy is the second full-length album released by New Zealand rock band Shihad. This album was released in May 1995.

It is their first album to go gold in New Zealand. It is widely regarded as a classic New Zealand rock album.

According to MTV, Iggy Pop and the members of metal band Metallica have both highly praised this album.

Track listing

 * 1) "You Again" - 4:37
 * 2) "Gimme Gimme" - 5:17
 * 3) "The Call" - 5:13
 * 4) "Envy" - 3:54
 * 5) "Deb’s Night Out" - 3:37
 * 6) "Bitter" - 4:12
 * 7) "For What You Burn" - 5:43
 * 8) "Silvercup" - 5:03
 * 9) "Get Up" - 4:11

The Japanese version included an extra track called "N.I.L." This track was also included as a bonus track on the 20th Anniversary remaster of Killjoy released in 2015.

Credits

 * All songs by: Shihad
 * Produced by: Shihad & Malcolm Welsford
 * Assistant Engineer: Nick Treacy
 * Recorded and Mixed by: Malcolm Welsford
 * Digital Editing: Evan Robertson
 * Additional Percussion: DLT

Awards
The album won Best Album at the 1996 New Zealand Music Awards.

title: Killjoy (Shihad album)


text:
Dafne

Dafne is the earliest known work that, by modern standards, could be considered an opera. The libretto by Ottavio Rinuccini, based on an earlier intermedio created in 1589, "Combattimento di Apollo col serpente Pitone," and set to music by Luca Marenzio, survives complete. The opera is considered to be the first "modern music drama."

The mostly lost music was completed by Jacopo Peri, but at least two of the six surviving fragments are by Jacopo Corsi. Dafne was first performed during Carnival of 1598 (1597 old style) at the Palazzo Corsi.

History
Most of Peri's music has been lost, despite its popularity and fame in Europe at the time of its composition, but the 455-line verse libretto was published and survives. Florence's ruling Medici family was sufficiently taken with Dafne to allow Peri's next work, Euridice, to be performed as part of Marie de' Medici and Henry IV's wedding celebrations in 1600.

The opera was written for an elite circle of humanists in Florence, the Florentine Camerata, between 1594 and 1597, with the support, and possibly the collaboration, of the composer and patron Jacopo Corsi. However, the first confirmed, non-public, performance of the work for Don Giovanni de' Medici was held in 1597 thanks to Marco da Gagliano. On Peri's own account, the opera seems to have been performed during three carnival celebrations (1595–1598), with the opera having been composed the year prior. The opera was later performed in 1599 at the Palazzo Pitti and at the Palazzo Guicciardini Corsi Salviati no later than January of the same year, but dates of performances are under scholastic debate.

As an attempt to revive Greek drama, it was a long way off from what the ancient Greeks would have recognized as dramatic art.

Story
The opera's story regarding Apollo falling in love with the eponymous nymph, Daphne, takes its inspiration from Ovid and his narrative poetry, "Metamorphoses," a work in wide usage within the operas composed within the Florentine, Mantuan, and Roman operatic spheres.

According to Rinunccini's libretto, Apollo saves mankind by shooting Python, and soon pushes Cupid into an archery contest to see who's the better shot. As a way to get back at him, Cupid shoots him and makes him fall in love with Daphne. In order to get away from Apollo, Daphne turns into a laurel tree which Apollo then makes a crown of, this becoming the symbol of poetry, music, and freedom.

Music
Dafne is scored for a much smaller ensemble than Claudio Monteverdi's slightly later operas, namely, a harpsichord, a lute, a viol, an archlute, and a triple flute. Drawing on a new development at the time, Peri established recitatives, melodic speech set to music, as a central part of opera.

Peri's musical language was a conglomeration of his contemporaries and the experimentation with the invocation of human speech in music through recitative and musical prosody. For Peri, he strove to replicate the flow and musicality of speech in his writing, while contemporaries Emilio de' Cavalieri and Giulio Caccini sought different but similar compositional goals. As a result, the music written for the opera may have been co-written with help from Caccini but contemporary research does not support this.

title: Dafne


text:
Mayday (music festival)

Mayday is an electronic music festival in Germany, where it debuted in 1991, and in Katowice, Poland where it debuted in 2000. Despite the name, Mayday festivals date oscillates between April and December (these being called Winter Mayday). Currently, the festival takes place only in around 30 April in Dortmund and 10 November in Katowice.

Each Mayday has a theme. Until 2013 it was composed by Members of Mayday, DJs WestBam and Klaus Jankuhn.

Since 1998 Mayday (Germany) is supported by eve&rave Münster e.V. with drug-information-desks.

Although it played techno music in its early days, in recent years Mayday has opened up to new sounds, from hardstyle to house, trance and EDM.

List of Mayday events
Attendance figures are estimated.

title: Mayday (music festival)