EGYPTIAN MYTH AND LEGEND

With Historical Narrative, Notes on Race Problems, Comparative Beliefs, etc.

by

Donald Mackenzie

Gresham Publishing Co., London

[1907]

CHAPTER IV

The Peasant who became King

The Two Brothers--Peasant Life--The Temptress--Wrath of Anpu--Attempt to slay his Brother--Flight of Bata--Elder Brother undeceived--Kills his Wife--Bata hides his Soul--His Wife--Sought by the King--Bata's Soul Blossom destroyed--Wife becomes a Queen--Recovery of Lost Soul--Bata as a Bull--Slaughtered for the Queen--Bata a Tree--Bata reborn as Son of his Wife--The King who slew his Wife--mother--Belief in Transmigration of Souls.

THERE were once two brothers, and they were sons of the same father and of the same mother. Anpu was the name of the elder, and the younger was called Bata. Now Anpu had a house of his own, and he had a wife. His brother lived with him as if he were his son, and made garments for him. It was Bata who drove the oxen to the field, it was he who ploughed the land, and it was he who harvested the grain. He laboured continually upon his brother's farm, and his equal was not to be found in the land of Egypt; he was imbued with the spirit of a god.

In this manner the brothers lived together, and many days went past. Each morning the younger brother went forth with the oxen, and when evening came on he drove them again to the byre, carrying upon his back a heavy burden of fodder which he gave to the animals to eat, and he brought with him also milk and herbs for Anpu and his wife. While these two ate and drank together in the house, Bata rested in the byre with the cattle and he slept beside them.

When day dawned, and the land grew bright again, the younger brother was first to rise up, and he baked bread for Anpu and carried his own portion to the field and ate it there. As he followed the oxen he heard and he understood their speech. They would say: "Yonder is sweet herbage", and he would drive them to the place of their choice, whereat they were well pleased. They were indeed noble animals, and they increased greatly.

The time of ploughing came on, and Anpu spake unto Bata, saying: "Now get ready the team of oxen, for the Nile flood is past and the land may be broken up. We shall begin to plough on the morrow; so carry seed to the field that we may sow it."

As Anpu desired, so did Bata do. When the next day dawned, and the land grew bright, the two brothers laboured in the field together, and they were well pleased with the work which they accomplished. Several days went past in this manner, and it chanced that on an afternoon the seed was finished ere they had completed their day's task.

Anpu thereupon spake to his younger brother saying: "Hasten to the granary and procure more seed."

Bata ran towards the house, and entered it. He beheld his brother's wife sitting upon a mat, languidly pleating her hair.

"Arise," he said, "and procure corn for me, so that I may hasten back to the field with it. Delay me not."

The woman sat still and said: "Go thou thyself and open the storeroom. Take whatsoever thou dost desire. If I were to rise for thee, my hair would fall in disorder."

Bata opened the storeroom and went within. He took a large basket and poured into it a great quantity of seed. Then he came forth carrying the, basket through the house.

The woman looked up and said: "What is the weight of that great burden of thine?"

Bata answered: "There are two measures of barley and three of wheat. I carry in all upon my shoulders five measures of seed."

"Great indeed is thy strength," sighed the woman. "Ah, thee do I contemplate and admire each day!"

Her heart was moved towards him, and she stood up saying: "Tarry here with me. I will clothe thee in fine raiment."

The lad was made angry as the panther, and said: "I regard thee as a mother, and my brother is like a father unto me. Thou hast spoken evil words and I desire not to hear them again, nor will I repeat unto any man what thou hast just spoken."

He departed abruptly with his burden and hastened to the field, where he resumed his labour.

At eventide Anpu returned home and Bata prepared to follow after him. The elder brother entered his house and found his wife lying there, and it seemed as if she had suffered violence from an evildoer. She did not give him water to wash his hands, as was her custom. Nor did she light the lamp. The house was in darkness. She moaned where she lay, as if she were in sickness, and her garment was beside her.

"Who hath been here?" asked Anpu, her husband.

The woman answered him: "No one came nigh me save thy younger brother. He spoke evil words unto me, and I said: 'Am I not as a mother, and is not thine elder brother as a father unto thee?' Then was he angry, and he struck me until I promised that I would not inform thee. . . . Oh I if thou wilt allow him to live now, I shall surely die."

The elder brother became like an angry panther. He sharpened his dagger and went out and stood behind the door of the byre with purpose to slay young Bata when he came nigh.

The sun had gone down when the lad drove the oxen into the byre, carrying on his back fodder and herbs, and in one hand a vessel of milk, as was his custom each evening.

The first ox entered the byre, and then it spoke to Bata, saying: "Beware I for thine elder brother is standing behind the door. In his hand is a dagger, and he desires to slay thee. Draw not nigh unto him."

The lad heard with understanding what the animal had said. Then the second ox entered and went to its stall, and spake likewise words of warning, saying: "Take speedy flight."

Bata peered below the byre door, and he saw the legs of his brother, who stood there with a dagger in his hand. He at once threw down his burden and made hurried escape. Anpu rushed after him furiously with the sharp dagger.

In his sore distress the younger brother cried unto the sun god Ra-Harmachis, saying: "O blessed lord! thou art he who distinguisheth between falsehood and truth."

The god heard his cry with compassion, and turned round. 1 He caused a wide stream to flow between the two brothers, and, behold! it was full of crocodiles. Then it came that Anpu and Bata stood confronting one another, one upon the right bank and the other upon the left. The elder brother twice smote his hands with anguish because that he could not slay the youth.

Bata called out to Anpu, saying: "Tarry where thou art until the earth is made bright once again. Lo! when Ra, the sun god, riseth up, I shall reveal in his presence all that I know, and he shall judge between us, discerning what is false and what is true. . . . Know thou that I may not dwell with thee any longer, for I must depart unto the fair region of the flowering acacia."

When day dawned, and the sun god Ra appeared in his glory, the two brothers stood gazing one upon the other across the stream of crocodiles. Then the lad spake to his elder brother, saying: "Why didst thou come against me, desiring to slay me with treachery ere yet I had spoken for myself? Am I not thy younger brother, and hast thou not been as a father and thy wife as a mother unto me? Hear and know now that when I hastened to procure seed thy wife spoke, saying: 'Tarry thou with me.' But this happening hath been related unto thee in another manner."

So spake Bata, and he told his brother what was true regarding the woman. Then he called to witness the sun god, and said: "Great was thy wickedness in desiring to murder me by treachery." As he spoke he cut off a piece of his flesh and flung it into the stream, where it was devoured by a fish. 2 He sank fainting upon the bank.

Anpu was stricken with anguish; tears ran from his eyes. He desired greatly to be beside his brother on the opposite bank of the stream of crocodiles.

Bata spake again, saying: "Verily, thou didst desire an evil thing, but if thy desire now is to do good, I shall instruct thee what thou shouldst do. Return unto thy home and tend thine oxen, for know now that I may not dwell with thee any longer, but must depart unto the fair region of the flowering acacia. What thou shalt do is to come to seek for me when I need thine aid, for my soul shall leave my body and have its dwelling in the highest blossom of the acacia. When the tree is cut down, my soul will fall upon the ground. There thou mayest seek it, even if thy quest be for seven years, for, verily, thou shalt find it if such is thy desire. Thou must then place it in a vessel of water, and I shall come to life again and reveal all that hath befallen and what shall happen thereafter. When the hour cometh to set forth on the quest, behold! the beer given to thee will bubble, and the wine will have a foul smell. These shall be as signs unto thee."

Then Bata took his departure, and he went into the valley of the flowering acacia, which was across the ocean. 3 His elder brother returned home. He lamented, throwing dust upon his head. He slew his wife and cast her to the dogs, and abandoned himself to mourning for his younger brother.

Many days went past, and Bata reached at length the valley of the flowering acacia. He dwelt there alone and hunted wild beasts. At eventide he lay down to rest below the acacia, in whose highest blossom his soul was concealed. In time he built a dwelling place and he filled it with everything that he desired.

Now it chanced that on a day when he went forth he met the nine gods, who were surveying the whole land. They spoke one to another and then asked of Bata why he had forsaken his home because of his brother's wife, for she had since been slain. "Return again," they said, "for thou didst reveal unto thine elder brother the truth of what happened unto thee."

They took pity on the youth, and Ra spoke, saying: "Fashion now a bride for Bata, so that he may not be alone."

Then the god Khnumu 4 fashioned a wife whose body was more beautiful than any other woman's in the land, because that she was imbued with divinity.

Then came the seven Hathors 5 and gazed upon her. In one voice they spoke, saying: "She shall surely die a speedy death."

Bata loved her dearly. Each day she remained in his house while he hunted wild beasts, and he carried them home and laid them at her feet. He warned her each day, saying: "Walk not outside, lest the sea may come up and carry thee away. I could not rescue thee from the sea spirit, 6 against whom I am as weak as thou art, because my soul is concealed in the highest blossom of the flowering acacia. If another should find my soul I must needs fight for it."

Thus he opened unto her his whole heart and revealed its secrets.

Many days went past. Then on a morning when Bata had gone forth to hunt, as was his custom, his girl wife went out to walk below the acacia) which was nigh to the house.

Lo! the sea spirit beheld her in all her beauty and caused his billows to pursue her. Hastily she fled away and returned to the house, whereat the sea spirit sang to the acacia: "Oh, would she were mine!"

The acacia heard and cast to the sea spirit a lock of the girl wife's hair. The sea bore it away towards the land of Egypt and unto the place where the washers of the king cleansed the royal garments.

Sweet was the fragrance of the lock of hair, and it perfumed the linen of the king. There were disputes among the washers because that the royal garments smelt of ointment, nor could anyone discover the secret thereof. The king rebuked them.

Then was the heart of the chief washer in sore distress, because of the words which were spoken daily to him regarding this matter. He went down to the seashore; he stood at the place which was opposite the floating lock of hair, and he beheld it at length and caused it to be carried unto him. Sweet was its fragrance, and he hastened with it to the king.

Then the king summoned before him his scribes, and they spake, saying: "Lo! this is a lock from the hair of the divine daughter of Ra, and it is gifted unto thee from a distant land. Command now that messengers be sent abroad to seek for her. Let many men go with the one who is sent to the valley of the flowering acacia so that they may bring the woman unto thee". 7

The king answered and said: "Wise are your words, and they are pleasant unto me."

So messengers were sent abroad unto all lands. But those who journeyed to the valley of the flowering acacia returned not, because that Bata slew them all; the king had no knowledge of what befel them.

Then the king sent forth more messengers and many soldiers also, so that the girl might be brought unto him. He sent also a woman, and she was laden with rare ornaments . . . and the wife of Bata came back with her.

Then was there great rejoicing in the land of Egypt. Dearly did the king love the divine girl, and he exalted her because of her beauty. He prevailed upon her to reveal the secrets of her husband, and the king then said: "Let the acacia be cut down and splintered in pieces."

Workmen and warriors were sent abroad, and they reached the acacia. They severed from it the highest blossom, in which the soul of Bata was concealed. The petals were scattered, and Bata dropped down dead. 8

A new day dawned, and the land grew bright. The acacia was then cut down.

Meanwhile Anpu, the elder brother of Bata., went into his house, and he sat down and washed his hands. 9 He was given beer to drink, and it bubbled, and the wine had a foul smell.

He seized his staff, put on his shoes and his garment, and armed himself for his journey, and departed unto the valley of the flowering acacia.

When he reached the house of Bata he found the young man lying dead upon a mat. Bitterly he wept because of that. But he went out to search for the soul of his brother at the place where, below the flowering acacia) Bata was wont to lie down to rest at eventide. For three years he continued his search, and when the fourth year came his heart yearned greatly to return to the land of Egypt. At length he said: "I shall depart at dawn to-morrow."

A new day came, and the land grew bright. He looked over the ground again at the place of the acacia for his brother's soul. The time was spent thus. In the evening he continued his quest also, and he found a seed, which he carried to the house, and, lo! the soul of his brother was in it. He dropped the seed into a vessel filled with cold water, and sat down as was his custom at evening.

Night came on, and then the soul absorbed the water.

The limbs of Bata quivered and his eyes opened and gazed upon his elder brother, but his heart was without feeling. Then Anpu raised the vessel which contained the soul to the lips of Bata, and he drank the water. Thus did his soul return to its place, and Bata was as he had been before.

The brothers embraced and spoke one to the other. Bata said: "Now I must become a mighty bull with every sacred mark. None will know my secret. Ride thou upon my back, and when the day breaks I shall be at the place where my wife is. Unto her must I speak. Lead me before the king, and thou shalt find favour in his eyes. The people will wonder when they behold me, and shout welcome. But thou must return unto thine own home."

A new day dawned, and the land grew bright. Bata was a bull, and Anpu sat upon his back and they drew nigh to the royal dwelling. The king was made glad, and he said: "This is indeed a miracle." There was much rejoicing throughout the land. Silver and gold were given to the elder brother, and he went away to his own home and waited there.

In time the sacred bull stood in a holy place, and the beautiful girl wife was there. Bata spoke unto her, saying: "Look thou upon me where I stand, for, lo! I am still alive."

Then said the woman: "And who art thou?"

The bull made answer: "Verily, I am Bata. It was thou who didst cause the acacia to be cut down; it was thou who didst reveal unto Pharaoh that my soul had dwelling in the highest blossom, so that it might be destroyed and I might cease to be. But, lo! I live on, and I am become a sacred bull."

The woman trembled; fear possessed her heart when Bata spoke unto her in this manner. She at once went out of the holy place.

It chanced that the king sat by her side at the feast, and made merry, for he loved her dearly. She spoke, saying: "Promise before the god that thou wilt do what I ask of thee."

His Majesty took a vow to grant her the wish of her heart, and she said: "It is my desire to eat of the liver of the sacred bull, for he is naught to thee." 10

Sorrowful was the king then, and his heart was troubled, because of the words which she spake. . . .

A new day dawned, and the land grew bright. Then the king commanded that the bull should be offered in sacrifice.

One of the king's chief servants went out, and when the bull was held high upon the shoulders of the people he smote its neck and it cast two drops of blood 11 towards the gate of the palace, and one drop fell upon the right side and one upon the left. There grew up in the night two stately Persea trees 12 from where the drops of blood fell down.

This great miracle was told unto the king, and the people rejoiced and made offerings of water and fruit to the sacred trees.

A day came when his majesty rode forth in his golden chariot. He wore his collar of lapis lazuli, and round his neck was a garland of flowers. The girl wife was with him, and he caused her to stand below one of the trees, and it whispered unto her:

"Thou false woman, I am still alive. Lo! I am even Bata, whom thou didst wrong. It was thou who didst cause the acacia to be cut down. It was thou who didst cause the sacred bull to be slain, so that I might cease to be."

Many days went past, and the woman sat with the king at the feast, and he loved her dearly. She spake, saying: "Promise now before the god that thou wilt do what I ask of thee."

His Majesty made a vow of promise, and she said: "It is my desire that the Persea trees be cut down so that two fair seats may be made of them."

As she desired, so was it done. The king commanded that the trees should be cut down by skilled workmen, and the fair woman went out to watch them. As she stood there, a small chip of wood entered her mouth, and she swallowed it.

After many days a son was born to her, and he was brought before the king, and one said: "Unto thee a son is given."

A nurse and servants were appointed to watch over the babe.

There was great rejoicing throughout the land when the time came to name the girl wife's son. The king made merry, and from that hour he loved the child, and he appointed him Prince of Ethiopia.

Many days went past, and then the king chose him to be heir to the kingdom.

In time His Majesty fulfilled his years, and he died, and his soul flew to the heavens.

The new king (Bata) then said: "Summon before me the great men of my Court, so that I may now reveal unto them all that hath befallen me and the truth concerning the queen."

His wife 13 was then brought before him. He revealed himself unto her, and she was judged before the great men, and they confirmed the sentence. 14

Then Anpu was summoned before His Majesty, and he was chosen to be the royal heir.

When Bata had reigned for thirty years, 15 he came to his death, and on the day of his burial his elder brother stood in his place.

Egyptian Love Songs

(Collected by Scribes over 3000 years ago, and laid in tombs so that they might be sung by departed souls in Paradise.)

THE WINE OF LOVE

Oh! when my lady cometh,
And I with love behold her,
I take her to my beating heart
And in mine arms enfold her;
My heart is filled with joy divine
For I am hers and she is mine.

Oh! when her soft embraces
Do give my love completeness,
The perfumes of Arabia
Anoint me with their sweetness;
And when her lips are pressed to mine
I am made drunk and need not wine.

THE SNARE OF LOVE

(Sung by a girl snarer to one she loves.)

With snare in hand I hide me,
I wait and will not stir;
The beauteous birds of Araby
Are perfumed all with myrrh--
Oh, all the birds of Araby,
That down to Egypt come,
Have wings that waft the fragrance
Of sweetly smelling gum!

I would that, when I snare them, Together we could be,
I would that when I hear them
Alone I were with thee.
If thou wilt come, my dear one,
When birds are snared above,
I'll take thee and I'll keep thee
Within the snare of love.

THE SYCAMORE SONG

A sycamore sang to a lady fair,
And its words were dropping like honey dew.
"Now ruby red is the fruit I bear
All in my bower for you.

"Papyri green are my leaves arrayed,
And branch and stem like to opal gleam;
Now come and rest in my cooling shade
The dream of your heart to dream.

"A letter of love will my lady fair
Send to the one who will happy be,
Saying: 'Oh, come to my garden rare
And sit in the shade with me!

"'Fruit I will gather for your delight,
Bread I will break and pour out wine,
I'll bring you the perfumed flow'rs and bright
On this festal day divine.'

"My lady alone with her lover will be,
His voice is sweet and his words are dear-
Oh, I am silent of all I see,
Nor tell of the things I hear!"

THE DOVE SONG

I hear thy voice, O turtle dove--
The dawn is all aglow--
Weary am I with love, with love,
Oh, whither shall I go?

Not so, O beauteous bird above,
Is joy to me denied. . . .
For I have found my dear, my love,
And I am by his side.

We wander forth, and hand in hand
Through flow'ry ways we go--
I am the fairest in the land,
For he hath called me so.

JEALOUSY

My face towards the door I'll keep
Till I my love behold,
With watching eyes and list'ning ears
I wait . . . and I turn cold,
I sigh and sigh;
He comes not nigh.

My sole possession is his love
All sweet and dear to me;
And ever may my lips confess
My heart, nor silent be.
I sigh and sigh;
He comes not nigh.

But now . . . a messenger in haste
My watching eyes behold . . .
He went as swiftly as he came.
"I am delayed", he told.
I sigh and sigh;
He comes not nigh.

Alas! confess that thou hast found
One fairer far than me.
O thou so false, why break my heart
With infidelity?
I sigh and sigh;
He'll ne'er come nigh.

THE GARDEN OF LOVE

Oh! fair are the flowers, my beloved,
And fairest of any I wait.
A garden art thou, all fragrant and dear,
Thy heart, O mine own, is the gate.

The canal of my love I have fashioned,
And through thee, my garden, it flows--
Dip in its waters refreshing and sweet,
When cool from the north the wind blows.

In our beauteous haunt we will linger,
Thy strong hand reposing in mine--
Then deep be my thoughts and deeper my joy,
Because, O my love, I am thine.

Oh! thy voice is bewitching, beloved,
This wound of my heart it makes whole--
Ah! when thou art coming, and thee I behold,
Thou'rt bread and thou'rt wine to my soul.

LOVE'S PRETENCE

With sickness faint and weary
All day in bed I'll lie;
My friends will gather near me
And she'll with them come nigh.
She'll put to shame the doctors
Who'll ponder over me,
For she alone, my loved one,
Knows well my malady.

Footnotes

1 Ra is here in his human form, walking through Egypt.
2 He was thus mutilated like Osiris, Attis, Adonis, and other gods.
3 Probably in Syria.
4 A creative god who resembles Ptah.
5 The seven Fates.
6 A non-Egyptian conception apparently.
7 An early version of the Cinderella story.
8 Like the typical giant of European folklore, who conceals his soul and is betrayed by his wife.
9 The Egyptians always washed their hands before and after meals.
10 It was believed that the soul was in the liver.
11 The belief that the soul was in the blood.
12 Out tree for the spirit and one for the soul.
13 Who was also his mother. Bata was reborn as the son of his wife. The tale is based upon belief in the transmigration of souls.
14 The sentence is not given, but is indicated by the prophecy of the seven Hathors, who said she would die "a speedy death" (a death by violence).
15 This suggests that he was sacrificed at the Sed festival.

THE BOOK OF THE DEAD

The Papyrus of Ani

by

E. A. WALLIS BUDGE

Late keeper of Assyrian and Egyptian Antiquities

in the British Museum

[1895]

PREFACE.

The Papyrus of Ani, which was acquired by the Trustees of the British Museum in the year 1888, is the largest, the most perfect, the best preserved, and the best illuminated of all the papyri which date from the second half of the XVIIIth dynasty (about B.C. 1500 to 1400). Its rare vignettes, and hymns, and chapters, and its descriptive and introductory rubrics render it of unique importance for the study of the Book of the Dead, and it takes a high place among the authoritative texts of the Theban version of that remarkable work. Although it contains less than one-half of the chapters which are commonly assigned to that version, we may conclude that Ani's exalted official position as Chancellor of the ecclesiastical revenues and endowments of Abydos and Thebes would have ensured a selection of such chapters as would suffice for his spiritual welfare in the future life. We may therefore regard the Papyrus of Ani as typical of the funeral book in vogue among the Theban nobles of his time.

The first edition of the Facsimile of the Papyrus was issued in 1890, and was accompanied by a valuable Introduction by Mr. Le Page Renouf, then Keeper of the Department of Egyptian and Assyrian Antiquities. But, in order to satisfy a widely expressed demand for a translation of the text, the present volume has been prepared to be issued with the second edition of the Facsimile. It contains the hieroglyphic text of the Papyrus with interlinear transliteration and word for word translation, a full description of the vignettes, and a running translation; and in the Introduction an attempt has been made to illustrate from native Egyptian sources the religious views of the wonderful people who more than five thousand years ago proclaimed the resurrection of a spiritual body and the immortality of the soul.

The passages which supply omissions, and vignettes which contain important variations either in subject matter or arrangement, as well as supplementary texts which appear in the appendixes, have been, as far as possible, drawn from other contemporary papyri in the British Museum.

The second edition of the Facsimile has been executed by Mr. F. C. Price.

E. A. WALLIS BUDGE.

BRITISH MUSEUM.

January 25, 1895.

ATLANTIS

THE ANTEDILUVIAN WORLD

by Ignatius Donnelly

[1882]

PART IV

THE MYTHOLOGIES OF THE OLD WORLD A RECOLLECTION OF ATLANTIS

CHAPTER VI

GOLD AND SILVER THE SACRED METALS OF ATLANTIS.

MONEY is the instrumentality by which man is lifted above the limitations of barter. Baron Storch terms it "the marvellous instrument to which we are indebted for our wealth and civilization."

It is interesting to inquire into the various articles which have been used in different countries and ages as money. The following is a table of some of them:

Articles of Utility.

India	Cakes of tea.
China	Pieces of silk.
Abyssinia	Salt.
Iceland and Newfoundland	Codfish.
Illinois (in early days)	Coon-skins.
Bornoo (Africa)	Cotton shirts.
Ancient Russia	Skins of wild animals.
West India Islands (1500)	Cocoa-nuts.
Massachusetts Indians	Wampum and musket-balls.
Virginia (1700)	Tobacco.
British West India Islands	Pins, snuff, and whiskey.
Central South America	Soap, chocolate, and eggs.
Ancient Romans	Cattle.
Ancient Greece	Nails of copper and iron.
The Lacedemonians	Iron.
The Burman Empire	Lead.
Russia (1828 to 1845)	Platinum.
Rome (under Numa Pompilius)	Wood and leather.
Rome (under the Cars)	Land.
Carthaginians	Leather.
Ancient Britons Cattle,	slaves, brass, and iron.
England (under James II.)	Tin, gun-metal, and pewter.
South Sea Islands	Axes and hammers.

