Max Mallowan Discovery" (1956) and his wife Agatha Christie described his work in Syria in "Come, Tell Me How You Live" (1946). Max's first wife, Lady Mallowan, known to millions as Dame Agatha Christie, died in 1976; the following year, Mallowan married Barbara Hastings Parker, an archaeologist, who had been his epigraphist at Nimrud and Secretary of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq. Mallowan was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire in the 1960 Queen's Birthday Honours, and knighted in 1968. He and Dame Agatha Christie were among a number of married couples each of whom held knightly
Ring on Her Finger, Time on Her Hands in February 1996. The song is about a married couple whose problems foreshadow the wife's decision to have an affair. The lyrics – mainly pronouns – are slightly changed, depending on whether the singer is a male or female. The song begins with a young couple standing at the altar, promising to be faithful to one another for the rest of their lives. The bride recalls that, as pure as the white in her gown, she stood by her groom's side and vowed to love him until her death. However, the couple's love life quickly sours, as the husband constantly