ARMAGEDDON (-ged´don), the great battlefield of the Old Testament, where the chief conflicts took place between the Israelites and their enemies--the table-land of Esdraelon in Galilee and Samaria, in the centre of which stood the town of Megiddo, on the site of the modern Lejjun: used figuratively in the _Apocalypse_ to signify the place of 'the battle of the great day of God'. It may, however, be _har migdo_, his fruitful mountain, 'the mountain land of Israel'. The phrase 'an Armageddon' expresses any great slaughter or final conflict, and has been frequently applied to the Great War of 1914-8. During this war severe fighting took place in Sept., 1918, on the field of Armageddon, the entrance to the passes of Megiddo. The battle ended in an overwhelming victory for General Allenby's armies. See _Megiddo_.
ARMAGH ([.a]r-mä´), a county of Ireland, in the province of Ulster; surrounded by Monaghan, Tyrone, Lough Neagh, Down, and Louth; area, 328,086 acres, of which about a half is under tillage. The north-west of the county is undulating and fertile. The northern part, bordering on Lough Neagh, consists principally of extensive bogs. On the southern border is a range of barren hills. The chief rivers are the Blackwater, which separates it from Tyrone; the Upper Bann, which discharges itself into Lough Neagh; and the Callan, which falls into the Blackwater. There are several small lakes. The manufacture of linen is carried on very extensively. Armagh, Lurgan, and Portadown are the chief towns. The county sends three members to Parliament. Pop. 120,291.--The county town, _Armagh_, is situated partly on a hill, about half a mile from the Callan. It has a Protestant cathedral crowning the hill, a Gothic building dating from the eighth century, repaired and beautified recently; a new Roman Catholic cathedral in the pointed Gothic style, and various public buildings. It is the see of an archbishop of the Protestant Episcopal Church, who is primate of all Ireland, and is a place of great antiquity. Pop. 7356.
ARMAGNAC ([.a]r-m[.a]-ny[.a]k), an ancient territory of France, in the province of Gascony, some of the counts of which hold prominent places in the history of France. Bernard VII, son of John II, surnamed the Hunchback, succeeded his brother, John III, in 1391, and was called to Court by Isabella of Bavaria, with the view of heading the Orleans in opposition to the Burgundian faction, where he no sooner gained the ascendancy than he compelled the queen to appoint him Constable of France. He showed himself a merciless tyrant, and became so generally execrated that the Duke of Burgundy, to whom Isabella had turned for help, found little difficulty in gaining admission into Paris, and even seizing the person of Armagnac, who was cast into prison in 1418, when the exasperated populace burst in and killed him and his followers. John V, grandson of the above, who succeeded in 1450, made himself notorious for his crimes. He was assassinated in his castle of Lectoure in 1473 by an agent of Louis XI, against whom he was holding out.