Articles of Ornament.

Ancient Jews	Jewels.
The Indian Islands and Africa	Cowrie shells,

Conventional Signs.

Holland (1574)	Pieces of pasteboard.
China (1200)	Bark of the mulberry-tree.

It is evident that every primitive people uses as money those articles upon which they set the highest value--as cattle, jewels, slaves, salt, musket-balls, pins, snuff, whiskey, cotton shirts, leather, axes, and hammers; or those articles for which there was a foreign demand, and which they could trade off to the merchants for articles of necessity--as tea, silk, codfish, coonskins, cocoa-nuts, and tobacco. Then there is a later stage, when the stamp of the government is impressed upon paper, wood, pasteboard, or the bark of trees, and these articles are given a legal-tender character.

When a civilized nation comes in contact with a barbarous people they seek to trade with them for those things which they need; a metal-working people, manufacturing weapons of iron or copper, will seek for the useful metals, and hence we find iron, copper, tin, and lead coming into use as a standard of values--as money; for they can always be converted into articles of use and weapons of war. But when we ask bow it chanced that gold and silver came to be used as money, and why it is that gold is regarded as so much more valuable than silver, no answer presents itself. It was impossible to make either of them into pots or pans, swords or spears; they were not necessarily more beautiful than glass or the combinations of tin and copper. Nothing astonished the American races more than the extraordinary value set upon gold and silver by the Spaniards; they could not understand it. A West Indian savage traded a handful of gold-dust with one of the sailors accompanying Columbus for some tool, and then ran for his life to the woods lest the sailor should repent his bargain and call him back. The Mexicans had coins of tin shaped like a letter T. We can understand this, for tin was necessary to them in hardening their bronze implements, and it may have been the highest type of metallic value among them. A round copper coin with a serpent stamped on it was found at Palenque, and T-shaped copper coins are very abundant in the ruins of Central America. This too we can understand, for copper was necessary in every work of art or utility.

All these nations were familiar with gold and silver, but they used them as sacred metals for the adornment of the temples of the sun and moon. The color of gold was something of the color of the sun's rays, while the color of silver resembled the pale light of the moon, and hence they were respectively sacred to the gods of the sun and moon. And this is probably the origin of the comparative value of these metals: they became the precious metals because they were the sacred metals, and gold was more valuable than silver--just as the sun-god was the great god of the nations, while the mild moon was simply an attendant upon the sun.

The Peruvians called gold "the tears wept by the sun." It was not used among the people for ornament or money. The great temple of the sun at Cuzco was called the "Place of Gold." It was, as I have shown, literally a mine of gold. Walls, cornices, statuary, plate, ornaments, all were of gold; the very ewers, pipes, and aqueducts--even the agricultural implements used in the garden of the temple--were of gold and silver. The value of the jewels which adorned the temple was equal to one hundred and eighty millions of dollars! The riches of the kingdom can be conceived when we remember that from a pyramid in Chimu a Spanish explorer named

Toledo took, in 1577, $4,450,284 in gold and silver. ("New American Cyclopia," art. American Antiquities.) The gold and silver of Peru largely contributed to form the metallic currency upon which Europe has carried on her commerce during the last three hundred years.

Gold and silver were not valued in Peru for any intrinsic usefulness; they were regarded as sacred because reserved for the two great gods of the nation. As we find gold and silver mined and worked on both sides of the Atlantic at the earliest periods of recorded history, we may fairly conclude that they were known to the Atlanteans; and this view is confirmed by the statements of Plato, who represents a condition of things in Atlantis exactly like that which Pizarro found in Peru. Doubtless the vast accumulations of gold and silver in both countries were due to the fact that these metals were not permitted to be used by the people. In Peru the annual taxes of the people were paid to the Inca in part in gold and silver from the mines, and they were used to ornament the temples; and thus the work of accumulating the sacred metals went on from generation to generation. The same process doubtless led to the vast accumulations in the temples of Atlantis, as described by Plato.

Now, as the Atlanteans carried on an immense commerce with all the countries of Europe and Western Asia, they doubtless inquired and traded for gold and silver for the adornment of their temples, and they thus produced a demand for and gave a value to the two metals otherwise comparatively useless to man--a value higher than any other commodity which the people could offer their civilized customers; and as the reverence for the great burning orb of the sun, master of all the manifestations of nature, was tenfold as great as the veneration for the smaller, weaker, and variable goddess of the night, so was the demand for the metal sacred to the sun ten times as great as for the metal sacred to the moon. This view is confirmed by the fact that the root of the word by which the Celts, the Greeks, and the Romans designated gold was the Sanscrit word karat, which means, "the color of the sun." Among the Assyrians gold and silver were respectively consecrated to the and moon precisely as they were in Peru. A pyramid belonging to the palace of Nineveh is referred to repeatedly in the inscriptions. It was composed of seven stages, equal in height, and each one smaller in area than the one beneath it; each stage was covered with stucco of different colors, "a different color representing each of the heavenly bodies, the least important being at the base: white (Venus); black (Saturn); purple (Jupiter); blue (Mercury); vermillion (Mars); silver (the Moon); and gold (the Sun)." (Lenormant's "Ancient History of the East," vol. i., p. 463.) "In England, to this day the new moon is saluted with a bow or a courtesy, as well as the curious practice of 'turning one's silver,' which seems a relic of the offering of the moon's proper metal." (Tylor's "Anthropology", p. 361.) The custom of wishing, when one first sees the new moon, is probably a survival of moon-worship; the wish taking the place of the prayer.

And thus has it come to pass that, precisely as the physicians of Europe, fifty years ago, practised bleeding, because for thousands of years their savage ancestors had used it to draw away the evil spirits out of the man, so the business of our modern civilization is dependent upon the superstition of a past civilization, and the bankers of the world are to-day perpetuating the adoration of "the tears wept by the sun" which was commenced ages since on the island of Atlantis.

And it becomes a grave question--when we remember that the rapidly increasing business of the world, consequent upon an increasing population, and a civilization advancing with giant steps, is measured by the standard of a currency limited by natural laws, decreasing annually in production, and incapable of expanding proportionately to the growth of the world--whether this Atlantean superstition may not yet inflict more incalculable injuries on mankind than those which resulted from the practice of phlebotomy.

ATLANTIS

THE ANTEDILUVIAN WORLD

by Ignatius Donnelly

[1882]

PART IV

THE MYTHOLOGIES OF THE OLD WORLD A RECOLLECTION OF ATLANTIS

CHAPTER V

THE PYRAMID, THE CROSS, AND THE GARDEN OF EDEN.

No fact is better established than the reverence shown to the sign of the Cross in all the ages prior to Christianity. We cannot do better than quote from an able article in the Edinburgh Review of July, 1870, upon this question:

"From the dawn of organized Paganism in the Eastern world to the final establishment of Christianity in the Western, the Cross was undoubtedly one of the commonest and most sacred of symbolical monuments; and, to a remarkable extent, it is so still in almost every land where that of Calvary is unrecognized or unknown. Apart from any distinctions of social or intellectual superiority, of caste, color, nationality, or location in either hemisphere, it appears to have been the aboriginal possession of every people in antiquity--the elastic girdle, so to say, which embraced the most widely separated heathen communities--the most significant token of a universal brotherhood, to which all the families of mankind were severally and irresistibly drawn, and by which their common descent was emphatically expressed, or by means of which each and all preserved, amid every vicissitude of fortune, a knowledge of the primeval happiness and dignity of their species. Where authentic history is silent on the subject, the material relics of past and long since forgotten races are not wanting to confirm and strengthen this supposition. Diversified forms of the symbol are delineated more or less artistically, according to the progress achieved in civilization at the period, on the ruined walls of temples and palaces, on natural rocks and sepulchral galleries, on the hoariest monoliths and the rudest statuary; on coins, medals, and vases of every description; and, in not a few instances, are preserved in the architectural proportions of subterranean as well as superterranean structures, of tumuli as well as fanes. The extraordinary sanctity attaching to the symbol, in every age and under every variety of circumstance, justified any expenditure incurred in its fabrication or embellishment; hence the most persistent labor, the most consummate ingenuity, were lavished upon it. Populations of essentially different culture, tastes, and pursuits--the highly-civilized and the demi-civilized, the settled and nomadic--vied with each other in their efforts to extend the knowledge of its exceptional import and virtue among their latest posterities. The marvellous rock-hewn caves of Elephanta and Ellora, and the stately temples of Mathura and Terputty, in the East, may be cited as characteristic examples of one laborious method of exhibiting it; and the megalithic structures of Callernish and Newgrange, in the West, of another; while a third may be instanced. in the great temple at Mitzla, 'the City of the Moon,' in Ojaaca, Central America. also excavated in the living rock, and manifesting the same stupendous labor and ingenuity as are observable in the cognate caverns of Salsette--of endeavors, we repeat, made by peoples as intellectually as geographically distinct, and followers withal of independent and unassociated deities, to magnify and perpetuate some grand primeval symbol. . . .

"Of the several varieties of the Cross still in vogue, as national or ecclesiastical emblems, in this and other European states, and distinguished by the familiar appellations of St. George, St. Andrew, the Maltese, the Greek, the Latin, etc., etc., there is not one among them the existence of which may not be traced to the remotest antiquity. They were the common property of the Eastern nations. No revolution or other casualty has wrought any perceptible difference in their several forms or delineations; they have passed from one hemisphere to the other intact; have survived dynasties, empires, and races; have been borne on the crest of each successive wave of Aryan population in its course toward the West; and, having been reconsecrated in later times by their lineal descendants, are still recognized as military and national badges of distinction. . . .

"Among the earliest known types is the crux ansata, vulgarly called 'the key of the Nile,' because of its being found sculptured or otherwise represented so frequently upon Egyptian and Coptic monuments. It has, however, a very much older and more sacred signification than this. It was the symbol of symbols, the mystical Tau, 'the bidden wisdom,' not only of the ancient Egyptians but also of the Chaldeans, Phnicians, Mexicans, Peruvians, and of every other ancient people commemorated in history, in either hemisphere, and is formed very similarly to our letter T, with a roundlet, or oval, placed immediately above it.

EGYPTIAN TAU.

Thus it was figured on the gigantic emerald or glass statue of Serapis, which was transported (293 B.C.) by order of Ptolemy Soter from Sinope, on the southern shores of the Black Sea, re-erected within that famous labyrinth which encompassed the banks of Lake Mris, and destroyed by the victorious army of Theodosius (A.D. 389), despite the earnest entreaties of the Egyptian priesthood to spare it, because it was the emblem of their god and of 'the life to come.' Sometimes, as may be seen on the breast of an Egyptian mummy in the museum of the London University, the simple Tonly is planted on the frustum of a cone; and sometimes it is represented as springing from a heart; in the first instance signifying goodness; in the second, hope or expectation of reward.

CROSS ROM THE MONUMENTS OF PALENQUE.

CENTRAL AMERICAN CROSS

Professor Hardwicke says:

"All these and similar traditions are but mocking satires of the old Hebrew story--jarred and broken notes of the same strain; but with all their exaggerations they intimate how in the background of man's vision lay a paradise of holy joy--a paradise secured from every kind of profanation, and made inaccessible to the guilty; a paradise full of objects that were calculated to delight the senses and to elevate the mind a paradise that granted to its tenant rich and rare immunities, and that fed with its perennial streams the tree of life and immortality."

COPPER COIN--TEOTIHUACAN.

To quote again from the writer in the Edinburgh Review, already cited:

"Its undoubted antiquity, no less than its extraordinary diffusion, evidences that it must have been, as it may be said to be still in unchristianized lands, emblematical of some fundamental doctrine or mystery. The reader will not have failed to observe that it is most usually associated with water; it was 'the key of the Nile,' that mystical instrument by means of which, in the popular judgment of his Egyptian devotees, Osiris produced the annual revivifying inundations of the sacred stream; it is discernible in that mysterious pitcher or vase portrayed on the brazen table of Bembus, before-mentioned, with its four lips discharging as many streams of water in opposite directions; it was the emblem of the water-deities of the Babylonians in the East and of the Gothic nations in the West, a

ANCIENT IRISH CROSS--PRE-CHRISTIAN--KILNABOY.

well as that of the rain-deities respectively of the mixed population in America. We have seen with what peculiar rites the symbol was honored by those widely separated races in the western hemisphere; and the monumental slabs of Nineveh, now in the museums of London and Paris, show us how it was similarly honored by the successors of the Chaldees in the eastern. . . .

"In Egypt, Assyria, and Britain it was emblematical of creative power and eternity; in India, China, and Scandinavia, of heaven and immortality; in the two Americas, of rejuvenescence and freedom from physical suffering; while in both hemispheres it was the common symbol of the resurrection, or 'the sign of the life to come;' and, finally, in all heathen communities, without exception, it was the emphatic type, the sole enduring evidence, of the Divine Unity. This circumstance alone determines its extreme antiquity--an antiquity, in all likelihood, long antecedent to the foundation of either of the three great systems of religion in the East. And, lastly, we have seen how, as a rule, it is found in conjunction with a stream or streams of water, with exuberant vegetation, and with a bill or a mountainous region--in a word, with a land of beauty, fertility, and joy.

CROSS FROM EGYPTIAN MONUMENTS.

Thus it was expressed upon those circular and sacred cakes of the Egyptians, composed of the richest materials-of flour, of honey, of milk--and with which the serpent and bull, as well as other reptiles and beasts consecrated to the service of Isis and their higher divinities, were daily fed; and upon certain festivals were eaten with extraordinary ceremony by the people and their priests. 'The cross-cake,' says Sir Gardner Wilkinson, 'was their hieroglyph for civilized land;' obviously a land superior to their own, as it was, indeed, to all other mundane territories; for it was that distant, traditional country of sempiternal contentment and repose, of exquisite delight and serenity, where Nature, unassisted by man, produces all that is necessary for his sustentation."

And this land was the Garden of Eden of our race. This was the Olympus of the Greeks, where

"This same mild season gives the blooms to blow,
The buds to harden and the fruits to grow."

In the midst of it was a sacred and glorious eminence--the umbilicus orbis terrarum--"toward which the heathen in all parts of the world, and in all ages, turned a wistful gaze in every act of devotion, and to which they hoped to be admitted, or, rather, to be restored, at the close of this transitory scene."

In this "glorious eminence" do we not see Plato's mountain in the middle of Atlantis, as he describes it:

"Near the plain and in the centre of the island there was a mountain, not very high on any side. In this mountain there dwelt one of the earth-born primeval men of that country, whose name was Evenor, and he had a wife named Leucippe, and they had an only daughter, who was named Cleito. Poseidon married her. He enclosed the hill in which she dwelt all around, making alternate zones of sea and land, larger and smaller, encircling one another; there were two of land and three of water . . . so that no man could get to the island. . . . He brought streams of water under the earth to this mountain-island, and made all manner of food to grow upon it. This island became the seat of Atlas, the over-king of the whole island; upon it they built the great temple of their nation; they continued to ornament it in successive generations, every king surpassing the one who came before him to the utmost of his power, until they made the building a marvel to behold for size and beauty. . . . And they had such an amount of wealth as was never before possessed by kings and potentates--as is not likely ever to be again."

The gardens of Alcinous and Laertes, of which we read in Homeric song, and those of Babylon, were probably transcripts of Atlantis. "The sacred eminence in the midst of a 'superabundant, happy region figures more or less distinctly in a]most every mythology, ancient or modern. It was the Mesomphalos of the earlier Greeks, and the Omphalium of the Cretans, dominating the Elysian fields, upon whose tops, bathed in pure, brilliant, incomparable light, the gods passed their days in ceaseless joys."

"The Buddhists and Brahmans, who together constitute nearly half the population of the world, tell us that the decussated figure (the cross), whether in a simple or a complex form, symbolizes the traditional happy abode of their primeval ancestors--that 'Paradise of Eden toward the East,' as we find expressed in the Hebrew. And, let us ask, what better picture, or more significant characters, in the complicated alphabet of symbolism, could have been selected for the purpose than a circle and a cross: the one to denote a region of absolute purity and perpetual felicity; the other, those four perennial streams that divided and watered the several quarters of it?" (Edinburgh Review, January, 1870.)

And when we turn to the mythology of the Greeks, we find that the origin of the world was ascribed to Okeanos, the ocean, The world was at first an island surrounded by the ocean, as by a great stream:

"It was a region of wonders of all kinds; Okeanos lived there with his wife Tethys: these were the Islands of the Blessed, the gardens of the gods, the sources of nectar and ambrosia, on which the gods lived. Within this circle of water the earth lay spread out like a disk, with mountains rising from it, and the vault of heaven appearing to rest upon its outer edge all around." (Murray's "Manual of Mythology," pp. 23, 24, et seq.)

On the mountains dwelt the gods; they had palaces on these mountains, with store-rooms, stabling, etc.

"The Gardens of the Hesperides, with their golden apples, were believed to exist in some island of the ocean, or, as it was sometimes thought, in the islands off the north or west coast of Africa. They were far famed in antiquity; for it was there that springs of nectar flowed by the couch of Zeus, and there that the earth displayed the rarest blessings of the gods; it was another Eden." (Ibid., p. 156.)

Homer described it in these words:

"Stern winter smiles on that auspicious clime,
The fields are florid with unfading prime,
From the bleak pole no winds inclement blow.
Mould the round hail, or flake the fleecy snow;
But from the breezy deep the blessed inhale
The fragrant murmurs of the western gale."

"It was the sacred Asgard of the Scandinavians, springing from the centre of a fruitful land, which was watered by four primeval rivers of milk, severally flowing in the direction of the cardinal points, 'the abode of happiness, and the height of bliss.' It is the Tien-Chan, 'the celestial mountain-land, . . . the enchanted gardens' of the Chinese and Tartars, watered by the four perennial fountains of Tychin, or Immortality; it is the hill-encompassed Ilof the Singhalese and Thibetians, 'the everlasting dwelling-place of the wise and just.' It is the Sineru of the Buddhist, on the summit of which is Tawrutisa, the habitation of Sekr the supreme god, from which proceed the four sacred streams, running in as many contrary directions.

It is the Slratta, 'the celestial earth,' of the Hindoo, the summit of his golden mountain Meru, the city of Brahma, in the centre of Jambadwa, and from the four sides of which gush forth the four primeval rivers, reflecting in their passage the colorific glories of their source, and severally flowing northward, southward, eastward, and westward."

It is the Garden of Eden of the Hebrews:

"And the Lord God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed. And out of the ground made the Lord God to grow every tree that is pleasant to the sight, and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of knowledge of good and evil. And a river went out of Eden to water the garden; and from thence it was parted, and became into four heads. The name of the first is Pison; that is it which compasseth the whole land of Havilah, where there is gold; and the gold of that land is good: there is bdellium and the onyx stone. And the name of the second river is Gihon: the same is it that compasseth the whole land of Ethiopia. And the name of the third river is Hiddekel: that is it which goeth toward the east of Assyria. And the fourth river is Euphrates. And the Lord God took the man and put him into the Garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it." (Gen. ii., 8-1-5.)

As the four rivers named in Genesis are not branches of any one stream, and head in very different regions, it is evident that there was an attempt, on the part of the writer of the Book, to adapt an ancient tradition concerning another country to the known features of the region in which be dwelt.

Josephus tells us (chap. i., p. 41), "Now the garden (of Eden) was watered by one river, which ran round about the whole earth, and was parted into four parts." Here in the four parts we see the origin of the Cross, while in the river running around the whole earth we have the wonderful canal of Atlantis, described by Plato, which was "carried around the whole of the plain," and received the streams which came down from the mountains. The streams named by Josephus would seem to represent the migrations of people from Atlantis to its colonies.

"Phison," he tells us, "denotes a multitude; it ran into India; the Euphrates and Tigris go down into the Red Sea while the Geon runs through Egypt."

We are further told (chap. ii., p. 42) that when Cain, after the murder of. Abel, left the land of Adam, "he travelled over many countries" before be reached the land of Nod; and the land of Nod was to the eastward of Adam's home. In other words, the original seat of mankind was in the West, that is to say, in the direction of Atlantis. Wilson tells us that the Aryans of India believed that they originally came "from the West." Thus the nations on the west of the Atlantic look to the east for their place of origin; while on the east of the Atlantic they look to the west: thus all the lines of tradition converge upon Atlantis.

But here is the same testimony that in the Garden of Eden there were four rivers radiating from one parent stream. And these four rivers, as we have seen, we find in the Scandinavian traditions, and in the legends of the Chinese, the Tartars, the Singhalese, the Thibetians, the Buddhists, the Hebrews, and the Brahmans.

And not only do we find this tradition of the Garden of Eden in the Old World, but it meets us also among the civilized races of America. The elder Montezuma said to Cortez, "Our fathers dwelt in that happy and prosperous place which they called Aztlan, which means whiteness. . . . In this place there is a great mountain in the middle of the water which is called Culhuacan, because it has the point somewhat turned over toward the bottom; and for this cause it is called Culhuacan, which means 'crooked mountain.'" He then proceeds to describe the charms of this favored land, abounding in birds, game, fish, trees, "fountains enclosed with elders and junipers, and alder-trees both large and beautiful." The people planted "maize, red peppers, tomatoes, beans, and all kinds of plants, in furrows."

Here we have the same mountain in the midst of the water which Plato describes--the same mountain to which all the legends of the most ancient races of Europe refer.

The inhabitants of Aztlan were boatmen. (Bancroft's "Native Races," vol. v., p. 325.) E. G. Squier, in his "Notes on Central America," p. 349, says, "It is a significant fact that in the map of their migrations, presented by Gemelli, the place of the origin of the Aztecs is designated by the sign of water, Atl standing for Atzlan, a pyramidal temple with grades, and near these a palm-tree." This circumstance did not escape the attention of Humboldt, who says, I am astonished at finding a palm-tree near this teocalli. This tree certainly does not indicate a northern origin. . . . The possibility that an unskilful artist should unintentionally represent a tree of which he had no knowledge is so great, that any argument dependent on it hangs upon a slender thread." ("North Americans of Antiquity," p. 266.)

The Miztecs, a tribe dwelling on the outskirts of Mexico, had a tradition that the gods, "in the day of obscurity and darkness," built "a sumptuous palace, a masterpiece of skill, in which they male their abode upon a mountain. The rock was called 'The Place of Heaven;' there the gods first abode on earth, living many years in great rest and content, as in a happy and delicious land, though the world still lay in obscurity and darkness. The children of these gods made to themselves a garden, in which they put many trees, and fruit-trees, and flowers, and roses, and odorous herbs. Subsequently there came a great deluge, in which many of the sons and daughters of the gods perished." (Bancroft's "Native Races," vol. iii., p. 71.) Here we have a distinct reference to Olympus, the Garden of Plato, and the destruction of Atlantis.

And in Plato's account of Atlantis we have another description of the Garden of Eden and the Golden Age of the world:

"Also, whatever fragrant things there are in the earth, whether roots, or herbage, or woods, or distilling drops of flowers and fruits, grew and thrived in that land; and again the cultivated fruits of the earth, both the edible fruits and other species of food which we call by the name of legumes, and the fruits having a hard rind, affording drinks and meats and ointments . . . all these that sacred island, lying beneath the sun, brought forth in abundance. . . . For many generations, as long as the divine nature lasted in them, they were obedient to the laws, and well affectioned toward the gods, who were their kinsmen; for they possessed true and in every way great spirits, practising gentleness and wisdom in the various chances of life, and in their intercourse with one another. They despised everything but virtue, not caring for their present state of life, and thinking lightly of the possession of gold and other property, which seemed only a burden to them; neither were they intoxicated by luxury; nor did wealth deprive them of their self-control; but they were sober, and saw clearly that all these goods were increased by virtuous friendship with one another, and that by excessive zeal for them, and honor of them, the good of them is lost, and friendship perishes with them."

