style works in one place not another

Why does this work when placed in the header:

<style type="text/css">
<!--
body {
background-color: #000000;
}
-->
</style>

and not when I have it in a style sheet (also called in the header):

.body {
other styles: blah, blah, blah;
background-color: #000000;
}

?

 

because you are declaring body as a class in your stylesheet. Correct code should be

body {
other styles: blah, blah, blah; 
background-color: #000000;
}

Code (markup):

without the .

 

That worked. Thanks.