All this cannot be a mere coincidence; it points to a common tradition of a veritable land, where four rivers flowed down in opposite directions from a central mountain-peak. And these four rivers, flowing to the north, south, east, and west, constitute the origin of that sign of the Cross which we have seen meeting us at every point among the races who were either descended from the people of Atlantis, or who, by commerce and colonization, received their opinions and civilization from them.

Let us look at the question of the identity of the Garden of Eden with Atlantis from another point of view:

If the alphabet of the Phnicians is kindred with the Maya alphabet, as I think is clear, then the Phnicians were of the same race, or of some race with which the Mayas were connected; in other words, they were from Atlantis.

Now we know that the Phnicians and Hebrews were of the same stock, used the same alphabet, and spoke almost precisely the same language.

The Phnicians preserved traditions, which have come down to us in the writings, of Sanchoniathon, of all the great essential inventions or discoveries which underlie civilization. The first two human beings, they tell us, were Protogonos and Aion (Adam and 'Havath), who produce Genos and Genea (Q and Qath), from whom again are descended three brothers, named Phos, Phur, and Phlox (Light, Fire, and Flame), because they "have discovered how to produce fire by the friction of two pieces of wood, and have taught the use of this element." In another fragment, at the origin of the human race we see in succession the fraternal couples of Autochthon and Technites (Adam and Quen--Cain?), inventors of the manufacture of bricks; Agros and Agrotes (Sade and C), fathers of the agriculturists and hunters; then Amynos and Magos, "who taught to dwell in villages and rear flocks."

The connection between these Atlantean traditions and the Bible record is shown in many things. For instance, "the Greek text, in expressing the invention of Amynos, uses the words κώμας καὶ ποίμνας, which are precisely the same as the terms el umiqneh, which the Bible uses in speaking of the dwellings of the descendants of Jabal (Gen., chap. iv., v. 20). In like manner Lamech, both in the signification of his name and also iv the savage character attributed to him by the legend attached to his memory, is a true synonyme of Agrotes."

"And the title of Ἀλῆται, given to Agros and Agrotes in the Greek of the Phnician history, fits in wonderfully with the physiognomy of the race of the Cainites in the Bible narrative, whether we take Ἀλῆται simply as a Hellenized transcription of the Semitic Elim, 'the strong, the mighty,' or whether we take it in its Greek acceptation, 'the wanderers;' for such is the destiny of Cain and his race according to the very terms of the condemnation which was inflicted upon him after his crime (Gen. iv., 14), and this is what is signified by the name of his grandson 'Yirad. Only, in Sanchoniathon the genealogy does not end with Amynos and Magos, as that of the Cainites in the Bible does with the three sons of Lamech. These two personages are succeeded by Mis and Sydyk, 'the released and the just,' as Sanchoniathon translates them, but rather the 'upright and the just' (Mish and d), 'who invent the use of salt.' To Mis is born Taautos (Ta), to whom we owe letters; and to Sydyk the Cabiri or Corybantes, the institutors of navigation." (Lenormant, "Genealogies between Adam and the Deluge." Contemporary Review, April, 1880.)

We have, also, the fact that the Phnician name for their goddess Astynome (Ashtar No'em, whom the Greeks called Nemaun, was the same as the name of the sister of the three sons of Lamech, as given in Genesis--Na'emah, or Na'amah.

If, then, the original seat of the Hebrews and Phnicians was the Garden of Eden, to the west of Europe, and if the Phnicians are shown to be connected, through their alphabets, with the Central Americans, who looked to an island in the sea, to the eastward, as their starting-point, the conclusion becomes irresistible that Atlantis and the Garden of Eden were one and the same.

The Pyramid.--Not only are the Cross and the Garden of Eden identified with Atlantis, but in Atlantis, the habitation of the gods, we find the original model of all those pyramids which extend from India to Peru.

This singular architectural construction dates back far beyond the birth of history. In the Puras of the Hindoos we read of pyramids long anterior in time to any which have survived to our day. Cheops was preceded by a countless host of similar erections which have long since mouldered into ruins.

If the reader will turn to page 104 of this work he will see, in the midst of the picture of Aztlan, the starting-point of the Aztecs, according to the Botturini pictured writing, a pyramid with worshippers kneeling before it.

Fifty years ago Mr. Faber, in his "Origin of Pagan Idolatry," placed artificial tumuli, pyramids, and pagodas in the same category, conceiving that all were transcripts of the holy mountain which was generally supposed to have stood in the centre of Eden; or, rather. as intimated in more than one place by the Psalmist, the garden itself was situated on an eminence. (Psalms, chap. iii., v. 4, and chap. lxviii., vs. 15, 16, 18.)

The pyramid is one of the marvellous features of that problem which confronts us everywhere, and which is insoluble without Atlantis.

The Arabian traditions linked the pyramid with the Flood. In a manuscript preserved in the Bodleian Library, and translated by Dr. Sprenger, Abou Balkhi says:

"The wise men, previous to the Flood, foreseeing an impending Judgment from heaven, either by submersion or fire, which would destroy every created thing, built upon the tops of the mountains in Upper Egypt many pyramids of stone, in order to have some refuge against the approaching calamity. Two of these buildings exceeded the rest in height, being four hundred cubits, high and as many broad and as many long. They were built with large blocks of marble, and they were so well put together that the joints were scarcely perceptible. Upon the exterior of the building every charm and wonder of physic was inscribed."

This tradition locates these monster structures upon the mountains of Upper Egypt, but there are no buildings of such dimensions to be found anywhere in Egypt. Is it not probable that we have here another reference to the great record preserved in the land of the Deluge? Were not the pyramids of Egypt and America imitations of similar structures in Atlantis? Might not the building of such a gigantic edifice have given rise to the legends existing on both continents in regard to a Tower of Babel?

How did the human mind hit upon this singular edifice--the pyramid? By what process of development did it reach it? Why should these extraordinary structures crop out on the banks of the Nile, and amid the forests and plains of America? And why, in both countries, should they stand with their sides square to the four cardinal points of the compass? Are they in this, too, a reminiscence of the Cross, and of the four rivers of Atlantis that ran to the north, south, east, and west?

"There is yet a third combination that demands a specific notice. The decussated symbol is not unfrequently planted upon what Christian archlogists designate 'a calvary,' that is, upon a mount or a cone. Thus it is represented in both hemispheres. The megalithic structure of Callernish, in the island of Lewis before mentioned, is the most perfect example of the practice extant in Europe. The mount is preserved to this day. This, to be brief, was the recognized conventional mode of expressing a particular primitive truth or mystery from the days of the Chaldeans to those of the Gnostics, or from one extremity of the civilized world to the other. It is seen in the treatment of the ash Yggdrasill of the Scandinavians, as well as in that of the Bo-tree of the Buddhists. The prototype was not the Egyptian, but the Babylonian crux ansata, the lower member of which constitutes a conical support for the oval or sphere above it. With the Gnostics, who occupied the debatable ground between primitive Christianity and philosophic paganism, and who inscribed it upon their tombs, the cone symbolized death as well as life. In every heathen mythology it was the universal emblem of the goddess or mother of heaven, by whatsoever name she was addressed--whether as Mylitta, Astarte, Aphrodite, Isis, Mata, or Venus; and the several eminences consecrated to her worship were, like those upon which Jupiter was originally adored, of a conical or pyramidal shape. This, too, is the ordinary form of the altars dedicated to the Assyrian god of fertility. In exceptional instances the cone is introduced upon one or the other of the sides, or is distinguishable in the always accompanying mystical tree." (Edinburgh Review, July, 1870.)

If the reader will again turn to page 104 of this work he will see that the tree appears on the top of the pyramid or mountain in both the Aztec representations of Aztlan, the original island-home of the Central American races.

The writer just quoted believes that Mr. Faber is correct in his opinion that the pyramid is a transcript of the sacred mountain which stood in the midst of Eden, the Olympus of Atlantis. He adds:

"Thomas Maurice, who is no mean authority, held the same view. He conceived the use to which pyramids in particular were anciently applied to have been threefold--namely, as tombs, temples, and observatories; and this view he labors to establish in the third volume of his 'Indian Antiquities.' Now, whatever may be their actual date, or with whatsoever people they may have originated, whether in Africa or Asia, in the lower valley of the Nile or in the plains of Chaldea, the pyramids of Egypt were unquestionably destined to very opposite purposes. According, to Herodotus, they were introduced by the Hyksos; and Proclus, the Platonic philosopher, connects them with the science of astronomy--a science which, he adds, the Egyptians derived from the Chaldeans. Hence we may reasonably infer that they served as well for temples for planetary worship as for observatories. Subsequently to the descent of the shepherds, their hallowed precincts were invaded by royalty, from motives of pride and superstition; and the principal chamber in each was used as tombs."

The pyramidal imitations, dear to the hearts of colonists of the sacred mountain upon which their gods dwelt, was devoted, as perhaps the mountain itself was, to sun and fire worship. The same writer says:

"That Sabian worship once extensively prevailed in the New World is a well-authenticated fact; it is yet practised to some extent by the wandering tribes on the Northern continent, and was the national religion of the Peruvians at the time of the Conquest. That it was also the religion of their more highly civilized predecessors on the soil, south of the equator more especially, is evidenced by the remains of fire-altars, both round and square, scattered about the shores of lakes Umayu and Titicaca, and which are the counterparts of the Gueber dokh mehs overhanging the Caspian Sea. Accordingly, we find, among these and other vestiges of antiquity that indissolubly connected those long-since extinct populations in the New with the races of the Old World, the well-defined symbol of the Maltese Cross. On the Mexican feroher before alluded to, and which is most elaborately carved in bass-relief on a massive piece of polygonous granite, constituting a portion of a cyclopean wall, the cross is enclosed within the ring, and accompanying it are four tassel-like ornaments, graved equally well. Those accompaniments, however, are disposed without any particular regard to order, but the four arms of the cross, nevertheless, severally and accurately point to the cardinal quarters, The same regularity is observable on a much smaller but not less curious monument, which was discovered some time since in an ancient Peruvian huaca or catacomb--namely, a syrinx or pandean pipe, cut out of a solid mass of lapis ollaris, the sides of which are profusely ornamented, not only with Maltese crosses, but also with other symbols very similar in style to those inscribed on the obelisks of Egypt and on the monoliths of this country. The like figure occurs on the equally ancient Otrusco black pottery. But by far the most remarkable example of this form of the Cross in the New World is that which appears on a second type of the Mexican feroher, engraved on a tablet of gypsum, and which is described at length by its discoverer, Captain du Paix, and depicted by his friend, M. Barade. Here the accompaniments--a shield, a hamlet, and a couple of bead-annulets or rosaries--are, with a single exception, identical in even the minutest particular with an Assyrian monument emblematical of the Deity. . . .

"No country in the world can compare with India for the exposition of the pyramidal cross. There the stupendous labors of Egypt are rivalled, and sometimes surpassed. Indeed, but for the fact of such monuments of patient industry and unexampled skill being still in existence, the accounts of some others which have long since disappeared, having succumbed to the ravages of time and the fury of the bigoted Mussulman, would sound in our ears as incredible as the story of Porsenna's tomb, which 'o'ertopped old Pelion,' and made 'Ossa like a wart.' Yet something not very dissimilar in character to it was formerly the boast of the ancient city of Benares, on the banks of the Ganges. We allude to the great temple of Bindh Madhu, which was demolished in the seventeenth century by the Emperor Aurungzebe. Tavernier, the French baron, who travelled thither about the year 1680, has preserved a brief description of it. The body of the temple was constructed in the figure of a colossal cross (i. e., a St. Andrew's Cross), with a lofty dome at the centre, above which rose a massive structure of a pyramidal form. At the four extremities of the cross there were four other pyramids of proportionate dimensions, and which were ascended from the outside by steps, with balconies at stated distances for places of rest, reminding us of the temple of Belus, as described in the pages of Herodotus. The remains of a similar building are found at Mhuttra, on the banks of the Jumna. This and many others, including the subterranean temple at Elephanta and the caverns of Ellora and Salsette, are described at length in the well-known work by Maurice; who adds that, besides these, there was yet another device in which the Hindoo displayed the all-pervading sign; this was by pyramidal towers placed crosswise. At the famous temple of Chillambrum, on the Coromandel coast, there were seven lofty walls, one within the other, round the central quadrangle, and as many pyramidal gate-ways in the midst of each side which forms the limbs of a vast cross."

In Mexico pyramids were found everywhere. Cortez, in a letter to Charles V., states that he counted four hundred of them at Cholula. Their temples were on those "high-places." The most ancient pyramids in Mexico are at Teotihuacan, eight leagues from the city of Mexico; the two largest were dedicated to the sun and moon respectively, each built of cut stone, with a level area at the summit, and four stages leading up to it. The larger one is 680 feet square at the base, about 200 feet high, and covers an area of eleven acres. The Pyramid of Cholula, measured by Humboldt, is 160 feet high, 1400 feet square at the base, and covers forty five acres! The great pyramid of Egypt, Cheops, is 746 feet square, 450 feet high, and covers between twelve and thirteen acres. So that it appears that the base of the Teotihuacan structure is nearly as large as that of Cheops, while that of Cholula covers nearly four times as much space. The Cheops pyramid, however, exceeds very much in height both the American structures.

Ser Garcia y Cubas thinks the pyramids of Teotihuacan (Mexico) were built for the same purpose as those of Egypt. He considers the analogy established in eleven particulars, as follows: 1, the site chosen is the same; 2, the structures are orientated with slight variation; 3, the line through the centres of the structures is in the astronomical meridian; 4, the construction in grades and steps is the same; 5, in both cases the larger pyramids are dedicated to the sun; 6, the Nile has "a valley of the dead," as in Teotihuacan there is "a street of the dead;" 7, some monuments in each class have the nature of fortifications; 8, the smaller mounds are of the same nature and for the same purpose; 9, both pyramids have a small mound joined to one of their faces; 10, the openings discovered in the Pyramid of the Moon are also found in some Egyptian pyramids; 11, the interior arrangements of the pyramids are analogous. ("Ensayo de un Estudio.")

It is objected that the American edifices are different in form from the Egyptian, in that they are truncated, or flattened at the top; but this is not an universal rule.

"In many of the ruined cities of Yucatan one or more pyramids have been found upon the summit of which no traces of any building could be discovered, although upon surrounding pyramids such structures could be found. There is also some reason to believe that perfect pyramids have been found in America. Waldeck found near Palenque two pyramids in a state of perfect preservation, square at the base, pointed at the top, and thirty-one feet high, their sides forming equilateral triangles." (Bancroft's Native Races," vol. v., p. 58.)

Bradford thinks that some of the Egyptian pyramids, and those which with some reason it has been supposed are the most ancient, are precisely similar to the Mexican teocalli." ("North Americans of Antiquity" p. 423.)

And there is in Egypt another form of pyramid called the mastaba, which, like the Mexican, was flattened on the top; while in Assyria structures flattened like the Mexican are found. "In fact," says one writer, "this form of temple (the flat-topped) has been found from Mesopotamia to the Pacific Ocean." The Phnicians also built pyramids. In the thirteenth century the Dominican Brocard visited the ruins of the Phnician city of Mrith or Marathos, and speaks in the strongest terms of admiration of those pyramids of surprising grandeur, constructed of blocks of stone from twenty-six to twenty-eight feet long, whose thickness exceeded the stature of a tall man. ("Prehistoric Nations," p. 144.)

"If," says Ferguson, "we still hesitate to pronounce that there was any connection between the builders of the pyramids of Suku and Oajaca, or the temples of Xochialco and Boro Buddor, we must at least allow that the likeness is startling, and difficult to account for on the theory of mere accidental coincidence."

The Egyptian pyramids all stand with their sides to the cardinal points, while many of the Mexican pyramids do likewise.

PYRAMIDS OF EGYPT.

The Egyptian pyramids were penetrated by small passage-ways; so were the Mexican. The Pyramid of Teotihuacan, according to Almarez, has, at a point sixty-nine feet from the base, a gallery large enough to admit a man crawling on hands and knees, which extends, inward, on an incline, a distance of twenty feet, and terminates in two square wells or chambers, each five feet square and one of them fifteen feet deep.

PYRAMIDS OF TEOTIHUACAN.

Mr. Lenstern states, according to Mr. Bancroft ("Native Races," vol. iv., p. 533), that "the gallery is one hundred and fifty-seven feet long, increasing in height to over six feet and a half as it penetrates the pyramid; that the well is over six feet square, extending (apparently) down to the base and up to the summit; and that other cross-galleries are blocked up by dris." In the Pyramid of Cheops there is a similar opening or passage-way forty-nine feet above the base; it is three feet eleven inches high, and three feet five and a half inches wide; it leads down a slope to a sepulchral chamber or well, and connects with other passage-ways leading up into the body of the pyramid.

THE GREAT MOUND, NEAR MIAMISBURG, OHIO.

In both the Egyptian the American pyramids the outside of the structures was covered with a thick coating of smooth, shining cement.

Humboldt considered the Pyramid of Cholula of the same type as the Temple of Jupiter Belus, the pyramids of Meidoun Dachhour, and the group of Sakkarah, in Egypt.

GREAT PYRAMID OF XCOCH, MEXICO.

In both America and Egypt the pyramids were used as places of sepulture; and it is a remarkable fact that the system of earthworks and mounds, kindred to the pyramids, is found even in England. Silsbury Hill, at Avebury, is an artificial mound one hundred and seventy feet high. It is connected with ramparts, avenues (fourteen hundred and eighty yards long), circular ditches, and stone circles, almost identical with those found in the valley of the Mississippi. In Ireland the dead were buried in vaults of stone, and the earth raised over them in pyramids flattened on the top. They were called "moats" by the people. We have found the stone vaults at the base of similar truncated pyramids in Ohio. There can be no doubt that the pyramid was a developed and perfected mound, and that the parent form of these curious structures is to be found in Silsbury Hill, and in the mounds of earth of Central America and the Mississippi Valley.

We find the emblem of the Cross in pre-Christian times venerated as a holy symbol on both sides of the Atlantic; and we find it explained as a type of the four rivers of the happy island where the civilization of the race originated.

We find everywhere among the European and American nations the memory of an Eden of the race, where the first men dwelt in primeval peace and happiness, and which was afterward destroyed by water.

We find the pyramid on both sides of the Atlantic, with its four sides pointing, like the arms of the Cross, to the four cardinal points-a reminiscence of Olympus; and in the Aztec representation of Olympos (Aztlan) we find the pyramid as the central and typical figure.

Is it possible to suppose all these extraordinary coincidences to be the result of accident? We might just as well say that the similarities between the American and English forms of government were not the result of relationship or descent, but that men placed in similar circumstances had spontaneously and necessarily reached the same results.

The Sumerian king list

(In the following translation, mss. are referred to by the sigla used by Vincente 1995; from those listed there, mss. Fi, Go, P6, and WB 62 were not used; if not specified by a note, numerical data come from ms. WB.)

---

After the kingship descended from heaven, the kingship was in Eridug. In Eridug, Alulim became king; he ruled for 28800 years. Alaljar ruled for 36000 years.

2 kings; they ruled for 64800 years.

Then Eridug fell and the kingship was taken to Bad-tibira.

In Bad-tibira, En-men-lu-ana ruled for 43200 years. En-men-gal-ana ruled for 28800 years. Dumuzid, the shepherd, ruled for 36000 years.

3 kings; they ruled for 108000 years.

Then Bad-tibira fell (?) and the kingship was taken to Larag.

In Larag, En-sipad-zid-ana ruled for 28800 years.

1 king; he ruled for 28800 years.

Then Larag fell (?) and the kingship was taken to Zimbir.

In Zimbir, En-men-dur-ana became king; he ruled for 21000 years.

1 king; he ruled for 21000 years.

Then Zimbir fell (?) and the kingship was taken to Curuppag.

In Curuppag, Ubara-Tutu became king; he ruled for 18600 years.

1 king; he ruled for 18600 years.

In 5 cities 8 kings; they ruled for 241200 years.

Then the flood swept over.

After the flood had swept over, and the kingship had descended from heaven, the kingship was in Kic.

In Kic, Jucur became king; he ruled for 1200 years. Kullassina-bel ruled for 960 (ms. P2+L2 has instead: 900) years. Nanjiclicma ruled for (ms. P2+L2 has:) 670 (?) years. En-tarah-ana ruled for (ms. P2+L2 has:) 420 years ......, 3 months, and 3 1/2 days. Babum ...... ruled for (ms. P2+L2 has:) 300 years. Puannum ruled for 840 (ms. P2+L2 has instead: 240) years. Kalibum ruled for 960 (ms. P2+L2 has instead: 900) years. Kalumum ruled for 840 (mss. P3+BT14, Su1 have instead: 900) years. Zuqaqip ruled for 900 (ms. Su1 has instead: 600) years. (In mss. P2+L2, P3+BT14, P5, the 10th and 11th rulers of the dynasty precede the 8th and 9th.) Atab (mss. P2+L2, P3+BT14, P5 have instead: Aba) ruled for 600 years. Macda, the son of Atab, ruled for 840 (ms. Su1 has instead: 720) years. Arwium, the son of Macda, ruled for 720 years. Etana, the shepherd, who ascended to heaven and consolidated all the foreign countries, became king; he ruled for 1500 (ms. P2+L2 has instead: 635) years. Balih, the son of Etana, ruled for 400 (mss. P2+L2, Su1 have instead: 410) years. En-me-nuna ruled for 660 (ms. P2+L2 has instead: 621) years. Melem-Kic, the son of En-me-nuna, ruled for 900 years. (ms. P3+BT14 adds:) 1560 are the years of the dynasty of En-me-nuna . Barsal-nuna, the son of En-me-nuna, (mss. P5, P3+BT14 have instead: Barsal-nuna) ruled for 1200 years. Zamug, the son of Barsal-nuna, ruled for 140 years. Tizqar, the son of Zamug, ruled for 305 years. (ms. P3+BT14 adds:) 1620 + X ....... Ilku ruled for 900 years. Iltasadum ruled for 1200 years. En-men-barage-si, who made the land of Elam submit, became king; he ruled for 900 years. Aga, the son of En-men-barage-si, ruled for 625 years. (ms. P3+BT14 adds:) 1525 are the years of the dynasty of En-men-barage-si.

23 kings; they ruled for 24510 years, 3 months, and 3 1/2 days.

Then Kic was defeated and the kingship was taken to E-ana.

In E-ana, Mec-ki-aj-gacer, the son of Utu, became lord and king; he ruled for 324 (ms. P2+L2 has instead: 325) years. Mec-ki-aj-gacer entered the sea and disappeared. Enmerkar, the son of Mec-ki-aj-gacer, the king of Unug, who built Unug (mss. L1+N1, P2+L2 have instead: under whom Unug was built), became king; he ruled for 420 (ms. TL has instead: 900 + X) years. (ms. P3+BT14 adds:) 745 are the years of the dynasty of Mec-ki-aj-gacer. (ms TL adds instead: ......; he ruled for 5 + X years.) Lugalbanda, the shepherd, ruled for 1200 years. Dumuzid, the fisherman, whose city was Kuara, ruled for 100 (ms. TL has instead: 110) years. (ms. P3+BT14 adds:) He captured En-me-barage-si single-handed. Gilgamec, whose father was a phantom (?), the lord of Kulaba, ruled for 126 years. Ur- Nungal, the son of Gilgamec, ruled for 30 years. Udul-kalama, the son of Ur- Nungal (ms. Su1 has instead: Ur-lugal), ruled for 15 years. La-ba'cum ruled for 9 years. En-nun-tarah-ana ruled for 8 years. Mec-he, the smith, ruled for 36 years. Melem-ana (ms. Su2 has instead: Til-kug (?) ......) ruled for 6 (ms. Su2 has instead: 900) years. Lugal-kitun (?) ruled for 36 (ms. Su2 has instead: 420) years.

12 kings; they ruled for 2310 (ms. Su2 has instead: 3588) years.

Then Unug was defeated and the kingship was taken to Urim.

In Urim, Mec- Ane-pada became king; he ruled for 80 years. Mec-ki-aj- Nanna (ms. P2+L2 has instead: Mec-ki-aj-nuna), the son of Mec- Ane-pada, became king; he ruled for 36 (ms. P2+L2 has instead: 30) years. Elulu ruled for (mss. L1+N1, P2+L2, P3+BT14 have:) 25 years. Balulu ruled for (mss. L1+N1, P2+L2, P3+BT14 have:) 36 years. (mss. L1+N1, P2+L2 have:)

4 kings; they ruled for (mss. L1+N1, P2+L2, P3+BT14 have:) 171 years.

Then Urim was defeated and the kingship was taken to Awan.

In Awan, ...... became king; he ruled for ...... years. ...... ruled for ...... years. ...... ruled for 36 years.

3 kings; they ruled for 356 years.

Then Awan was defeated and the kingship was taken to Kic.

In Kic, Susuda, the fuller, became king; he ruled for 201 + X years. Dadasig ruled for (ms. vD has:) 81 years. Mamagal, the boatman, ruled for 360 (ms. L1+N1 has instead: 420) years. Kalbum, the son of Mamagal (ms. WB has instead: Magalgal), ruled for 195 (ms. L1+N1 has instead: 132) years. Tuge (?) ruled for 360 years. Men-nuna , (ms. L1+N1 adds:) the son of Tuge (?), ruled for 180 years. (in mss. L1+N1, TL, the 7th and 8th rulers of the dynasty are in reverse order) ...... ruled for 290 years. Lugalju ruled for 360 (ms. L1+N1 has instead: 420) years.

8 kings; they ruled for 3195 (ms. L1+N1 has instead: 3792) years.

Then Kic was defeated and the kingship was taken to Hamazi.

In Hamazi, Hadanic became king; he ruled for 360 years.

1 king; he ruled for 360 years.

Then Hamazi was defeated and the kingship was taken (ms. P3+BT14 has instead: was returned a second time) to Unug.

(In mss. IB, L1+N1, TL, the 2nd dynasty of Unug of ll. 185-191 is preceded by the 2nd dynasty of Urim of ll. 192-203.)

In Unug, En-cakanca-ana became king; he ruled for 60 years. Lugal-ure (ms. P3+BT14 has instead: Lugal-kinice-dudu (?)) ruled for 120 years. Argandea ruled for 7 years. (ms. L1+N1 has:)

3 kings; they ruled for (ms. L1+N1 has:) 187 years.

Then Unug was defeated (ms. TL has instead: destroyed) and the kingship was taken to Urim.

In Urim, Nani became king; he ruled for (ms. vD has:) 120 + X (ms. IB has instead: 54 + X) years. Mec-ki-aj- Nanna, the son of Nani, ruled for (ms. vD has:) 48 years. ......, the son (?) of ......, ruled for (ms. IB has:) 2 years. (ms. IB has:)

3 kings; they ruled for (ms. IB has:) 582 (ms. TL has instead: 578) years. (ms. vD has instead: 2 kings; they ruled for 120 + X years.)

Then Urim was defeated (ms. TL has instead: destroyed) and the kingship was taken to Adab.

In Adab, Lugal- Ane-mundu became king; he ruled for (mss. L1+N1, TL have:) 90 years. (mss. L1+N1, TL have:)

1 king; he ruled for (mss. L1+N1, TL have:) 90 years.

Then Adab was defeated (ms. TL has instead: destroyed) and the kingship was taken to Mari.

In Mari, Anbu (?) became king; he ruled for 30 (ms. TL has instead: 90) years. Anba (?), the son of Anbu (?), ruled for 17 (ms. TL has instead: 7) years. Bazi, the leatherworker, ruled for 30 years. Zizi, the fuller, ruled for 20 years. Limer, the gudu priest, ruled for 30 years. Carrum-iter ruled for 9 (ms. TL has instead: 7) years.

6 kings; they ruled for 136 (ms. TL has instead: 184) years.

Then Mari was defeated (ms. TL has instead: destroyed) and the kingship was taken to Kic.

In Kic, Kug- Bau, the woman tavern-keeper, who made firm the foundations of Kic, became king; she ruled for 100 years.

1 king; she ruled for 100 years.

Then Kic was defeated (ms. TL has instead: destroyed) and the kingship was taken to Akcak.

In Akcak, Unzi became king; he ruled for 30 years. Undalulu ruled for 6 (mss. L1+N1, S have instead: 12) years. Urur ruled for (ms. IB has instead: was king (?) for) 6 years. Puzur- Nirah ruled for (mss. IB, L1+N1, S, Su1 have:) 20 years. Icu- Il ruled for (mss. IB, L1+N1, S, Su1 have:) 24 years. Cu- Suen, the son of Icu- Il, ruled for (mss. IB, L1+N1, S, TL have:) 7 (ms. Su1 has instead: 24) years. (mss. S, Su1, TL have:)

6 kings; they ruled for (mss. L1+N1, S, TL have:) 99 (ms. Su1 has instead: 116) years (ms. IB has instead: 5 kings; they ruled for (ms. IB has:) 87 years).

Then Akcak was defeated (ms. S has instead: Then the reign of Akcak was abolished) and the kingship was taken to Kic. (mss. IB, S, Su1, Su3+Su4 list the 3rd and 4th dynasty of Kic of ll. 224-231 and ll. 244-258, respectively, as one dynasty)

In Kic, Puzur- Suen, the son of Kug- Bau, became king; he ruled for 25 years. Ur- Zababa, the son of Puzur- Suen, ruled for 400 (mss. P3+BT14, S have instead: 6) (ms. IB has instead: 4 + X) years. (ms. P3+BT14 adds:) 131 are the years of the dynasty of Kug- Bau. Zimudar (ms. TL has instead: Ziju-iake) ruled for 30 (ms. IB has instead: 30 + X) years. U߄i-watar, the son of Zimudar (ms. TL has instead: Ziju-iake), ruled for 7 (ms. S has instead: 6) years. Ectar-muti ruled for 11 (ms. Su1 has instead: 17 (?)) years. Icme- Camac ruled for 11 years. (ms. Su1 adds:) Cu-ilicu ruled for 15 years. Nanniya, the jeweller, (ms. Su1 has instead: Zimudar) (ms. IB has instead: ......) ruled for 7 (ms. S has instead: 3) years. 7 kings; they ruled for 491 (ms. Su1 has instead: 485) years (ms. S has instead:

7 kings; they ruled for 491 years.

Then Kic was defeated (ms. S has instead: Then the reign of Kic was abolished) and the kingship was taken (ms. P3+BT14 has instead: was returned a third time) to Unug. (ms. IB omits the 3rd dynasty of Unug of ll. 258-263)

In Unug, Lugal-zage-si became king; he ruled for 25 (ms. P3+BT14 has instead: 34) years.

1 king; he ruled for 25 (ms. P3+BT14 has instead: 34) years.

Then Unug was defeated (ms. S has instead: Then the reign of Unug was abolished) and the kingship was taken to Agade.

In Agade, Sargon, whose father was a gardener, the cupbearer of Ur- Zababa, became king, the king of Agade, who built Agade (ms. L1+N1 has instead: under whom Agade was built); he ruled for 56 (ms. L1+N1 has instead: 55) (ms. TL has instead: 54) years. Rimuc, the son of Sargon, ruled for 9 (ms. IB has instead: 7) (ms. L1+N1 has instead: 15) years. Man-icticcu, the older brother of Rimuc, the son of Sargon, ruled for 15 (ms. L1+N1 has instead: 7) years. Naram- Suen, the son of Man-icticcu, ruled for (mss. L1+N1, P3+BT14 have:) 56 years. Car-kali-carri, the son of Naram- Suen, ruled for (ms. L1+N1, Su+Su4 have:) 25 (ms. P3+BT14 has instead: 24) years. (ms. P3+BT14 adds:)

157 are the years of the dynasty of Sargon.

Then who was king? Who was the king? (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: who was king? Who indeed was king?) Irgigi was king, Imi was king, Nan was king (in mss. L1+N1, Su3+Su4, Imi and Nan are in reverse order) , Ilulu was king, and the (mss. P3+BT14, S have:) 4 of them ruled for only (mss. P3+BT14, S have:) 3 years. Dudu ruled for 21 years. Cu- Durul, the son of Dudu, ruled for 15 (ms. IB has instead: 18) years.

11 kings; they ruled for 181 years (ms. S has instead: 12 kings; they ruled for (ms. S has:) 197 years) (mss. Su1, Su3+Su4, which omit Dudu and Cu-Durul, have instead: 9 kings; they ruled for (ms. Su1 has:) 161 (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 177) years.

Then Agade was defeated (ms. S has instead: Then the reign of Agade was abolished) and the kingship was taken to Unug.

In Unug, Ur-nijin became king; he ruled for 7 (mss. IB, S have instead: 3) (ms. Su1 has instead: 15) (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 30) years. Ur-gigir, the son of Ur-nijin, ruled for 6 (ms. IB has instead: 7) (ms. Su1 has instead: 15) (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 7) years. Kuda ruled for 6 years. Puzur-ili ruled for 5 (ms. IB has instead: 20) years. Ur- Utu ruled for 6 (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: Ur- Utu), the son of Ur-gigir, ruled for 25 (ms. Su1 has instead: Lugal-melem, the son of Ur-gigir, ruled for 7) years.

5 kings; they ruled for 30 (ms. IB has instead: 43) (mss. PHa, S have instead: 26) years (ms. Su3+Su4, which omits Kuda and Puzur-ili, has instead: 3 kings; they ruled for (ms. Su3+Su4 has:) 47 years). Unug was defeated (ms. S has instead:

Then the reign of Unug was abolished) and the kingship was taken to the army (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: land) of Gutium.

In the army (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: land) of Gutium, at first no king was famous; they were their own kings and ruled thus for 3 years (ms. L1+N1 has instead: they had no king; they ruled themselves for 5 years). Then Inkicuc (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: ......) ruled for 6 (ms. L1+Ni1 has instead: 7) years. Zarlagab ruled for 6 years. Culme (ms. L1+N1 has instead: Yarlagac) ruled for 6 years. Silulumec (ms. Mi has instead: Silulu) ruled for 6 (ms. G has instead: 7) years. Inimabakec ruled for 5 (ms. Mi has instead: Duga ruled for 6) years. Igecauc ruled for 6 (ms. Mi has instead: Ilu-an (?) ruled for 3) years. Yarlagab ruled for 15 (ms. Mi has instead: 5) years. Ibate ruled for 3 years. Yarla (ms. L1+N1 has instead: Yarlangab (?)) ruled for 3 years. Kurum (ms. L1+N1 has instead: ......) ruled for 1 (ms. Mi has instead: 3) years. Apil-kin ruled for 3 years. La-erabum (?) ruled for 2 years. Irarum ruled for 2 years. Ibranum ruled for 1 year. Hablum ruled for 2 years. Puzur- Suen, the son of Hablum, ruled for 7 years. Yarlaganda ruled for 7 years. ...... ruled for 7 years. Tiriga (?) ruled for 40 days.

21 kings; they ruled for (ms. L1+N1 has:) 124 years and 40 days (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 25 years).

Then the army of Gutium was defeated (ms. TL has instead: destroyed) and the kingship was taken to Unug.

In Unug, Utu-hejal became king; he ruled for 427 years, ...... days (ms. IB has instead: 26 years, 2 + X months, and 15 days) (ms. J has instead: 7 years, 6 months, and 15 days) (ms. TL has instead: 7 years, 6 months, and 5 days).

1 king; he ruled for 427 years, ...... days (ms. J has instead: 7 years, 6 months, and 15 days) (ms. TL has instead: 7 years, 6 months, and 5 days).

Then Unug was defeated and the kingship was taken to Urim.

In Urim, Ur- Namma became king; he ruled for 18 years. Culgi, the son of Ur-Namma, ruled for 46 (mss. Su3+Su4, TL have instead: 48) (ms. P5 has instead: 58) years. Amar- Suena, the son of Culgi, ruled for 9 (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 25) years. Cu- Suen, the son of Amar- Suena, ruled for 9 (ms. P5 has instead: 7) (ms. Su1 has instead: 20 + X) (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 16) years. Ibbi- Suen, the son of Cu- Suen, ruled for 24 (mss. P5, Su1 have instead: 25) (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 15) (ms. TL has instead: 23 (?)) years.

4 kings; they ruled for 108 years (mss. J, P5, Su1, Su3+Su4 have instead: 5 kings; they ruled for (ms. P5 has:) 117 (ms. Su1 has instead: 120 + X) (ms. Su3+Su4 has instead: 123) years).

Then Urim was defeated (ms. P5 has instead: Then the reign of Urim was abolished). (ms. Su3+Su4 adds:) The very foundation of Sumer was torn out (?). The kingship was taken to Isin.

In Isin, Icbi- Erra became king; he ruled for 33 (ms. P5 has instead: 32) years. Cu-ilicu, the son of Icbi- Erra, ruled for 20 (ms. P5 has instead: 10) (ms. Su1 has instead: 15) years. Iddin- Dagan, the son of Cu-ilicu, ruled for 21 (ms. Su1 has instead: 25) years. Icme- Dagan, the son of Iddin- Dagan, ruled for (mss. P2, P5 have:) 20 (ms. Mi has instead: 18) years. Lipit- Ectar, the son of Icme- Dagan (ms. P2 has instead: Iddin- Dagan), ruled for (mss. L1+N1, P2, P5 have:) 11 years. Ur- Ninurta (mss. L1+N1, P2 add:) , the son of Ickur -- may he have years of abundance, a good reign, and a sweet life -- ruled for (ms. P5 has:) 28 years. Bur- Suen, the son of Ur- Ninurta, ruled for 21 years. Lipit- Enlil, the son of Bur- Suen, ruled for 5 years. Erra-imitti ruled for 8 (mss. P5, TL have instead: 7) years. (ms. P5 adds:) ...... ruled for ...... 6 months. Enlil-bani ruled for 24 years. Zambiya ruled for 3 years. Iter-pica ruled for 4 years. Ur-dul-kuga ruled for 4 years. Suen-magir ruled for 11 years. (ms. P5 adds:) Damiq-ilicu, the son of Suen-magir, ruled for 23 years.

14 kings; they ruled for 203 years (ms. P5 has instead: 225 years and 6 months). (Mss. P2+L2, L1+N1 and P4+Ha conclude with a summary of the post-diluvium dynasties; the translation of ll. 378-431 uses numerical data from each mss. but follows the wording of P2+L2 and L1+N1)

A total of 39 kings ruled for 14409 + X years, 3 months and 3 1/2 days, 4 times in Kic.

A total of 22 kings ruled for 2610 + X years, 6 months and 15 days, 5 times in Unug.

A total of 12 kings ruled for 396 years, 3 times in Urim.

A total of 3 kings ruled for 356 years, once in Awan.

A total of 1 king ruled for 420 years, once in Hamazi.

16 lines missing

A total of 12 (?) kings ruled for 197 (?) years, once in Agade.

A total of 21 (ms. P4+Ha has instead: 23) kings ruled for 125 years and 40 days (ms. P4+Ha has instead: 99 years), once in the army of Gutium.

A total of 11 (ms. P4+Ha has instead: 16) kings ruled for 159 (ms. P4+Ha has instead: 226) years, once in Isin.

There are 11 cities, cities in which the kingship was exercised.

A total of 134 (ms. P4+Ha has instead: 139) kings, who altogether ruled for 28876 + X (ms. P4+Ha has instead: 3443 + X) years. 21.

Mesopotamia

with thanks to The History Guide

What is good in a man's sight is evil for a god, What is evil to a man's mind is good for his god. Who can comprehend the counsel of the gods in heaven? The plan of a god is deep waters, who can fathom of it? Where has befuddled mankind ever learned what is a god's conduct?

---

Before Civilization

Between 9000 B.C. and the beginning of the Christian era, western civilization came into being in Egypt and in what historians call Ancient Western Asia (modern-day Cyprus, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Turkey, south-western Russia, Iraq and Iran). The earliest permanent settlements occurred between 9000-6000 B.C. and were accompanied by the domestication of plants and animals. Between 4000-3000 B.C., the first cities appeared in response to the pressures of population growth, the organizational requirements of irrigation and the demands of more complex trade patterns. According to our previous definitions, these societies of Egypt and Ancient Western Asia correspond to what we would call civilization.

Around 10,000 B.C., many hunter-gatherers living along the coastal plains of modern Syria and Israel and in the valleys and hills near the Zagros Mountains between Iran and Iraq began to develop special strategies that led to a transformation in the human community. Rather than constantly travelling in search of food, people stayed in one region and exploited the seasonal sources of food, including fish, grain, fruits and game. At a community such as Jericho, people built and rebuilt their mud brick and stone huts rather than moving on as had their ancestors. In general, these communities began to focus on seasonal food sources and so were less likely to leave in search of new sources.

Just why hunters and gatherers in this region of the ancient world turned to agriculture is difficult to say. And there are a variety of problems associated with this transformation. For one thing, specialization in a relatively small number of plants or animals could spell disaster during times of famine. Some scholars have argued that agriculture developed out of an increased population and the development of a political hierarchy. In settled communities, infant mortality decreased and life expectancy rose. This change may have occurred since life in a fixed community was less demanding. The practice of infanticide decreased since children could now be used in rudimentary agricultural tasks. And as population growth put pressure on the local food supply, gathering activities required more coordination and organization and led eventually to the development of political leadership.

Settlements began to encourage the growth of plants such as barley and lentils and the domestication of pigs, sheep and goats. People no longer looked for their favorite food sources where they occurred naturally. Now they introduced them into other locations. An agricultural revolution had begun.

The ability to domesticate goats, pigs, sheep and cattle and to cultivate grains and vegetables changed human communities from passive harvesters of nature to active partners with it. The ability to expand the food supply in one area allowed the development of permanent settlements of greater size and complexity. The people of the Neolithic or New Stone Age (8000-5000 B.C.) organized fairly large villages. Jericho grew into a fortified town complete with ditches, stone walls, and towers and contained perhaps 2000 residents. Catal H in southern Turkey may have been substantially larger.

Although agriculture resulted in a stable food supply for permanent communities, the revolutionary aspect of this development was that the community could bring what they needed (natural resources plus their tool kit) to make a new site inhabitable. This development made it possible to create larger communities and also helped to spread the practice of agriculture to a wider area. Farmers in Catal-H cultivated plants that came from hundreds of miles away. The presence of tools and statues made of stone not available locally indicates that there was also some trading with distant regions.

Agricultural society brought changes in the organization of religious practices as well. Sanctuary rooms decorated with frescoes and sculptures of the heads of bulls and bears shows us that structured religious rites were important to the inhabitants of these early communities. At Jericho, human skulls were covered with clay in an attempt to make them look as they had in life suggesting that they practiced a form of ancestor worship. Bonds of kinship that had united hunters and gatherers were being supplemented by religious organization, which helped to regulate the social behaviour of the community.

Around 1500 B.C., a new theme appears on the cliff walls at Tassili-n-Ajjer. We see men herding horses and driving horse-drawn chariots. These practices had emerged more than fifteen hundred years earlier in Mesopotamia, a desert plain stretching to the marshes near the mouths of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. Chariots symbolized a dynamic and expansive phase in western culture. Constructed of wood and bronze and used for transport as well as for warfare, the chariot is symbolic of the culture of early river civilizations, the first civilizations in Ancient Western Asia.

Mesopotamian Civilization

The history and culture of Mesopotamian civilization is inextricably connected to the ebb and flow of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers. The earliest communities developed to the north but since rainfall in that area was so unpredictable, by 5000 B.C. communities had spread south to the rich alluvial plain. The economy of these communities was primarily agricultural and approximately 100-200 people lived in these permanently established villages. The alluvial plain in southern Mesopotamia ("land between the rivers") was far more fertile than the north but because there was little rainfall, irrigation ditches had to be constructed. Furthermore, the river beds of the Tigris and Euphrates rise and fall with the seasons and they change their course unpredictably. Southern Mesopotamia also had its share of flash floods which could destroy crops, livestock and village homes. Floods and torrential rains were a significant theme in Mesopotamian literature as depicted in the EPIC OF GILGAMESH.

The rampant flood which no man can oppose,
Which shakes the heavens and causes earth to tremble,
In an appalling blanket folds mother and child,
Beats down the canebrake's full luxuriant greenery,
And drowns the harvest in its time of ripeness.

Rising waters, grievous to eyes of man, All-powerful flood, which forces the embankments And mows down mighty trees, Frenzied storm, tearing all things in massed confusion With it in hurling speed.

Civilization emerged in Mesopotamia because the soil provided a surplus of food. With this surplus, people could settle down to village life and with these new settlements, towns and cities began to make their appearance, a process known as urbanization. With settlements and a surplus of food came an increase in the population, a well-defined division of labor, organization, cooperation and kingship. The emergence of cities involved interaction between people. Most cities evolved from smaller farming villages and with the practice of irrigation, which was necessary for villages distant from the Tigris and Euphrates, a stable food supply was produced. This, in turn, allowed increases in the number of people who inhabited each settlement.

Because the land closest to the river was the most fertile, there was a variation in terms of the wealth of these early farmers, which led to distinct social classes. At the same time, the construction of canals, ditches and dikes essential to irrigation demanded cooperation between different social groups. Decision-making, regulation and control of all food production and herding meant cooperation. And because more food could be produced by less people, some people gave up farming and became craftsmen, labourers, merchants and officials and this too required cooperation. The Mesopotamians built massive temples or ziggurats which housed the priestly class, the human representatives of the gods. The priests controlled the religious life of the community, the economy, land ownership, the employment of workers as well as the management of long distance trade.

Mesopotamian villages and towns eventually evolved into independent and nearly self-sufficient city-states. Although largely economically dependent on one another, these city-states were independent political entities and retained very strong isolationist tendencies. This isolationism hindered the unification of the Mesopotamian city-states, which eventually grew to twelve in number.

By 3000 B.C., Mesopotamian civilization had made contact with other cultures of the Fertile Crescent (a term first coined by James Breasted in 1916, an extensive trade network connecting Mesopotamia with the rest of Ancient Western Asia. Again, it was the two rivers which served as both trade and transportation routes.

The achievements of Mesopotamian civilization were numerous. Agriculture, thanks to the construction of irrigation ditches, became the primary method of subsistence. Farming was further simplified by the introduction of the plow. We also find the use of wheel-made pottery. Between 3000 and 2900 B.C. craft specialization and industries began to emerge (ceramic pottery, metallurgy and textiles). Evidence for this exists in the careful planning and construction of the monumental buildings such as the temples and ziggurats. During this period (roughly 3000 B.C.), cylinder seals became common. These cylindrical stone seals were five inches in height and engraved with images. These images were reproduced by rolling the cylinder over wet clay. The language of these seals remained unknown until to 20th century. But, scholars now agree that the language of these tablets was Sumerian.

Ancient Sumer

The Sumerians inhabited southern Mesopotamia from 3000-2000 B.C. The origins of the Sumerians is unclear -- what is clear is that Sumerian civilization dominated Mesopotamian law, religion, art, literature and science for nearly seven centuries.

The greatest achievement of Sumerian civilization was their CUNEIFORM ("wedge-shaped") system of writing. Using a reed stylus, they made wedge-shaped impressions on wet clay tablets which were then baked in the sun. Once dried, these tablets were virtually indestructible and the several hundred thousand tablets which have been found tell us a great deal about the Sumerians. Originally, Sumerian writing was pictographic, that is, scribes drew pictures of representations of objects. Each sign represented a word identical in meaning to the object pictured, although pictures could often represent more than the actual object.

The pictographic system proved cumbersome and the characters were gradually simplified and their pictographic nature gave way to conventional signs that represented ideas. For instance, the sign for a star could also be used to mean heaven, sky or god. The next major step in simplification was the development of phonetization in which characters or signs were used to represent sounds. So, the character for water was also used to mean "in," since the Sumerian words for "water" and "in" sounded similar. With a phonetic system, scribes could now represent words for which there were no images (signs), thus making possible the written expression of abstract ideas.

The Sumerians used writing primarily as a form of record keeping. The most common cuneiform tablets record transactions of daily life: tallies of cattle kept by herdsmen for their owners, production figures, lists of taxes, accounts, contracts and other facets of organizational life in the community. Another large category of cuneiform writing included a large number of basic texts which were used for the purpose of teaching future generations of scribes. By 2500 B.C. there were schools built just for his purpose.

The city-state was Sumer's most important political entity. The city-states were a loose collection of territorially small cities which lacked unity with one another. Each city-state consisted of an urban center and its surrounding farmland. The city-states were isolated from one another geographically and so the independence of each city-state became a cultural norm with important consequences. For instance, it was held that each city-state was the estate of a particular god: Nannar (moon) was said to have watched over the city-state of Ur; Uruk had An (sky), Sippar had Utu (sun) and Enki (earth) could be found at Eridu. Nippur, the earliest centre of Sumerian religion, was dedicated to Enlil, god of wind (Enlil was supplanted by Marduk at Babylon). Each city-state was sacred since it was carefully guarded by and linked to a specific god or goddess. Located near the centre of each city-state was a temple. Occupying several acres, this sacred area consisted of a ziggurat with a temple at the top dedicated to the god or goddess who "owned" the city. The temple complex was the true centre of the community. The main god or goddess dwelt there symbolically in the form of a statue, and the ceremony of dedication included a ritual that linked the statue to the god or goddess and thus harnessed the power of the deity for the benefit of the city-state. Considerable wealth was poured into the construction of temples as well as other buildings used for the residences of priests and priestesses who attended to the needs of the gods. The priests also controlled all economic activities since the economy was "redistributive." Farmers would bring their produce to the the priests at the ziggurat. The priests would "feed" and "clothe" the gods and then redistribute the remainder to the people of the community.

With its rather large pantheon of gods and goddesses animating all aspects of life, Sumerian religion was polytheistic in nature. By far, the most important deities were An, Enlil, Enki and Ninhursaga. An was the god of the sky and hence the most important force in the universe. He was also viewed as the source of all authority including the earthly power of rulers and fathers alike. In one myth, the gods address them in the following manner:

What you have ordered comes true! The utterance of Prince and Lord is but what you have ordered, do agree with.
O An! your great command takes precedence, who could gainsay it?
O father of the gods, your command, the very foundations of heaven and earth, what god could spurn it?

Enlil, god of wind, was considered the second greatest power of the universe and became the symbol of the proper use of force and authority on earth. As the god of wind, Enlil controlled both the fertility of the soil and destructive storms. This dual nature of Enlil inspired a justifiable fear of him:

What has he planned? . . .
What is in my father's heart?
What is in Enlil's holy mind?
What has he planned against me in his holy mind?
A net he spread: the net of an enemy; a snare he set: the snare of an enemy.
He has stirred up the waters and will catch the fishes, he has cast his net, and will bring down the birds too.

Enki was god of the earth. Since the earth was the source of life-giving waters, Enki was also god of rivers, wells, and canals. He also represented the waters of creativity and was responsible for inventions and crafts. Ninhursaga began as a goddess associated with soil, mountains, and vegetation. Eventually she was worshipped as a mother goddess, a "mother of all children," who manifested her power by giving birth to kings.

Although these four deities were supreme, there were numerous gods and goddesses below them. One group included the astral deities, who were all grandchildren and great-grandchildren of An. These included Utu, god of the sun, the moon god Nannar, and Inanna, goddess of the morning and evening star as well as of war and rain. Unlike humans, these gods and goddesses were divine and immortal. But they were not all-powerful since no one god had control over the entire universe. Furthermore, humans were capable of devising ways to discover the will of the gods and to influence them as well.

The relationship of human beings to the gods was based on subservience since, according to Sumerian myth, human beings were created to do the manual labour the gods were unwilling to do for themselves. As a consequence, humans were insecure since they could never be sure of the god's actions. But humans did make attempts to circumvent or relieve their anxiety by discovering the intentions of the gods; these efforts gave rise to the development of the arts of divination, which took a variety of forms. A common form, at least for kings and priests who could afford it, involved killing animals, such as sheep or goats, and examining their livers or other organs. Supposedly, features seen in the organs of the sacrificed animals foretold of events to come. Private individuals relied on cheaper divinatory techniques. These included interpreting patterns of smoke from burning incense or the pattern formed when oil was poured into water.

The Sumerian art of divination arose from a desire to discover the purpose of the gods. If people could decipher the signs that foretold events, the events would be predictable and humans could act wisely. But the Sumerians also developed cultic arts to influence good powers (gods and goddesses) whose decisions could determine human destiny and to ward off evil powers (demons). These cultic arts included ritualistic formulas, such as spells against evil spirits, or prayers or hymns to the gods to win their positive influence. Since only the priests knew the precise rituals, it is not difficult to understand the important role they exercised in a society dominated by a belief in the reality of spiritual powers.

The Code of Hammurabi

Mesopotamian men and women viewed themselves as subservient to the gods and believed humans were at the mercy of the god's arbitrary decisions. To counter their insecurity, the Mesopotamians not only developed the arts of divination in order to understand the wishes of their gods, but also relieved some anxiety by establishing codes that regulated their relationships with one another. These law codes became an integral part of Mesopotamian society. Although there were early Sumerian law codes, the best-preserved Mesopotamian collection of law codes was that of Hammurabi (fl.18th century B.C.).

The CODE OF HAMMURABI reveals a society of strict justice. Penalties for criminal offences were severe and varied according to the wealth of the individual. According to the code, there were three social classes in Babylonia: an upper class of nobles (government officials, priests, and warriors), the class of freemen (merchants, artisans, professionals, and wealthy farmers), and a lower class of slaves. An offence against a member of the upper class was punished with more severity than the same offence against a member of a lower class. The principle of retaliation ("an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth") was fundamental. It was applied in cases where members of the upper class committed criminal offences against their own social equals. But for offences against members of the lower classes, a money payment was made instead.

Mesopotamian society, like any other society, had its share of crime. Burglary was common. If a person stole goods belonging to the temples, he was put to death, and so was the person who received the stolen goods. If the private property of an individual was stolen, the thief had to make a tenfold restitution. If he could not do so he was put to death. An offender caught attempting to loot a burning house was to be "thrown into that fire."

Private individuals were often responsible for bringing charges before a court of law. To insure that accusations were not brought lightly, the accuser in cases of murder was responsible for proving his case against the defendant. If the accuser could not, he was put to death. Providing false testimony in a murder case meant the same fate.

Hammurabi's code took seriously the responsibilities of all public officials. The governor of an area and city officials were expected to catch burglars. If they failed to do so, public officials in which the crime took place had to replace the lost property. If murderers were not found, the officials had to pay a fine to the relatives of the murdered person. Soldiers were also expected to fill their duties. If a soldier hired a substitute to fight for him, he was put to death, and a substitute was given control of his estate.

The law code also extended into the daily life of the ordinary citizen. Builders were held responsible for the buildings they constructed. If a house collapsed and caused the death of its owner, the builder was put to death. Goods destroyed by the collapsed must also be replaced and the house itself rebuilt at the builder's expense.

Slavery was a common feature of Mesopotamian society. Slaves were obtained by war; others were criminals. Crimes such as striking one's older brother and kicking one's mother were punished by condemnation to slavery. A man could pay his debts by selling both his children and wife into slavery for a specified length of time. One could become a slave simply by going into debt.

Slaves were used in temples, in public buildings, and in the homes of private individuals. Most temple slaves were women who did domestic chores. Royal slaves were used to construct buildings and fortifications. Slaves owned by private citizens performed domestic chores. The laws were harsh for those slaves who tried to escape or who were disobedient. "If a male slave has said to his master, 'You are now my master,' his master shall prove him to be his slave and cut off his ear." Despite such harsh measures, slaves did possess a number of privileges: they could hold property, participate in business, marry free man or women, and eventually purchased their own freedom.

The number of laws in Hammurabi's code dedicated to land and commerce reveal the importance of agriculture and trade in Mesopotamian society. Numerous laws dealt with questions of landholding, such as the establishment of conditions for renting farmland. Tenant farming was the basis of Mesopotamian agriculture. Ten farmers paid their annual rent in crops rather than money. Laws concerning land-use and irrigation were especially strict. If a landowner or tenant failed to keep dikes in good repair he was required to pay for the grain that was destroyed. If he could not pay he was sold into slavery and his goods sold, the proceeds of which were divided among the injured parties. Rates of interest on loans were watched carefully. If the lender raised his rate of interest after a loan was made, he lost the entire amount of the loan. The Code of Hammurabi also specified the precise wages of labourers and artisans.

The largest number of laws in the Code of Hammurabi were dedicated to marriage and family. Parents arranged marriages for their children. After marriage, the party signed a marriage contract. Without this contract, no one was considered legally married. While the husband provided a bridal payment, the woman's parents were responsible for a dowry to the husband. Dowries were carefully monitored and governed by regulations.

Mesopotamian society was a patriarchal society, and so women possessed far fewer privileges and rights in their marriage. A woman's place was at home and failure to fulfil her duties was grounds for divorce. If she was not able to bear children, her husband could divorce her but he had to repay the dowry. If his wife tried to leave the home in order to engage in business, her husband could divorce her and did not have to repay the dowry. Furthermore, if his wife was a "gadabout, . . . neglecting her house [and] humiliating her husband," she could be drowned.

Women were guaranteed some rights, however. If a woman was divorced without good reason she received the dowry back. A woman could seek divorce and get her dowry back if her husband was unable to show that she had done anything wrong. The mother also chose a son to whom an inheritance would be passed.

Sexual relations were strictly regulated as well. Husbands, but not wives, were permitted sexual activity outside marriage. A wife caught committing adultery was pitched into the river. Incest was strictly forbidden. If a father committed incestuous relations with his daughter, he would be banished. Incest between a son and his mother resulted in both being burned.

Fathers ruled their children as well as their wives. Obedience was expected: "If a son has struck his father, they shall cut off his hand." If a son committed a serious enough offence, his father could disinherit him. It should be clear that the Code of Hammurabi covered virtually every aspect of an individual's life. Although scholars have questioned the extent to which these laws were actually employed in Babylonian society, the Code of Hammurabi provides us an important glimpse into the values of Mesopotamian civilization.

The Akkadian Kingdom

The Sumerians were not the only people to inhabit the Fertile Crescent of Mesopotamia. There were other groups of people who lived in permanent communities and who interacted with the Sumerians in times of peace and in war. By 2350 B.C., Semitic-speaking people united northern Mesopotamia with the Sumerian city-states and a new capital was set up at Akkad. The result was a centralized government under the authority of the king, his royal court, and the high class of priests.

The man most responsible for this development is assumed to be Sargon. Sargon, whose name is taken to mean "the king is legitimate," carried out more than thirty battles against the Sumerian city-states and eventually, these city-states were incorporated into the Akkadian kingdom.

The foundation of the Akkadian state was economic. Sargon and his royal court served as the focal point of all economic activity. Remember, at Sumer, this task was assumed by the priests of the temple. Sargon brought vast amounts of wealth to the capital city he also brought a huge number of royal servants and administrators, thus creating a bureaucratic organization to help rule his kingdom.

The Akkadian kingdom, like most Ancient Near Eastern kingdoms, also embraced a polytheistic religion. Their gods were anthropomorphic, that is, the gods took human form. And because the gods took human form, they also had human qualities: the gods could be foolish, intelligent, shy, humorous, jealous, angry or silly. Among themselves, the gods also had unequal status. The gods were derived from the world of nature for the simple reason that life in Mesopotamia was controlled or conditioned by the seasons. Theirs was a world of nature and in order to understand nature, the Mesopotamians gave human shape to the forces of nature. So, we encounter An, the sky god, Enlil, the god of air, Nanna, the moon god and Utu, the sun god. The Mesopotamians believed these gods were responsible for creating the universe and everything it contained, including humankind. The gods were also responsible for the smooth running of that world. The gods ruled the world of men through their earthly representatives, and in the case of the Akkadian kingdom, this meant Sargon. Hopefully, you can already notice the decreased status of the temple priests at Akkad. Although they still exist, and continue to serve a vital role, the mediator between the gods and ordinary men and women, is now Sargon.

Men and women were created by the gods to serve the gods to feed and clothe them, to honour and obey them. One thing absent from this religion, however, was that the gods did not specify any code of ethics or morality. Issues of good and evil were left to men and women to discover on their own. In the end, the gods gave the inhabitants of these early river civilizations an answer to the basic question why are we here? what is our role? And the answer was equally simple to serve the gods.

Clay Tablets from Sumer, Babylon and Assyria

This page is added because a lot of my readers complained about the absence of pictures of the published texts so I gathered some pictures of clay tablets from the internet, most of them are mentioned in my book as well as in the ancient texts in my Babylon and Sumer section.

To enlarge the pictures click on them

Special Thanks to The Schoyen Collection, worth a visit.

The Schen Collection comprises most types of manuscripts from the whole world spanning over 5000 years. It is the largest private manuscript collection formed in the 20th century. The whole collection, MSS 1-5268, comprises 13,497 manuscript items, including 2,174 volumes. 6,850 manuscript items are from the ancient period, 3300 BC - 500 AD; 3,864 are from the medieval period, 500 - 1500; and 2,783 are post-medieval. Never before there has been formed a collection with such variety geographically, linguistically, textually, and of scripts, writing materials, etc., over such a great span of time as 5 millennia.

The Schen Collection is located mainly in Oslo and London. Scholars are always welcome, and are strongly encouraged to do research and to publish material. Parts of the collection are deposited with universities and public libraries to facilitate access for scholars. Over 90 % of the MSS are unpublished at present.

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Sumerian history

MS 2426 Sumer, ca. 2385 BC

MS 4556 Sumer, ca. 2217-2193 BC

MS 2814 Sumer, 2100-1800 BC

MS 2855 Babylonia, 2000-1800 BC

MS 2110/1 Babylonia 1900-1700 BC

MS 5103 Babylonia 1900-1700 BC

MS 2426

ROYAL INSCRIPTION OF GISHAKIDU OF UMMA: WHEN SHARA SAID TO ENLIL, AND STOOD AT HIS SERVICE, GISHAKIDU, THE BELOVED OF SHARA - HERO AND FIERCE ENCHANTER OF SUMER, THE BOLD ONE WHO TURNS BACK THE LANDS, THE CONQUEROR OF NIN-URRA, THE MOTHERLY COUNSELLOR OF ENKI, THE BELOVED COMPANION OF ISHTARAN, THE MIGHTY FARMER OF ENLIL, THE KING CHOSEN BY INANNA; HE DUG THE CANALS, HE SET UP THE STELES -

MS in Sumerian on limestone, Umma, Sumer, ca. 2385 BC, 1/3 of a truncated cone, h. 11,9 cm, originally ca. 35 cm, diam. 5,3-7,3 cm, 2 columns, compartments with 30 lines in a transitional linear script between pictographic and cuneiform script.

Context: Continuation of the text (mainly listing the boundaries of Shara of Umma) on British Museum terracotta vase, former Erlenmeyer Collection (Christie's 13.12.1988:60), and also related to The Louvre AO 19225, a gold beard from a statue which alludes to the existence of King Gishakidu.

For another foundation inscription of Gishakidu of Umma, see MS 4983.

Commentary: The cone and the vase relate to the Umma-Lagash border conflict that lasted over the reign of many kings between ca. 2450 and 2300 BC, with many bloody battles. This conflict is the earliest well documented piece of history. All the written and artistic materials came from Lagash, such as the stele of the vultures in The Louvre. The cone and the vase for the first time tell the history from Umma's point of view. The present MS also reveals the unknown king of the British Museum vase, and dates it to ca. 2385 BC.

Information kindly given by Mark Wilson who will publish the text.

MS 4556

ROYAL INSCRIPTION OF KING SHAR-KALI-SHARRI OF AKKAD, DESCRIBING HIS CAMPAIGNS AND CONQUESTS

MS in Sumerian on light green translucent alabaster, Akkad, Sumer, ca. 2217-2193 BC, 1 partial tablet, 10,0x11,5x4,7 cm, (originally at least ca. 20x25x5 cm), 2+2 columns (originally 5+5 columns), 18 compartments remaining in a formal archaizing cuneiform script of high quality.

Commentary: This was originally a luxury inscription of impressive size and beauty. No royal inscriptions have so far been published of this king, who is known from other sources, including monumental inscriptions. The king's name have been recut, after another name had been erased, possibly of the previous king, Naram-S (2254-2218 BC).

MS 2814

ROYAL INSCRIPTION COMMEMORATING DEFEAT OF MAGAN, MELUKHAM, ELAM(?), AND AMURRU, AND ESTABLISHMENT OF REGULAR OFFERINGS TO HIS STATUE; SCHOOL TEXT?

MS in Neo Sumerian and Old Babylonian on clay, Sumer, 2100-1800 BC, 1 tablet, 14,8x14,0x3,3 cm (originally ca. 16x14x3 cm), 3+3 columns, 103 lines in cuneiform script.

Commentary: The text was copied from a Sargonic royal inscription on a statue in the Ur III or early Old Babylonian period. Magan was at Oman and at the Iranian side of the Gulf. Meluhha or Melukham was the Indus Valley civilisation (ca. 2500-1800 BC). This is one of fairly few references to the Indus civilisation on tablets. The 3 best known references are: 1. Sargon of Akkad (2334-2279 BC) referring to ships from Meluhha, Magan and Dilmun; 2. Naram-Sin (2254-2218 BC) referring to rebels to his rule, listing the rebellious kings, including '(..)ibra, man of Melukha'; and 3. Gudea of Lagash (2144-2124 BC) referring to Meluhhans that came from their country and sold gold dust, carnelian, etc. There are further references in literary texts. After ca. 1760 BC Melukha is not mentioned any more. For Indus MSS in The Schen Collection, see MS 2645 (actually linking the Old Acadian and Indus civilisations), MSS 4602, 4617, 4619, 5059, 5061, 5062 and 5065.

Exhibited: Tigris 25th anniversary exhibition. The Kon-Tiki Museum, Oslo, 30.1. - 15.9.2003.

MS 2855

LIST OF KINGS AND CITIES FROM BEFORE THE FLOOD

IN ERIDU: ALULIM RULED AS KING 28,800 YEARS. ELALGAR RULED 43,200 YEARS. ERIDU WAS ABANDONED. KINGSHIP WAS TAKEN TO BAD-TIBIRA. AMMILU'ANNA THE KING RULED 36,000 YEARS. ENMEGALANNA RULED 28,800 YEARS. DUMUZI RULED 28,800 YEARS. BAD-TIBIRA WAS ABANDONED. KINGSHIP WAS TAKEN TO LARAK. EN-SIPA-ZI-ANNA RULED 13,800 YEARS. LARAK WAS ABANDONED. KINGSHIP WAS TAKEN TO SIPPAR. MEDURANKI RULED 7,200 YEARS. SIPPAR WAS ABANDONED. KINGSHIP WAS TAKEN TO SHURUPPAK. UBUR-TUTU RULED 36,000 YEARS. TOTAL: 8 KINGS, THEIR YEARS: 222,600

MS in Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 2000-1800 BC, 1 tablet, 8,1x6,5x2,7 cm, single column, 26 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: 5 other copies of the Antediluvian king list are known only: MS 3175, 2 in Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, one is similar to this list, containing 10 kings and 6 cities, the other is a big clay cylinder of the Sumerian king list, on which the kings before the flood form the first section, and has the same 8 kings in the same 5 cities as the present.

A 4th copy is in Berkeley: Museum of the University of California, and is a school tablet. A 5th tablet, a small fragment, is in Istanbul.

Commentary: The list provides the beginnings of Sumerian and the worlds history as the Sumerians knew it. The cities listed were all very old sites, and the names of the kings are names of old types within Sumerian name-giving. Thus it is possible that correct traditions are contained, though the sequence given need not be correct. The city dynasties may have overlapped. It is generally held that the Antediluvian king list is reflected in Genesis 5, which lists the 10 patriarchs from Adam to Noah, all living from 365 years (Enoch) to 969 years (Methuselah), altogether 8,575 years. It is possible that the 222,600 years of the king list reflects a more realistic understanding of the huge span of time from Creation to the Flood, and the lengths of the dynasties involved. The first of the 5 cities mentioned , Eridu, is Uruk, in the area where the myths places the Garden of Eden, while the last city, Shuruppak, is the city of Ziusudra, the Sumerian Noah.

MS 2110/1

1. DEBATE BETWEEN BIRD AND FISH; PART OF THE SUMERIAN CREATION STORY
2. CREATION OF THE WORLD, THE MAN AND THE HOE, 1 - 33, SUMERIAN MYTH

MS in Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC, 1 tablet, 24x17x5 cm, 2+2 columns, 42 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: Creation of the hoe is the text on MSS 2423/1-5, 2110/1, text 2, and 3293. Bird and Fish is also the text on MSS 2884 and 3325. About 50-60 sources for the Creation of the Hoe is known.

Commentary:

Text 1, a part of the Sumerian creation story; as a literary debate between the bird and the fish in which they argue for their usefulness in the universe as it was then conceived. It has a substantially variant form of the published text, and the end is unpublished. Parts of the text are similar to Genesis 1:20-22.

Text 2: The Sumerians believed that the hoe, one of their basic agricultural tools, in the beginning was given as a gift of the gods. A myth was created explaining the circumstances of this event. It opens with the Sumerian creation of the world and of man. There are parallels to both the Bible's 1st creation story: 'The Lord hastened to separate heaven from earth' (Gen. 1:6-10); 'and Daylight shone forth' (Gen. 1:3-5); and the 2nd creation story: 'The Lord put the (first) human in the brick mould, and Enlil's people emerged from the ground' (Gen. 2:7).

Exhibited: Tigris 25th anniversary exhibition. The Kon-Tiki Museum, Oslo, 30.1. - 15.9.2003.

MS 5103

ICREATION OF THE WORLD, SUMERIAN MYTH: IN DISTANT DAYS, IN THOSE DAYS, AFTER DESTINIES HAD BEEN DECREED, AFTER AN AND ENLIL HAD SET UP THE REGULATIONS FOR HEAVEN AND EARTH, ENKI, THE EXALTED KNOWING GOD, LIKE A HIGH PRIEST WITH WIDE KNOWLEDGE, ENLIL-BANDA, IN THE LANDS WAS THEIR RULER. BY THE RULES FOR HEAVEN AND EARTH, THE FIXED RULES, HE SET UP CITIES. - HE DUG THE TIGRIS AND THE EUPHRATES. THEREUPON HE ESTABLISHED THE RULES OF THE LANDS. HE SET UP HAND-WASHING RITES, HE SET UP LIBATIONS

MS in Neo Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC, 1 tablet, 10,6x5,0x2,2 cm, single column, 26 lines in cuneiform script, the lines on reverse missing.

Commentary: The present text is unique, and different from the abbreviated creation story which introduces the creation of the hoe (MSS 2423/1-5, 2110/1, text 2, and 3293), and some Neo Babylonian epic of Creation, Enuma Elish, 1000 years later.

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Babylonian history

MS 1686 Babylonia, 1813-1812 BC

MS 1876/1 Babylonia, 1792-1750 BC

MS 1955/1 Syria, 1250-1240 BC

MS 2063 Babylon, 604-562 BC

MS 1686  

THE UR-ISIN KING LIST

1. LIST OF THE 5 KINGS OF THE UR III DYNASTY WITH REGNAL YEARS FROM KING UR-NAMMU 2112 BC TO KING IBBI-SIN 2004 BC
2. LIST OF THE 15 KINGS OF THE ISIN I DYNASTY WITH REGNAL YEARS FROM KING ISHBI-ERRA 2017 BC TO THE 4TH YEAR OF KING DAMIQ-ILISHU 1813 BC

MS in Old Babylonian with a few names in Sumerian on clay, Isin, Babylonia, 1813 or 1812 BC, 1 tablet, 5,6x3,9x2,0 cm, 21 lines in Old Babylonian cuneiform script.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 1993, red quarter morocco gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Context: An incomplete tablet with the same texts was Erlenmeyer Collection no. 115, now in a public institution. The texts were originally extracted from date lists, now lost.

Commentary: 17 different Babylonian and Assyrian King Lists have survived, mostly in fragmentary or worn condition. The present King List is the only one perfectly preserved and is the oldest as well. All others are in public collections. In addition there are 23 surviving Sumerian King Lists, all in public collections except MS 2855 . The importance of the King Lists for the chronology of the Babylonian and Assyrian Kingdoms can hardly be over-estimated. They are crucial tools and primary historical evidence for the historians.

Published: E. Sollberger: 'New Lists of the Kings of Ur and Isin', in: Journal of Cuneiform Studies 8(1954) pp. 135-6; and A.H. Grayson, King List 2 in the article 'Kiglisten und Chroniken' in Reallexicon der Assyriologie und vorderasiatische Archaeologie, Berlin 1980, p. 90.

Exhibited: 1. Conference of European National Librarians, Oslo. Sept. 1994; 2. 'The Story of Time', Queen's House at the National Maritime Museum and The Royal Observatory, Greenwich, Dec. 1999 - Sept. 2000.

MS 1876/1

HAMMURABI, MIGHTY KING, KING OF BABYLON, KING OF THE FOUR QUARTERS OF THE WORLD, THE BUILDER OF THE TEMPLE EZI-KALAM-MA ('HOUSE - THE LIFE OF THE LAND'), TEMPLE OF THE GODDESS INNANA IN ZABALA

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Zabala, Babylonia, 1792-1750 BC, 1 brick, 13x29x9 cm, originally ca. 33x29x9 cm, 9 columns, (7x16 cm) in cuneiform script.

Context: There are 10 bricks extant apart from MS 1876/1-2, 9 in the Iraq Museum and 1, former MS 1876/3, now in British Museum (gift from The Schen Collection). MS 3028 is a royal inscription on black stone from the shoulder of a statue.

Commentary: Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC), the great king who created the Old Babylonian empire, is today mostly remembered for his famous law code. But he also built a series of great temples like the present one in Zabala. Towards the end of his reign, Hammurabi ordered his law code to be carved on stelae which were placed in the temples bearing witness that the king had performed his important function of 'king of justice' satisfactorily. The famous stele now in the Louvre, was originally erected in the Sippar temple. The 12 surviving bricks are the only witnesses of the Zabala temple, its law code stele is lost.

For The Hammurabi law code, see MS 2813.

The Iraq bricks are published in: The Royal Inscriptions of Mesopotamia, early periods, vol. 4: Douglas Frayne, Old Babylonian Period (2003-1595 BC), p. 352.

MS 1955/1

INTERNATIONAL JUDGEMENT MADE BEFORE INITESHSHUB, KING OF CARCHEMISH AND SHAUSHGAMUWA KING OF AMURRU WHICH WAS SENT TO AMISTAMRU II, KING OF UGARIT CONCERNInG PIDDU, THE FORMER QUEEN OF UGARIT, SISTER OF SHAUSHGAMUWA, AND FORMER WIFE OF AMISTAMRU. PIDDU IS EXILED BUT PROTECTED FROM BEING PUT TO DEATH IN THAT AMISTAMRU CANNOT BRING HER BACK TO UGARIT FOR ANY REASON, AND SHAUSHGAMUWA IS FORBIDDEN TO ASSOCIATE WITH HER OR MAKE PLANS THAT WILL HAVE ANY IMPLICATIONS ON THE ROYAL LINE AT UGARIT

MS in Acadian on clay, Carchemish, Syria, 1250-1240 BC, 1 tablet, 8,2x10,2x3,2 cm, single column, 15+5 lines in cuneiform script, with seal impression rolled across the whole of the tablet, showing the deity Sharruma advancing left, holding a double axe and a sceptre.

Context: The present tablet is one out of 11 tablets concerning the divorce and judgement of Queen Piddu, involving 3 of the Kingdoms of the time, as well as the Hittite empire under King Tudkhaliash IV (ca. 1265-1220 BC).

Commentary: The kingdoms of Ugarit, Amurru and Carchemish at the North-east corner of the Mediterranean, were squeezed between the 3 great powers of the 13th c. BC, the Hittite empire, Assyria and Egypt. The present tablet illustrates the tensions among the kingdoms that fills in a bit of the picture of the upheaval to come at the end of the Bronze Age and the beginning of the Iron Age, leading to the fall of the Hittite empire to Assyria and the following Trojan war as described by Homer.

Published in Analecta Orientalia, 48, Roma, Pontificium Institutum Biblicum, 1971: Loren R. Fisher, editor, The Claremont Ras Shamra Tablets, pp. 11-21. The seal is published in Ugaritica III, p. 24.

Exhibited: 1. The Claremont Ras Shamra Tablets, at the Institute for Antiquity and Christianity, Claremont, California, 1970-1994. 2. 'Preservation for access: Originals and copies'. On the occasion of the 1st International Memory of the World Conference, organized by the Norwegian Commission for UNESCO and the National Library of Norway, at the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, 3 June - 14 July 1996.

MS 2063

THE TOWER OF BABEL STELE

ETEMENANKI: ZIKKURAT BABIBLI: 'THE HOUSE, THE FOUNDATION OF HEAVEN AND EARTH, ZIGGURAT IN BABYLON'. CAPTION IDENTIFYING THE GREAT ZIGGURAT OF BABYLON, THE TOWER OF BABEL. THE ROYAL INSCRIPTION OF NEBUCHADNEZZAR CONTINUES: ETEMENANKI, I MADE IT THE WONDER OF THE PEOPLE OF THE WORLD, I RAISED ITS TOP TO THE HEAVEN, MADE DOORS FOR THE GATES, AND I COVERED IT WITH BITUMEN AND BRICKS

MS in Neo Babylonian on black stone, Babylon, 604-562 BC, the upper half of a stele with rounded top, 47x25x11 cm, originally ca. 80-100x25x11 cm, 3+24 lines in cuneiform script, to the left: carving of the Tower of Babel from a side view, clearly showing the relative proportions of the 7 steps and the buttress construction and a temple complex at its foot; to the right: the standing figure of Nebuchadnezzar II with his royal conical hat, holding a spear in his left hand and a scroll with the rebuilding plans of the Tower in his outstretched right hand; at the top: a line drawing of the ground plan of the temple on the top, showing both the outer walls and the inner arrangement of rooms, including the one that once had a fine large coach in it, richly covered, and a gold table beside it, according to Herodot: The Histories I:181; on the left edge: a line drawing of the ground plan of Esagila, the temple of Marduk, showing the buttresses as an integral part of the construction.

Context: The lower part of the stele with account of further building works on other temples, was in a religious institution in U.S.A. The stele was found in a special hiding chamber, broken into 3 parts in antiquity, at Robert Koldewey's excavations of the site of the Tower of Babel in 1917. Its importance was immediately recognised. A photograph was taken with 3 archaeologists standing next to the stele. With the imminent danger of war breaking out in the area, they decided to rescue it, and each archaeologist carried one part out of the war zone. Two parts were taken to Germany, the third part to U.S.A. Now the 2 most important parts are reunited in The Schen collection. For bricks from the Tower of Babel, stamped with Nebuchadnezzar's name, used during the rebuilding, see MS 1815/1-3. For the only other known architect's plan of a known temple, see MS 3031.

Commentary: The Ziggurat in Babylon was restored and enlarged by Nebuchadnezzar II, King of Babylon 604-562, captured by Kyros 538 BC, Dareios I 519 BC, Xerxes ca. 483 BC, and entirely destroyed by Alexander I the Great 331 BC. Until now our knowledge of the Tower of Babel has been based on the account in Genesis 11:1-9, and of Herodot: The Histories I:178 - 182, with the measurement of the first 2 steps, and a Seleucid tablet of 229 BC (Louvre AO 6555), giving the sizes of the steps. However, no contemporary illustrations have been known, resulting in a long series of fanciful paintings throughout the art history until present. Here we have for the first time an illustration contemporary with Nebuchadnezzar II's restoring and enlargement of the Tower of Babel, and with a caption making the identity absolutely sure. We also have the building plans, as well as a short account of the reconstruction process. Only 4 of 24 lines concerning this has so far been read. The last of these lines also covers the restoration of the E-ir-inimanki ziggurat in Borsippa, once believed by some scholars to be the Tower of Babel. A German scholar identified a few worn wedges to represent the name of Nebuchadnezzar II; and Dr. Stefan Maul has recently confirmed the reading.

Exhibited: Rounded top part only: 1. The Bibliophile Society of Norway's 75th anniversary. Bibliofilklubben 75 . Jubileumsutstilling Bok og Samler, Universitetsbliblioteket 27.2 - 26.4.1997; 2. XVI Congress of the International Organization for the study of the Old Testament. Faculty of Law Library, University of Oslo, 29 July - 7 August 1998; 3. Tigris 25th anniversary exhibition. The Kon-Tiki Museum, Oslo, 30.1. - 15.9.2003.

Published: To be published by Andrew George in the series, Manuscripts in The Schen Collection, ed. Jens Braarvig.

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Assyrian history

MS 2004 Assyria, 1115-1077 BC

MS 711 Assyria, 883-859 BC

MS 2848 Assyria, 811-783 BC

MS 2368 Assyria, 722-705 BC

MS 2180 Assyria, ca. 646 BC

MS 2004

ROYAL ANNALS OF KING TIGLATH-PILESAR I

1. CHRONICLE OF SEVERAL MILITARY CAMPAIGNS TO CONQUER NAIRI, LEBANON, AMURRU AND THE HITTITE EMPIRE
2. CHRONICLE OF THE FIRST WAR BETWEEN ASSYRIA AND BABYLONIA: 'I WENT TO BABYLONIA. FROM THE CITY RIKSU-SHA-ILI WHICH IS ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE LOWER ZAB RIVER AS FAR AS THE CITY LUBDI I CONQUERED. I KNOCKED DOWN THEIR TOWNS AND BURNT THEM WITH FIRE, THEIR POSSESSIONS AND THEIR PROPERTY I CARRIED OFF TO MY CITY ASHUR. I WENT TO THE LAND SUHA - VARIOUS TOWNS WHICH ARE IN THE MIDST OF THE EUPHRATES I CONQUERED. THEIR POSSESSIONS WITHOUT NUMBER I TOOK AWAY. I TORE UP THEIR FIELDS. I CUT DOWN THEIR ORCHARDS'
3. CHRONICLE OF THE SECOND WAR BETWEEN ASSYRIA AND BABYLONIA: 'AT THE COMMAND OF NINURTA, THE GOD WHO LOVES ME, FOR THE SECOND TIME TO BABYLONIA I WENT. SIPPAR, BABYLON, UPI, THE GREAT SETTLEMENTS OF BABYLONIA I CONQUERED TOGETHER WITH THEIR FORTRESSES. THEIR POSSESSIONS AND THEIR PROPERTY WITHOUT NUMBER I TOOK AWAY. THE PALACES OF BABYLON, THE CITY OF MARDUK-NADIN-AHHI, KING OF BABYLONIA, I KNOCKED DOWN. THE MANY OBJECTS OF HIS VARIOUS PALACES I CARRIED OFF. THE KING OF BABYLONIA, IN THE STRENGTH OF HIS SOLDIERS AND HIS CHARIOTS HE PUT HIS TRUST, AND HE CAME AFTER ME. IN THE CITY SITULA WHICH IS NORTH OF THE CITY AKKAD WHICH IS OPPOSITE THE TIGRIS RIVER, HE ENGAGED IN BATTLE WITH ME. HIS MANY CHARIOTS I DISPERSED, THE DEFEAT OF HIS WARRIORS AND HIS FIGHTERS IN THE MIDST OF THAT BATTLE I BROUGHT ABOUT. HE RETREATED AND RETURNED TO HIS LAND'
4. DETAILED ACCOUNT OF THE REBUILDING OF THE GREAT CITY WALL OF PAKUTE AND ITS PRINCIPAL PALACE

MS in Middle Assyrian on clay, Assyria, 1115-1077 BC, 1 tablet, 19,7x14,5x3,3 cm, single column, 35+35 lines in Assyrian cuneiform script, with 60 'fire holes'.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 1995, quarter green morocco gilt folding case, by Aquarius.

Context: Another inscription of Tiglath-pileser is MS 2795.

Commentary: The present tablet represents a major new contribution to the history of the world in its detailed account of two hitherto unknown wars between 2 of the 3 greatest powers of the period, Assyria and Babylonia, texts 2 and 3. The campaigns in text 1 are known from other sources, while the city Pakute in text 4 is attested here for the first time.

Exhibited: 'Preservation for access: Originals and copies'. On the occasion of the 1st International Memory of the World Conference, organized by the Norwegian Commission for UNESCO and the National Library of Norway, at the Astrup Fearnley Museum of Modern Art, Oslo, 3 June - 14 July 1996.

MS 711

ROYAL INSCRIPTION OF ASSURNASIRPAL II: CALAH I RESTORED. A TEMPLE OF MY LADY I ESTABLISHED THERE. THIS TEMPLE DEDICATED TO THE GODS AND SUBLIME, WHICH WILL ENDURE FOREVER, I WILL DECORATE SPLENDIDLY. PART OF THE 'STANDARD INSCRIPTION' FROM THE ROYAL PALACE IN CALAH, MENTIONED IN THE BIBLE

MS in Assyrian on basalt stone, Nimrod (Calah), Assyria, 883-859 BC, 1 plaque, 43x26 cm, single column, (43x23 cm), 10 lines in display cuneiform script. Complete standard inscription: ca. 50x225 cm (ca. 45x215), 21 long lines with friezes over and below (both ca. 70x225 cm).

Context: Most of the reliefs and inscriptions are in British Museum and Louvre. Further holdings in New York Historical Society, Metropolitan Museum of Art and Yale University.

Commentary: From the East Wing of the Palace, room I. The site of the temple is mentioned in Genesis 10:11-12: 'Out of that land went forth Assur, and builded Nineveh, and the city of Rehoboth, and Calah, and Resen between Nineveh and Calah, the same is a great city'. Genesis 10:1-12 mentions that the builder of Calah was Nimrod, son of Cush, son of Ham, son of Noah. The 'standard inscription' is a 22-line text that records Assurnasirpal's victories, his greatness and describes the building of his palace at Calah. The inscription exists in many variants, all of which come from the slabs lining the walls of the palace. The version presented here is recorded by Y. Le Gac: Les incriptions d'Ashur-nasir-pal II, roi d'Assyrie. Paris 1908, p. 187. What makes the present inscription of interest, is that it includes a detailed description of the very palace that it adorned, and that Calah is directly referred to in Genesis 10:11-12.

MS 2848

ROYAL INSCRIPTION OF ADAD-NIRARI III: - MY DREAD OVERWHELMED THEM - I CONSTRUCTED A CITY - I WENT UP AND MADE SACRIFICES - PRIME SON OF ASSUR-NASIR-APLI - PRINCES HAS NO RIVAL - SON OF TUKULTI-NINURTA

MS in Neo Babylonian on bronze, Assyria, 811-783 BC, lower part of the garment of a giant statue, 42x26x5-10 cm remaining, single column, 19 lines in a large formal cuneiform script, the lower border of the garment, 6x18 cm, divided into 4 square compartments with decorative designs of Assyrian type.

Commentary: A unique royal inscription. There seems to be no other remains of so large a statue of an Assyrian king surviving. Assur-nasir-apli II was the son of Tukulti-Ninurta II and the great grandfather of Adad-nirari III.

MS 2368

ROYAL INSCRIPTION OF SARGON II OF ASSYRIA, DESCRIBING HIS CONQUESTS GENERALLY, MENTIONING: BIT-HABAN, PARSHUMASH, MANNAEA, URARTU; THE HEROIC MAN WHO DEFEATED HUMBANIGASH, KING OF ELAM; WHO MADE THE EXTENSIVE BIT-HUMRIYA (HOUSE OF OMRI) TOTTER, THE DEFEAT OF MUSRU IN RAPIHU; BOUND TO ASHUR, WHO CONQUERED THE TAMUDI; WHO CAUGHT THE IONIANS IN THE SEA LIKE A BIRD-CATCHER; ALSO BIT-BURTASHA, KIAKKI AND AMRISH, THEIR RULERS; WHO DROVE AWAY MIT(MIDAS), KING OF MUSHKU; WHO PLUNDERED HAMATH AND CARCHEMISH; GREAT HAND CONQUERED, THE DEVASTATOR OF URARTU, MUSASIR; THE URARTIANS BY THE TERROR OF HIS WEAPONS, KILLED BY HIS OWN HANDS; WHO DESTROYED THE PEOPLES OF HARHAR, WHO GATHERED THE MANNAEANS, ELLIPI; WHO CHANGED THE ABODE OF PA, LALLUKNU; WHO FLAYED THE SKIN OF ASHUR-L#39;I, THEIR GOVERNOR; WHO IMPOSED THE YOKE OF ASHUR ON SHURD FROM MELIDU, HIS ROYAL CITY; THE FEARSOME ONSLAUGHT, WHO HAD NO FEAR OF BATTLE, -

MS in Neo Babylonian on clay, Nimrod, Assyria, 722-705 BC, 1 partial 8-facetted prism, 6,2x12,0 cm remaining, 8 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: 1 fragment of a cylinder with the same inscription, also in Neo Babylonian, is known.

Commentary: The present MS is related to the clay cylinders from Khorsabad, but they are in Assyrian. These cylinders were written in Nimrud, Assyria, for being sent to Babylonian cities to be deposited in foundation deposits in buildings in Babylonia.

MS 2180

TO NAB EXALTED LORD, WHO DWELLS IN EZIDA, WHICH IS IN NINEVEH, HIS LORD: I ASHURBANIPAL, KING OF ASSYRIA, THE ONE LONGED FOR AND DESTINED BY HIS GREAT DIVINITY, WHO, AT THE ISSUING OF HIS ORDER AND THE GIVING OF HIS SOLEMN DECREE, CUT OFF THE HEAD OF TE'UMMAN, KING OF ELAM, AFTER DEFEATING HIM IN BATTLE, AND WHOSE GREAT COMMAND MY HAND CONQUERED UMMAN-IGASH, TANMARIT, PA'E AND UMMAN-ALTASH, WHO RULED OF ELAM AFTER TE'UMMAN. I YOKED THEM TO MY SEDAN CHAIR, MY ROYAL CONVEYANCE. WITH HIS GREAT HELP I ESTABLISHED DECENT ORDER IN ALL THE LANDS WITHOUT EXCEPTION. AT THAT TIME I ENLARGED THE STRUCTURE OF THE COURT OF THE TEMPLE OF NAB MY LORD, USING MASSIVE LIMESTONE. MAY NABLOOK WITH JOY ON THIS, MAY HE FIND IT ACCEPTABLE. BY THE RELIABLE IMPRESS OF YOUR WEDGES MAY THE ORDER FOR A LIFE OF LONG DAYS COME FORTH FROM YOUR LIPS, MAY MY FEET GROW OLD BY WALKING IN EZIDA IN YOUR DIVINE PRESENCE

MS in Neo Assyrian on limestone, Nineveh, Assyria, ca. 646 BC, 1 limestone slab, 47x42x4 cm, single column, 19 lines in Neo Assyrian cuneiform script.

Commentary: King Ashurbanipal (669-631 BC) rebuilt Ezida, the temple of Nab the god of writing.

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Sumerian literature

MS 3396 Sumer, ca. 2600 BC

MS 3026 Babylonia, 19th-18th c. BC

MS 2652/1 Babylonia, ca. 18th c. BC

MS 3283 Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC

MS 2367/1 Babylonia, 20th-17th c. BC

MS 3396

INSTRUCTIONS OF SHURUPPAK, proofRB COLLECTION

MS in Sumerian on clay, Sumer, ca. 2600 BC, 1 tablet, 8,7x8,7x2,5 cm, 2 columns + 2 blank columns, 8+8 compartments in cuneiform script, reverse blank. Context: For the Old Babylonian recension of the text, see MSS 2817 (lines 1-22), 3352 (lines 1-38), 2788 (lines 1-45), 2291 (lines 88-94), 2040 (lines 207-216), 3400 (lines 342-345), MS 3176/1, text 3, and 3366.

Context: For the Old Babylonian recension of the text, see MSS 2788 (lines 1-45), 2291 (lines 88-94) and 2040 (lines 207-216).

Commentary: The present Early Dynastic tablet is one of a few that represent the earliest literature in the world. Only 3 groups of texts are known from the dawn of literature: The Shuruppak instructions, The Kesh temple hymn, and various incantations (see MS 4549 ). The instructions are addressed by the ante-diluvian ruler Shuruppak, to his son Ziusudra, who was the Sumerian Noah, cf. MS 3026 , the Sumerian Flood Story, and MS 2950 , Atra- Hasis, the Old Babylonian Flood Story. The Shuruppak instructions can be said to be the Sumerian forerunner of the 10 Commandments and some of the proofrbs of the Bible: Line 50: Do not curse with powerful means (3rd Commandment); lines 28: Do not kill (6th Commandment); line 33-34: Do not laugh with or sit alone in a chamber with a girl that is married (7th Commandment); lines 28-31: Do not steal or commit robbery (8th Commandment); and line 36: Do not spit out lies (9th Commandment).

MS 3026

FLOOD STORY

MS in Neo Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 19th-18th c. BC, 1/4 tablet, 6,4x5,5x2,3 cm, ca. 35 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: For 5 of the 6 Sumerian forerunners of the Gilgamesh Epic, see MSS2652/1-2 , 2887, 3026 , 3027 and 3361.

Commentary: Mankind's oldest reference to the Deluge, together with 1/3 tablet in Philadelphia, the only other tablet bearing this story in Sumerian. The tablets share several lines from the beginning of the Flood story, but the present tablet also offers new lines and textual variants. Ziusudra, the Sumerian Noah, is here described as 'the priest of Enki', which is new information.

The Sumerian Flood story is one of the 6 forerunners to the Old Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic, the source for the Old Babylonian myth Atra-Hasis, and for the Biblical account of the Flood (Genesis 6:5-9:29), written down several hundred years later.

According to British Museum, their Neo Babylonian tablet with the Flood story as a part of Gilgamesh, is perhaps the most famous tablet in the world. The present tablet is over 1000 years older.

Exhibited: Tigris 25th anniversary exhibition. The Kon-Tiki Museum, Oslo, 30.1. - 15.9.2003.

MS 2652/1

GILGAMESH AND KING AKKA OF KISH, LINES 1 - 60

MS in Neo Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, ca. 18th c. BC, 1 tablet, 14,5x5,5 cm, single column, 60 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: In line 25 there is a possible, much earlier parallel from ca. 2600 BC, in MS 1952/37. There would possibly have been a companion tablet with the remaining lines, 61-114 of this work.

For 5 of the 6 Sumerian forerunners of the Gilgamesh Epic, see MSS 2652/1-2 , 2887, 3026 , 3027 and 3361.

Commentary: There are two literary traditions concerning the war between Kish and Uruk, the present and Shulgi Hymn O, taking up themes from other tales, such as Gilgamesh in the Cedar forest, and Gilgamesh and the Bull of Heaven, eventually melting together in the famous Epic of Gilgamesh.

Exhibited: Tigris 25th anniversary exhibition. The Kon-Tiki Museum, Oslo, 30.1. - 15.9.2003.

MS 3283

1.	DEBATE BETWEEN SUMMER (EMESH) AND WINTER (ENTEN)

2.	CREATION OF THE WORLD, PART OF THE SUMERIAN CREATION STORY

MS in Neo Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC, a 4-sided prism, 20x12x11 cm, 2 columns per side, 50 lines per column in cuneiform script.

Context: Other tablets of the Sumerian creation story are MSS 2110 , 2423/1-5 and 3293.

Commentary: The prism had the full text of some 400 lines, but with losses along one corner. This is the most substantial MS of the text. The end is different from the published edition, which has 318 lines. The disputation between Summer and Winter remains unsolved, since their verdict insists that they are complementary and should remain so. There are parallels to the Biblical creation story: 'The Lord lifted his head in pride, bountiful days arrived. Heaven and earth he regulated and the population spread wide' (Genesis 1:31-2:1), with further references to Genesis 1:11-13; 20-25.

MS 2367/1

1. ENHEDU' ANNA: HYMN C TO INANNA 1 - 16: 'INANNA, STOUT-HEARTED, AGGRESSIVE LADY, MOST NOBle OF THE ANUNNA-GODS, - SHE IS A BIG NECK-STOCK CLAMPING DOWN ON THE GODS OF THE LAND, - ONCE SHE HAS SPOKEN, CITIES BECOME RUIN-HEAPS, A HOUSE OF DEVILS'
2. proofRB

MS in Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 20th-17th c. BC, 1 tablet, 21x17x4 cm, 3 columns, 16+16+16+4 lines in cuneiform script by a teacher of a scribal school in column 1, with 2 students repeating the hymn in columns 2 and 3.

Context: The same text as on MS 2367/3. Hymns to Inanna are MSS 2367/1, 2367/3, 2647, 2698/1-2, 2784, 3286, 3301, 3376 and 3384. Hymns by Enhedu'Anna are MSS 2367/1-4 ,, 2647, 3376 and 3384.

Commentary: Enheduanna was daughter of King Sargon of Akkad (2334-2279 BC), founder of the first documented empire in Asia. Enheduanna emerges as a genuine creative talent, a poetess as well as a princess, a priestess and a prophetess. She is, in fact, the first named and non-legendary author in history. As such she has found her way into contemporary anthologies, especially of women's literature.

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Babylonian literature

MS 2866 Babylonia, 18th c. BC

MS 3025 Babylonia, 19th-18th c. BC

MS 4573/1 Babylonia, 2000-1600 BC

MS 2950 Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC

MS 5108 Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC

MS 2624 Babylonia, 1700-1500 BC

MS 2866

MY BELOVED KNOWS MY HEART,

MY BELOVED IS SWEET AS HONEY,

SHE IS AS FRAGRANT TO THE NOSE AS WINE,

THE FRUIT OF MY FEELINGS -, POEM

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, 18th c. BC, 1 tablet, 11,0x5,7 cm, 23 lines in cuneiform script.

Commentary: So far a unique love poem, without parallels for this early period.

MS 3025

GILGAMESH EPIC:: THE DREAM OF GILGAMESH, INCLUDING THE FIRST TWO OF GILGAMESH'S NIGHTMARES FROM THE EXPEDITION TO THE CEDAR FOREST AND ENKIDU'S EXPLANATIONS OF THEM

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, 19th-18th c. BC, 1 tablet, 20,3x7,5x3,2 cm, 85 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: For 5 of the 6 Sumerian forerunners of the Gilgamesh Epic, see MSS 2652/1 -2, 4, 2887, 3026 , 3027 and 3361.

Commentary: Gilgamesh, the oldest substantial world literature, is mostly preserved on a set of 12 Neo Babylonian tablets, which however, are about 1000 years later than the present Old Babylonian original version. Only one more large intact tablet and 9 fragments of this version are known. One of the fragments is MS 2652/5. None of these are overlapping the present text, which makes this tablet the sole witness to this part of the Old Babylonian Gilgamesh. Less than half of the text has parallels with the later Middle Babylonian version from Hathusa, and the Neo Babylonian Gilgamesh tablet IV. Only about 2/3 of the epic is preserved. The present tablet adds 55 new lines to it, including an entirely new dream and its explanation.

Published: A.R. George: The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic. Introduction, critical edition and cuneiform texts. Oxford, University press, 2003. 2 vols. Also to be published in the series Manuscripts in The Schen Collection, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 4573/1

HUMBABA'S HEAD WITH WRINKLES, A BROAD GRIN AND STRAIGHT HAIR, VOTIVE CLAY CAST

MS on clay, Babylonia, 2000-1600 BC, 1 circular votive head, 7,3x7,1x3,0 cm, uninscribed.

Context: MSS 4573/1-3 come from a hoard of 4 casting forms and 56 casts of an artist's workshop, not yet distributed for votive use in private homes.

Commentary: Humbaba belongs in the tale of Gilgamesh in the Cedar Forest, where Gilgamesh and Enkindu kill the demi god, Humbaba. 'Humbaba, his voice is the Deluge, his speech is Fire, and his breath is Death!' See MS 3025.

MS 2950

ATRA-HASIS, EPIC, THE END OF THE BABYLONIAN FLOOD STORY: - IN HIS HEART HE DID NOT TAKE COUNSEL(?) -, THE ANIMALS HAD SWELLED UP -, MANKIND HAD SWELLED UP -, AT THAT TIME THE SAGE WATRAM-HASIS SAW THIS. HE SPOKE TO EA HIS LORD, (ENLIL WAS DISTURBED BY) THE NOISE OF (THE PEOPLE)

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC, upper half of a tablet, 6,5x5,2x2,5 cm, single column, 12 lines of originally 40 lines in cuneiform script.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 2000, blue quarter morocco gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Context: The present part of Atra-Hasis is so far missing on all known tablets. It could belong to BM tablet I, lines 360-365, with a gap concerning the plague prior to the Flood, or to BM tablet III, column 3 after line 27, and column 4 before line 30, where 54 lines are missing, covering the flood story from its peak to the period after the flood had dried up. The primary cause of swelling is development of interior gasses following floods and drowning or famine. According to W.G. Lambert and A.R. Milland: Atra-Hasis: The Babylonian story of the flood. Eisenbrauns 1999, pp. 31-41. There are only some 13 tablets and fragments preserved of the Atra-Hasis Epic, in at least 4 different recentions. Very much of the epic is lost. Another part of the Atra-Hasis epic is MS 5108.

Commentary: The Old Babylonian Flood story told in both the epics of Atra-Hasis and Gilgamesh was written about 200 years before the account in the Bible, Genesis 6:5-8:22. While the cause of the Flood in the Bible was mankind's wickedness and violence, the Old Babylonian cause was the noisy activities of humans, preventing the chief god, Enlil, from sleeping, actually mentioned in the present tablet.

The harsh account of swollen animals and human bodies was apparently deleted from the Biblical Flood story, even if it would have been the first sight meeting Noah leaving the Arc.

MS 5108

ATRA-HASIS EPIC, TABLET 2, COLUMN 4:11 - 20; COLUMN 8:34 - END; AND CA. 40 NEW LINES: - THEY BROKE THE COSMIC BARRIER! - THE FLOOD WHICH YOU MENTIONED, WHOSE IS IT? - THE GODS COMMANDED TOTAL DESTRUCTION! ENLIL DID AN EVIL DEED ON THE PEOPLE! THEY COMMANDED IN THE ASSEMBLY OF THE GODS, BRINGING A FLOOD FOR A LATER DAY, 'LET US DO THE DEED!' ATRA-HASIS -

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, ca. 1900-1700 BC, upper half of a tablet, 13,0x12,3x4,2 cm, 2+2 columns, 15+17+20+24+1 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: There are only some 13 tablets and fragments preserved of the Atra-Hasis Epic, in at least 4 different recentions. Very much of the epic is lost. The ca. 40 new lines on the present tablet improofs this situation. Another part of the Atra-Hasis epic is MS 2950.

Commentary: The Old Babylonian Flood story told in both the epics of Atra-Hasis and Gilgamesh was written about 200 years before the account in the Bible, Genesis 6:5-8:22. While the cause of the Flood in the Bible was mankind's wickedness and violence, the Old Babylonian cause was the noisy activities of humans, preventing the chief god, Enlil, from sleeping. When the Neo Babylonian account of the Flood story as part of the Gilgamesh epic was discovered in the 19th c., it caused a sensation. It turned out that this was a abbreviated account extracted from the Old Babylonian Atra-hasis epic, written about 1000 years earlier. The Flood is the climax of the whole story. The gods created the human race to take over the hard agricultural work in the universe. They were created with the power to reproduce, but without the fate of dying as an result of age. The human race multiplied and made such noise that the chief Sumerian god, Enlil, could not sleep. Accordingly he tried to reduce their numbers, first by plague, then by famine. In each case the god Ea, who was mainly responsible for creating the human race, frustrated the plan. Enlil then got all the gods to swear to co-operate in exterminating the whole human race by a huge flood, which failed because Ea got his favourite , Ziuzudra (the Old Babylonian Noah), to build an ark and so save the human race and the animals. This tablet starts when the second attempt, famine, had just failed, Enlil was looking into what had happened and making another plan.

MS 2624

LITERARY AND RELIGIOUS SPEECH, STARTING: LIKE A CITY WITH SUPREME POWER MY CITY IS URUK, THE CITY OF THE KING. BUT YOU, WHO GREW UP IN MY CITY AND MY LAND, HAVE PLUNDERED THE TEMPLE OF MY LORD, HAVE DESPOILED THE PROPERTY OF MY LADY. -

MAY THE FORMER DAYS OF CONFLICT PASS ON, AND MAY THE NOW DISTANT DAYS OF PEACE BE ESTABLISHED. - CONFER AND ANSWER THAT HE MAY BE SET FREE, BECAUSE TO ME YOU ARE A FOOL. -

MS in Neo Sumerian and Old Babylonian on clay, Uruk, Babylonia, 1700-1500 BC, 1 tablet, 20,0x6,4x2,2 cm, 63 double lines in a minute expert cuneiform script.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 1998, blue quarter morocco gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Commentary: The text is bilingual, first line in artificial Sumerian, quite unlike the real Sumerian of the 3rd millennium, immediately followed by a line with the Old Babylonian translation. The text is hitherto unknown.

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Sumerian Block printing in blind on clay

MS 5105

ROYAL INSCRIPTION OF NARAM-S: NARAM-S WHO BUILT THE TEMPLE OF INANNA

MS in Sumerian on clay, Akkad, Sumer, 2291-2254 BC, 1 brick printing block, 13x13x10 cm, 3 lines in a large formal cuneiform script, large loop handle.

Context: There are only 2 more brick stamps of Naram-S known, one intact with a cylindrical handle, and a tiny fragment in British Museum.

Commentary: Naram-S was the first king to use blocks for printing bricks. Prior to him the inscriptions on the bricks were written by hand. These 3 brick stamps known, are the earliest evidence of printing, in this case blindprinting on soft clay.

MS 1937

TO NINGIRSU, MIGHTY WARRIOR OF ENLIL, GUDEA RULER OF LAGASH MADE IT SPLENDID FOR HIM AND BUILT FOR HIM THE TEMPLE OF THE SHINING IMDUGUD BIRD AND RESTORED IT

 

Blockprint in blind in Sumerian on clay, Lagash, Sumer, 2141-2122 BC, 1 brick, 32x32x7 cm, 6+4 columns, in cuneiform script.

Context: Foundation inscriptions of Gudea in The Schen collection are MSS 1877, 1895, 1936, 1937 and 2890. Building cones, see MSS 1791/1-2.

Commentary: Gudea built or rather rebuilt, at least 15 temples in the city-state of Lagash. The present brick has deposits of the bitumen that originally bound the bricks together in the wall of the temple.

MS 2764

AMAR-SIN OF NIPPUR, CHOSEN BY ENLIL, MIGHTY HERO, THE TEMPLE OF ENLIL, BRICK STAMP INSCRIPTION

MS in Neo Sumerian on white marble, Sumer, 2046-2038 BC, 1 brick printing block, 18,5x10,0x3,5 cm, single column, 7 lines in cuneiform script, with a handle on the back.

Context: Bricks of King Amar-Sin with full texts are MSS 1878 and 1914.

Commentary: Brick printing blocks are so rare as objects that there is a theory that they were broken when a production run was finished. Those that are known are almost never intact. There are some broken ones from the Old Acadian Period, including the intact MS 5106, but they are of terracotta. Until this one there were no examples of an UR III brick printing block known at all, and the material of their construction was a complete mystery.

The inscription is a well known one, but the last 3 lines have not been cut, apart from the first sign in line 7. This printing block was never used, but discarded by the scribe due to a slight chipping to the inscription. Since the natural medium for writing at this time, was clay, the process of impressing a block into wet soft clay can be seen as the first known example of true printing. Some of the printing blocks even had 'movable type' so that the inscription relating to more than one building could be accommodated with a minimum of effort.

Exhibited: TEFAF Maastricht International Fine Art and Antiques Fair, 12-21 March 1999.

MS 1878

AMAR-SIN IN NIPPUR, CALLED BY ENLIL WHO SUPPORTS THE TEMPLE OF ENLIL, POWERFUL MALE, KING OF UR, KING OF THE 4 QUARTERS OF THE WORLD

Blockprint in blind in Neo Sumerian on clay, Nippur, Sumer, reign of King Amar-Sin, 2047-2038 BC, 1 brick, 17x19x6 cm, originally ca. 33x33x6 cm, 9 columns, (10x11 cm) in cuneiform script.

Context: A original brick printing block of Amar-Sin is MS 2764.

Commentary: Enlil was the chief Sumerian god, whose main temple was in Nippur.

See also MS 1876/1 , Hammurabi brick, Babylonia, 1792-1750 BC

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Sumerian music

MS 2340

LEXICAL LIST OF 9 TYPES OF MUSICAL STRINGS, 23 TYPES OF MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS AND MUSIC, INCLUDING DIFFERENT TYPES OF STRINGED INSTRUMENTS SUCH AS HARP AND LYRE, AS WELL AS HITHERTO UNKNOWN INSTRUMENTS; FURTHER LAPIS LAZULI, BEDS, COPPER UTENSILS, TEXTILES, DOMESTIC ANIMALS AND SINEWS, JEWELLERY, WEAPONS, LEATHER PARTS OF YOKE, STRAPS, SACKS, TYPES OF SHEEP, KNIVES, AROMATICS AND PERFUMES, REED OBJECTS, GRAINS AND FLOURS, ETC.

MS in Sumerian on clay, Sumer, 26th c. BC, upper half of a huge tablet + fragment of lower part, 20x30x5 cm + 9x18x5 cm, originally ca. 40x30x5 cm, 16+9 and 7+7 columns, 437+ ca. 100 lines remaining in cuneiform script, circular depressions introducing each new entry.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 1996, green quarter morocco gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Context: Similar, smaller tablets are known from Fara or Tell Abu Salabikh. 3 compilations all from 26th c. BC have music instruments. The present tablet is almost a duplicate of a relatively well-known lexical list, discussed by Miguel Civil in Cagni, Ebla 1975-1985, pp. 133 ff. The obverse is an abbreviated recension with minor changes in the sequence of the entries. The reverse is the continuation of the unfinished Fara recension.

Commentary: The earliest known record of music and musical instruments in history. The name of one of the stringed instruments is a Semitic word, ki-na-ru, the later kinnaru known from the Mari letters and Ras Shamra texts (13th c. BC, cfr. MS 1955/1-6 ), and the still later Biblical Hebrew kinnor. The system of phonetic notation in Sumer and Babylonia is based on a music terminology that gives individual names to 9 musical strings or 'notes', and to 14 basic terms describing intervals of the 4th and 5th that were used in tuning string instruments (according to 7 heptatonic diatonic scales), and terms for 3rds and 6ths that appear to have been used to fine tune (or temper in some way) the 7 notes generated for each scale. The combination of string names and interval terms is used to describe the tuning procedure and the generation of the 7 scales and form a skeletal phonetic notation. (The New Grove, 2nd ed., vol. 18, p. 74.) The oldest musical instruments known are a ca. 41 000 BC flute made of bear bone, found in 1995 at a Neanderthal site in Slovenia, and 6 intact and 30 fragmentary crane bone flutes from Jiahu, in the Chinese province of Henan, dated to 9000-7700 BC. One crane bone flute is still in playing order, the earliest instrument possible to play.

MS 2951

HEBE-ERIDU THE SON OF ADAD-LAMASI SAT WITH IL-SIRI IN ORDER TO LEARN MUSIC. AT THAT TIME, IN ORDER TO STUDY SINGING, THE TIGIDLU-INSTRUMENT, THE ASILA, TIGI INSTRUMENT, AND THE ADAB INSTRUMENT SEVEN TIMES, ADAD-LAMASI PAID IL-SIRI 5 SHEKELS OF SILVER. ILI-IPPALSANI, THE SCHOOLMASTER

MS in Neo Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 1900-1700 BC, 1 tablet, 6,5x4,4x2,0 cm, single column, 13 lines in cuneiform script.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 2000, blue cloth gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Context: Cf. MS 2340 listing 23 types of musical instruments.

Commentary: There are texts of dialogues between a teacher and a scribe, (Schooldays, see MS 4481 ) and between an examiner and a student, but a text concerning music lessons is so far unique.

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Old Babylonian cuneiform musical notation

MS 5105

MUSICAL NOTATION OF 2 ASCENDING CONSECUTIVE HEPTATONIC SCALES TO BE PLAYED ON A 4 STRINGED LUTE TUNED IN ASCENDING FIFTHS: C - G - D - A, USING FRETS; SCHOOL TEXT

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, 2000-1700 BC, 1 lenticular tablet, diam. 9,0x3,2 cm, 2 double columns, each of 7 ruled lines with numbers in Old Babylonian cuneiform notation, with headings, 'intonation' and 'incantation', respectively.

Context: The only other complete music text is a later Hurrian hymn written in the mode of nidqibli, which is the enneatonic descending scale of E.

Commentary: The oldest musical notation known so far. Lutes are not preserved from the Old Babylonian period. The earliest known description of a lute dates from the middle of the 10th c., of a 9th c. instrument, Oxford, Bodleian library MS Marsh 521. The present notation system gives contemporary information on the Old Babylonian 4 stringed lute. It further attests that frets were used, and that their values, tonal and semitonal, were purposely calculated. Most significantly the discovery of this text attests of a music syllabus in educational institutions about 4000 years ago.

Published: To be published by Richard Dunnbrill: An Old Babylonian music text, from where the information has been taken.

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Sumerian law

MS 2064

THE UR-NAMMU LAW CODE

CODE OF 57 LAWS INCLUDING CRIMINAL LAW, FAMILY LAW, INHERITANCE

LAW, LABOUR LAW INCLUDING SLAVE RIGHTS, AND AGRICULTURAL AND COMMERCIAL TARIFFS

MS in Sumerian on clay, Sumer, reign of King Shulgi, 2095-2047 BC, 1 cylinder, l. 28 cm, diam. 12 cm, 8 columns (originally 10 columns), 243 lines in cuneiform script.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 1996, green quarter morocco gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Context: For the Hammurabi law code, see MS 2813 .

Commentary: The Ur-Nammu law code is the oldest known, written about 300 years before Hammurabi's law code. When first found in 1901, the laws of Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC) were heralded as the earliest known laws. Now older collections are known: The laws of the town Eshnunna (ca. 1800 BC), the laws of King Lipit-Ishtar of Isin (ca. 1930 BC), and Old Babylonian copies (ca. 1900-1700 BC) of the Ur-Nammu law code , with 26 laws of the 57 on the present MS. This cylinder is the first copy found that originally had the whole text of the code, and it is the world's oldest law code MS. Further it actually mentions the name of Ur-Nammu for the first time.

Hammurabi's laws represented the inhuman Law of Retaliation, 'an Eye for an Eye'. One would expect the 300 years older laws of Ur-Nammu would be even more brutal, but the opposite is the case: 'If a man knocks out the eye of another man, he shall weigh out 1/2 a mina of silver'.

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Babylonian law

MS 2813

THE HAMMURABI LAW CODE

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, ca. 1750 BC, 1 tablet, 11,7x10,0x3,0 cm (originally ca. 13x10x3 cm), 2 columns, 48 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: The complete text is 282 laws of which 247 are on the famous black basalt stele in Louvre. Cf. MS 2064 , The Ur- Nammu law code, the oldest laws known.

Commentary: Hammurabi (1792-1750 BC), the great king who created the Old Babylonian empire, is today mostly remembered for his famous law code. Towards the end of his reign, Hammurabi ordered his law code to be carved on stelae which were placed in the temples bearing witness that the king had performed his important function of 'king of justice' satisfactorily. The stele now in the Louvre, was originally erected in the Sippar temple, but was found in Susa in 1901.

The Hammurabi law code has until recently been considered the oldest, until the laws of Eshnunna (ca. 1800 BC), Lipit-Ishtar (ca. 1930 BC) and Old Babylonian school extracts (ca. 1900-1700 BC) of Ur-Nammu were discovered. Hammurabi's laws represented the inhuman Law of Retaliation, 'an Eye for an Eye', that was taken up in the laws of Moses and subsequent legislation.

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Pre-literate counting and accounting

MS 5067/1-8

NEOLITHIC PLAIN COUNTING TOKENS POSSIBLY REPRESENTING 1 MEASURE OF GRAIN, 1 ANIMAL AND 1 MAN OR 1 DAY'S LABOUR, RESPECTIVELY

Counting tokens in clay, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 8000-3500 BC, 3 spheres: diam. 1,6, 1,7 and 1,9 cm , (D.S.-B 2:1); 3 discs: diam. 1,0x0,4 cm, 1,1x0,4 cm and 1,0x0,5 cm (D.S.-B 3:1); 2 tetrahedrons: sides 1,4 cm and 1,7 cm (D.S.-B 5:1).

Commentary: About 8000 BC the Palaeolithic notched tallies representing the simplest form of counting, in one-to-one correspondence, were superseded by Neolithic tokens of various geometric forms suited for concrete counting, including the type of commodity. This invention was used without any discontinuity for 5000 years, prior to the use of abstract numbers which lead to writing about 3300 BC, and then to mathematics ca. 2600 BC. When tokens were invented they were the first clay objects of the Near East, and they first exploited systematically most of the basic geometric forms, such as spheres, tetrahedrons, cones, cylinders, discs, quadrangles, triangles, etc. They were first kept in baskets, leather poaches, clay bowls, etc., and later within clay bullas, see MSS 4631, 4632and 4638.

Exhibited: The Norwegian Intitute of Palaeography and Historical Philology (PHI), Oslo, 13.10.2003-

MS 4522/1

COMPLEX COUNTING TOKEN REPRESENTING 1 JAR OF OIL

Counting token in stone, Ur?, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 4000-3200 BC, 1 ovoid token, diam. 2,0x2,3 cm, circular line at the top and piercing at the bottom.

Context: For a drum shaped token with zigzag band, see MS 4522/2 (Schmandt-Besserat 3:72), and for disk type tokens, see MSS 4522/3-8.

Commentary: Same type as Schmandt-Besserat 6:14, but pierced at the bottom. The complex tokens were a natural development from the plain tokens (see MSS 5067/1-8) with new forms, added lines, dots and various designs to cover the more advanced accounting needs. They were first kept in baskets, leather poaches, bowls, etc., and then to some extent within bulla-envelopes (see MS 4631), but mainly attached to strings fastened to a bulla (see MS 4523). They lasted until ca. 3200 BC, when they were superseded by counting tablets and pictographic tablets. Some of the earliest tablets have actual tokens impressed into the clay to form numbers and pictographs, and many of the pictographs were illustrations of tokens. An account of 14 jars of oil would just be 14 tokens of the present type. On a pictographic tablet this representation would be substituted by the number 14 and the pictograph of a jar with lid looking similar to the token. This was the first break-through of the invention of writing. For such a pictographic tablet, see MS 4551 . (All 8 tokens MSS 4522/1-8 are illustrated here, text: Counting tokens representing a Jar of oil and various textiles, Near East, ca. 4000-3200 BC.)

MS 4631

BULLA-ENVELOPE WITH 11 PLAIN AND COMPLEX TOKENS INSIDE, REPRESENTING AN ACCOUNT OR AGREEMENT, TENTATIVELY OF WAGES FOR 4 DAYS' WORK, 4 MEASURES OF METAL, 1 LARGE MEASURE OF BARLEY AND 2 SMALL MEASURES OF SOME OTHER COMMODITY

Bulla in clay, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 3700-3200 BC, 1 spherical bulla-envelope (complete), diam. ca. 6,5 cm, cylinder seal impressions of a row of men walking left; and of a predator attacking a deer, inside a complete set of plain and complex tokens: 4 tetrahedrons 0,9x1,0 cm (D.S.-B.5:1), 4 triangles with 2 incised lines 2,0x0,9 (D.S.-B.(:14), 1 sphere diam. 1,7 cm (D.S.-B.2:2), 1 cylinder with 1 grove 2,0x0,3 cm (D.S.-B.4:13), 1 bent paraboloid 1,3xdiam. 0,5 cm (D.S.-B.8:14).

Context: MSS 4631-4646 and 5114-5127are from the same archive. Total number of bulla-envelopes worldwide is ca. 165 intact and 70 fragmentary.

Commentary: While counting for stocktaking purposes started ca. 8000 BC using plain tokens of the type also represented here, more complex accounting and recording of agreements started about 3700 BC using 2 systems: a) a string of complex tokens with the ends locked into a massive rollsealed clay bulla (see MS 4523), and b) the present system with the tokens enclosed inside a hollow bulla-shaped rollsealed envelope, sometimes with marks on the outside representing the hidden contents. The bulla-envelope had to be broken to check the contents hence the very few surviving intact bulla- envelopes. This complicated system was superseded around 3500-3200 BC by counting tablets giving birth to the actual recording in writing, of various number systems (see MSS 3007 and 4647), and around 3300-3200 BC the beginning of pictographic writing (see MSS 2963 and 4551 ).

Exhibited: The Norwegian Intitute of Palaeography and Historical Philology (PHI), Oslo, 13.10.2003-

MS 4632

BULLA-ENVELOPE WITH 17 PLAIN TOKENS INSIDE, REPRESENTING AN ACCOUNT OR WAGES OF TENTATIVELY 1 LARGE MEASURE OF BARLEY, 8 SMALL MEASURES OF BARLEY, 5 MEDIUM AND 3 SMALL MEASURES OF SOME OTHER COMMODITY

Bulla in clay, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 3700-3200 BC, 1 spherical bulla-envelope (complete), diam. ca. 7 cm, cylinder seal impressions of a row of men each carrying a sack on his head towards a large cauldron placed on a rounded stand; and of a line of tall ringstaffs and men; a 3rd impression of a large disk type token or the bottom of a large cone, diam. 2,2 cm, possibly representing the total sum of the complete set of plain tokens inside: 1 sphere diam. 1,5 cm (D.S.-B.2:2), 8 small spheres diam. 0,8 cm of which 1 still sticks to the inside of the bulla (D.S.-B.2:1), 5 cones diam.1,0x1,5 cm (D.S.-B.1:1), 3 small cylinders diam. 0,4xca.1,2 cm (D.S.-B.4:1).

Context: MSS 4631-4646 and 5144-5127 are from the same archive. Only 25 more bulla-envelopes are known from Sumer, all excavated in Uruk. Total number of bulla-envelopes worldwide is ca. 165 intact and 70 fragmentary.

Commentary: 17 tokens is the largest number found inside a bulla-envelope. While counting for stocktaking purposes started ca. 8000 BC using plain tokens of the type here, more complex accounting and recording of agreements started about 3700 BC using 2 systems: a) a string of complex tokens with the ends locked into a massive rollsealed clay bulla (see MS 4523), and b) the present system with the tokens enclosed inside a hollow bulla-shaped rollsealed envelope, sometimes with marks on the outside representing the hidden contents. The bulla-envelope had to be broken to check the contents hence the very few surviving intact bulla- envelopes. This complicated system was superseded around 3500-3200 BC by counting tablets giving birth to the actual recording in writing, of various number systems (see MSS 3007 and 4647), and around 3300-3200 BC the beginning of pictographic writing (see MSS 2963 and 4551 ).

MS 4638

BULLA-ENVELOPE WITH 1 PLAIN TOKEN INSIDE, REPRESENTING AN ACCOUNT OR AGREEMENT OF TENTATIVELY 1 VERY LARGE MEASURE OF BARLEY

Bulla in clay, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 3700-3200 BC, 1 spherical bulla-envelope (complete), diam. 6,0-6,8 cm, cylinder seal impression of several men facing tall ringstaff; and another with animals; token inside: 1 large sphere diam. 2 cm (D.S.-B.2:2). Context: MSS 4631-4646 and 5144-5127 are from the same archive. Only 25 more bulla-envelopes are known from Sumer, all excavated in Uruk. Total number of bulla-envelopes worldwide is ca. 165 intact and 70 fragmentary.

Commentary: While counting for stocktaking purposes started ca. 8000 BC using plain tokens of the type here, more complex accounting and recording of agreements started about 3700 BC using 2 systems: a) a string of complex tokens with the ends locked into a massive rollsealed clay bulla (see MS 4523), and b) the present system with the tokens enclosed inside a hollow bulla-shaped rollsealed envelope, sometimes with marks on the outside representing the hidden contents. The bulla-envelope had to be broken to check the contents hence the very few surviving intact bulla- envelopes. This complicated system was superseded around 3500-3200 BC by counting tablets giving birth to the actual recording in writing, of the sexagesimal counting system (see MSS 3007 and 4647), and around 3300-3200 BC the beginning of pictographic writing (see MSS 2963 and 4551 ).

MS 4523

BULLA FOR HOLDING A STRING OF COMPLEX COUNTING TOKENS CONCERNING A TRANSACTION

Bulla in clay, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 3500-3200 BC, 1 oblong bulla, diam. 2,5x6,5 cm, rollsealed with a line of animals walking left or 2 men standing with arms raised, pierced for holding a string of counting tokens.

Context: For another bulla of the same type, see MS 5113.

Commentary: The bulla originally locked the ends of a string with a number of complex counting tokens attached to it, representing 1 transaction. The string with the tokens was hanging outside the bulla like a necklace. If the string had, say, 5 disk type tokens representing types of textiles, this number could not be tampered with without breaking the seal. The tokens could also be entirely enclosed in the centre of the bulla, see MSS 4631, 4632 and 4638. Tokens were used for accounting purposes in the Near East from the Neolithic period ca. 8000 BC until ca. 3200 BC, when they were superseded by counting tablets and pictographic tablets. Some of the earliest tablets have actual tokens impressed into the clay to form numbers and pictographs, and some of the pictographs were illustrations of tokens, see MS 4551 .

MS 3007

NUMBERS 10 AND 5 +4 + 4 + 4 + 5 + 3

MS on clay, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 3500-3200 BC, 1 elliptical tablet, 6,7x4,4x1,9 cm, 2+1 compartments, 2 of which with 3 columns of single numbers as small circular depressions.

Commentary:Numerical or counting tablets with their more complex combination of decimal and sexagesimal numbers are a further step from the tallies with the simplest form of counting in one-to-one correspondence. They were used parallel with the bulla-envelopes with tokens. The commodity counted was not indicated in the beginning, but was gradually imbedded in the numbers system or with a seal or a pictograph of the commodity added, i. e. development into ideonumerographical tablets, the forerunners to pictographic tablets. There are only about 260 numerical tablets known. Most of them are found in Iran.

MS 4647

NUMBERS 3+4, POSSIBLY REPRESENTING 3 MEASURES OF BARLEY AND 4 MEASURES OF SOME OTHER COMMODITY, IN SEXAGESIMAL NOTATION

MS on clay, Syria/Sumer/Highland Iran, ca. 3500-3200 BC, 1 tablet, 4,4x5,0x2,3 cm, 2 lines with 3 small circular depressions and 4 short wedges.

Numerical or counting tablets with their more complex combination of decimal and sexagesimal numbers are a further step from the tallies with the simplest form of counting in one-to-one correspondence. They were used parallel with the bulla-envelopes with tokens. The commodity counted was not indicated in the beginning, but was gradually imbedded in the numbers system or with a seal or a pictograph of the commodity added, i. e. development into ideonumerographical tablets, the forerunners to pictographic tablets. There are only about 260 numerical tablets known. Most of them are found in Iran.

Exhibited: The Norwegian Intitute of Palaeography and Historical Philology (PHI), Oslo, 13.10.2003-

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Arithmetic's

MS 3047

1, MULTIPLICATION TABLE FOR LENGTH MEASURES, WITH THE PRODUCTS EXPRESSED AS AREA MEASURES, THE LENGTH NUMBERS (5, 10, 20, ETC.) IN COLUMN 1 ARE MULTIPLIED WITH THE LENGTH NUMBERS (5X60, 10X60, 20X60, ETC.) IN COLUMN 2 TO GIVE THE COMPLICATED AREA NUMBERS IN COLUMN 3
2. SUCCESSIVE MULTIPLICATION OF SEXAGESIMAL NUMBERS BY 2, FROM 11.5=675 (OR 3/16) IN LINE 2 TO 3.00.00 (=3X60X60=10800) IN LINE 6

 

MS in Old Sumerian on clay, Sumer, 27th c. BC, 1 tablet, 7,2x7,1x2,0 cm, 28 compartments in cuneiform script.

Commentary: The oldest known mathematical text. Only one nearly as old mathematical table text is known, a table of squares of length measures, with the products expressed as area measures, Berlin VAT 12593. There is a big difference between this kind of multiplication table with explicit lengths and areas and the 1000 years younger Old Babylonian multiplication tables with abstract sexagesimal numbers.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 1844

SUM OF A GEOMETRIC PROGRESSION COMPUTED FROM THE BOTTOM UP. THE FIRST TERM IS 2, THE SECOND TERM IS 2X(1+1/6) = 2 1/3, WRITTEN AS 2;20. THE SUM IS GIVEN IN LINE 1, IN SEXAGESIMAL PLACE VALUE NOTATION; SCHOOL TEXT REPRESENTING AN INHERITANCE PROBLEM FOR 7 BROTHERS

MS in Neo Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 20th c. BC, 1 round tablet, 11,0x3,5 cm, 9 lines in cuneiform script. Binding: tasut

Context: No other Old Babylonian mathematical text is written from the bottom up in this way.

Commentary: According to the subscript, the number in each line should be equal to the number in the line above it, minus a seventh of that number. Actually, the 7 numbers in lines 2-8 have been computed from the bottom up, beginning with 2 and then making the number in each line equal to the number in the line below it plus a sixth of that number. The sum of the 7 numbers is recorded in line 1. A numerical error in line 3 is propagated upwards, to lines 2 and 1. The recorded numbers look like very large integers, but are actually all a small integer plus a sexagesimal fraction. The youngest of the 7 brothers gets 2, the next gets 2x(1+1/6), the next 2.20x(1+1/6), etc., or read from the top each brother gets 1/7 less than the brother before him. The tablet certainly has been re-used, and there are traces of possible numerical notation from its previous use.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 3866

MULTIPLICATION TABLE FOR 1.12(=72), IN THE SUMERIAN SEXAGESIMAL SYSTEM

 MS on clay, Babylonia, 19th c. BC, 1 tablet, 7,8x4,7x1,8 cm, single column, 15+8 lines in cuneiform script.

Commentary: The number 72 or 1 1/5 is the sexagesimal reciprocal of 50, which appears in the standard tables of reciprocals. Scholars have used the absence of any multiplication tables of 1 1/5 as evidence that they did not exist, and that Babylonians did not have multiplication tables for all sexagesimal numbers appearing in their standard table of reciprocals. The present unique tablet proofs that making such assumptions is groundless.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 2351

EXTREMELY LARGE 15-PLACE SEXAGESIMAL NUMBER 13 22 50 54 59 09 29 58 26 43 17 31 51 06 40, EQUALLING THE 20TH POWER OF 20, WHICH IS 104,857,600,000,000,000,000,000

MS on clay, Babylonia, 19th c. BC, 1 tablet, 4,5x11,7x2,8 cm, single column, 2 lines in cuneiform script.

Commentary: The number 104 quintillions, 857 quadrillions and 600 trillions is so large that it occupies 2 lines on the obverse and continues on the reverse, being one of the largest numbers recorded on a cuneiform tablet.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 2221

MATHEMATICAL CALCULATIONS ON CARRYING BRICKS AND MUD, THE 4X4 TABLE LISTS CONSTANTS FOR CARRYING THE 3 MOST COMMON BRICK SIZES AND MUD, THE LOAD OF 6 BRICKS, 50 MINAS (25 KG), THAT ONE WORKER CAN CARRY, AND THE DAILY CARRYING DISTANCE, 45.60 LENGTH UNITS = CA. 10,8 KM

 

MS on clay, Babylonia, 19th c. BC, 1 tablet, 5,0x5,2x2,3 cm, 3 + 4 columns, 9+6 lines in cuneiform script.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

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Algebra

MS 3048

TABLE WITH DATA FOR SOLVING CUBIC EQUATIONS, IN THE SUMERIAN SEXAGESIMAL SYSTEM

MS on clay, Babylonia, 19th c. BC, 1 tablet, 7,6x4,4x2,3 cm, 3 columns, 30 lines in cuneiform script.

Context: The only similar text known before is a Late Babylonian table text, where the numbers m at left take the values nxnx(n+1). Problems of the mentioned type are known from a large Old Babylonian clay tablet (BM 85200+VAT 6599).

Commentary: Every line of the table says, 'm has the root n'. The numbers n at right take the values 1 to 30. The numbers m at left take the corresponding values nx(n+1)x(n+2). In the 6th line, for instance, n = 6 and m = 6x7x8 = 336 = 5x60 + 36. The table was probably used to set up a series of problems leading to cubic equations guaranteed to have integers as solutions. The problems would have been of the form 'An excavated room. Its length equals its width plus 1 cubit. Its height equals its length. Its volume plus its bottom area is ... (a given number).'

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 2317

THREE NUMBERS ARE RECORDED: 1 1 1 1 (60 CUBED + 60 SQUARED + 60 + 1), AND 13 AND 4 41 37

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, 19th c. BC, 1 tablet, 2,9x2,9x1,4 cm, single column, 2 lines in cuneiform script.

Commentary: The meaning of the text is that the first number, 1 01 01 01 in sexagesimal place value notation, is exactly divisible by 13, and that the quotient is 4 41 37. A dressed up version is known from an early Old Babylonian tablet from Ur, where 1 01 01 01 sheep are divided between 13 shepherds.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 5112

1.	EQUATIONS FOR THE SIDES OF ONE, TWO, OR MORE SQUARES
2.	EQUATIONS FOR THE SIDES OF A RECTANGLE

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, probably later than 1700, upper half of a tablet, 8,9x9,8x2,7 cm, 2+2 columns, 125 lines in a clear minute cuneiform script.

Commentary: A collection of 16, originally 23, mathematical problem texts. The problem texts were the higher mathematics of the time, and for the better students only. The tablet is probably post-Old Babylonian.

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Geometry

MS 3052

EIGHT MATHEMATICAL PROBLEMS WITH DRAWINGS OF SUBDIVIDED TRAPEZOIDS AND TRIANGLES

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, ca. 19th c. BC, 1 tablet, 21,0x8,2x2,9 cm, 92 lines in cuneiform script, drawings to each problem.

Commentary: Problems about trapezoids or triangles divided into two or more smaller parts by transversals parallel to the base were popular in Old Babylonian mathematics. Such problems led to systems of linear or quadratic equations. One particular type of problems for divided trapezoids led to the equation square a + square b = 2 square c. Old Babylonian mathematicians could find solutions in integers to both this equation and the similar equation square a + square b = square c, at least 1200 years before Pythagoras.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 3049

PROPERTIES OF CHORDS OF CIRCLES, HERE CALLED BOW STRINGS, AND DIAMETERS IN CIRCLES

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, ca. 17th c. BC, upper left quarter of a tablet, 11,5x6,4x2,2 cm, single column, 43 lines in an expert cuneiform script, signed by the scribe, drawings of 2 circles with diameters and chords indicated.

Commentary: This is a high quality tablet possibly from a royal library.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

MS 2192

GIVEN 2 CONCENTRIC AND PARALLEL EQUILATERAL TRIANGLES WITH THE AREA BETWEEN THEM DIVIDED INTO 3 EQUALLY SHAPED TRAPEZOIDS; COMPUTE THE AREA BETWEEN THE 2 TRIANGLES AS THE SUM OF THE AREAS OF THE 3 TRAPEZOIDS; SCHOOL TEXT

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, 19th c. BC, 1 tablet, diam. 7,1x2,5 cm, 8+3 lines in cuneiform script, drawing of 2 concentric and parallel equilateral triangles with the sides given as 60 and 10.

Commentary: The sides of the trapezoids are correctly computed. The text may have been an assignment to a student, but the answer to the problem is not given. No parallel to this text has been published before.

Published: To be published by Jan Friberg in the Manuscripts in The Schen Collection series, ed. Jens Braarvig.

Historical and Literary letters

MS 2199/2

LETTER TO KING SHULGI FROM A HIGH OFFICIAL NAMED IRMU OR ARADMU HAVING BEEN SENT TO A PROVINCE TO ENSURE THAT THE LOCAL GOVERNOR, ABA-ANDA-SA, WAS ACTING ACCORDING TO INSTRUCTIONS SENT TO HIM, REPORTING BACK THAT THE GOVERNOR WAS ACTING LIKE AN INDEPENDENT KING; AND THE REPLY FROM KING SHULGI TO IRMU, 2095-47 BC, COPY DATED 9TH MONTH, 5TH DAY, YEAR SAMSU-ILUNA THE KING AT THE COMMAND OF ENLIL

MS in Neo Sumerian on clay, Babylonia, 28th regnal year of King Samsu-iluna, 1722 BC, 1 tablet, 10,5x7,1x2,7 cm, single column, 29 lines in cuneiform script by Marduk-mushallim.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 1996, yellow cloth gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Context: A belle lettre to King Iter Pisha of Isin, see MS 2287.

Commentary: This correspondence had become belles-lettres, 8 letters are published. The present one is unpublished.

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 Lexical texts

MS 3173

LEXICAL LIST OF TREES, WOODEN OBJECTS, GEOGRAPHICAL NAMES AND TYPES OF SPADES

MS in Sumerian on clay, Sumer, Uruk III, 3100-3000 BC, lower 1/2 of a tablet, 10,5x24,5x4,5 cm (originally ca. 25x24,5x4,5 cm), 9 columns, 120 lines in pictographic script.

Commentary: This is by far the largest pictographic tablet known. It represents a new lexical tradition different from the 13 Uruk lists of titles (MS 2429/4), animals, fish, plants, jars, cities, etc. The present list would have had no less than 230 geographical names compared to the Uruk city list of 88 entries. The later Tell Abu Salabikh (ca. 2500 BC) and Ebla (ca. 2400 BC) lists had 289 entries, but entirely different from the present one.

See also MS 2429/4 , Lexical list of titles, Sumer, 31st c. BC

See also MS 2340 , Lexical list of harp strings, Sumer, 26th c. BC

MS 2462

LEXICAL LIST OF BIRDS, ANIMALS AND OBJECTS, PRECEDED BY NUMBERS, 'THE TRIBUTE'

MS in Sumerian on clay, Sumer, ca. 2500 BC, 1 tablet, 12,6x13,4x2,5 cm, 6 columns, 96 compartments in a fine professional cuneiform script.

Binding: Barking, Essex, 1998, blue quarter morocco gilt folding case by Aquarius.

Commentary: 'The Tribute' dates to ca. 2900 BC; the present tablet is an Early Dynastic version of the text, the only one so far attested.

See also MS 3030 , Lexical list of buildings, Assyria, 681-669 BC

See also MS 1816, Isidorus Hispalensis: Etymologiarum sive originum, Germany, ca. 800

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 Medical texts

MS 2670

DIAGNOSES OF MEDICAL CONDITIONS WITH PROGNOSES OF THE OUTCOME, SUCH AS:

IF A MAN'S EPIGASTRIUM IS LOOSE, HE IS IN A CRITICAL STATE.

IF A MAN'S EYELIDS THICKEN AND HIS EYES SHED TEARS, IT IS A 'BLAST OF THE WIND'.

IF A SICK MAN IS RELAXED DURING THE DAY, BUT FROM DUSK HE IS SICK FOR THE NIGHT, IT IS AN ATTACK OF A GHOST.

IF A SICK MAN'S ADAM'S APPLE IS LOOSE, HIS SINEWS ARE DISEASED AND HIS NOSTRILS CLOSED, HE IS IN A CRITICAL STATE

MS in Old Babylonian on clay, Babylonia, ca. 1900-1700 BC, 1 tablet, 10,4x7,8x3,2 cm, 45 lines (originally 66) in cuneiform script.

Commentary: Medical texts of this category are well known from Neo Babylonian literature, while from the over 1000 year older, Old Babylonian period, few survive. Many of the Babylonian diagnoses and prognoses still hold true in modern medicine.

MS 4575

IF A YOUTH WHO HAS NOT KNOWN A WOMAN SUFFERS A PROLAPSE OF THE RECTUM, YOU CRUSH A ... AND A ... AND YOU HAVE HIM DRINK IT IN BEER, AND/OR MASSAGE HIM WITH IT IN OIL. IF IT IS NOT RELIEVED BY POTIONS OR SALVES, IF IT IS HIS RIGHT TESTICLE APPLY HEAT TO HIS LEFT SHOULDER BLADE; IF IT IS HIS LEFT TESTICLE, APPLY HEAT TO HIS RIGHT SHOULDER BLADE.

IF A YOUTH WHO HAS NOT KNOWN A WOMAN SUFFERS A PROLAPSE OF THE RECTUM, YOU BOIL UP A LIZARD; HE DRINKS THE FLUID AND HE WILL RECOVER.

IF A YOUTH WHO HAS NOT KNOWN A WOMAN SUFFERS A PROLAPSE OF THE RECTUM, YOU SIT HIM UP TO HIS WAIST IN STALE FINE FLOUR AND WHEAT FLOUR IN A ... OF ... SESAME, AND HE WILL RECOVER.

IF A YOUTH'S TESTICLES ARE INFLAMED, YOU MIX TOGETHER EQUAL QUANTITIES OF POWDERED ROAST BARLEY, AND POWDERED ...; IF IT IS SUMMER YOU KNEAD IT IN KASU-JUICE; IF IT IS WINTER, IN HOT WATER.

IF A YOUTH'S TESTICLES ARE INFLAMED, YOU 'IT IS BROKEN' IN HOT WATER WHICH ...; YOU ANOINT HIM WITH OIL; YOU REPEAT THIS FOR 10 DAYS. YOU REPEAT THIS FOR 20 DAYS AS WITH INFLAMMATION OF THE INTESTINES, AND HE WILL RECOVER.

IF A YOUTH SUFFERS FROM PROLAPSE OF THE RECTUM, YOU BOIL UP ... ..., UP TO HIS ANUS; HE SHOULD SQUAT DOWN, AND ... IN FRESH CRESS, YOU WASH IT IN WATER, STEEP IT, AND AFTERWARDS CRUSH FINE, AND MIX IT UP WITH THE CRESS; YOU BANDAGE AS A POULTICE WHEN HOT TO THE ANUS AND 'IT IS BROKEN' -.

IF A YOUTH'S HIPS HURT HIM, OR HE SUFFERS FROM STRANGURY, OR HIS KIDNEYS HURT HIM, OR HIS ... ARE INFLAMED, OR HE CANNOT SIT(?) DUE TO HIS ..., OR HE IS BLOATED WITH WIND, OR A TENDON IN HIS HIP, OR TESTICLE, OR HIS -

MS in Babylonian on clay, Uruk, ca. 300 BC, 1 tablet, 7,4x5,8x2,3 cm, 31 lines in cuneiform script by one of the leading Uruk scribes, Anu-Iksur or Iqisha.

Context: Other medical tablets are MSS2670and 3277. This tablet is written by a member of the well-known families of leading Uruk scribes, such as Anu-iksur or Iqisha. The excavations at Warka have produced whole archives of medical, magical and scholarly texts in identical script and format. The present tablet must come from one of those archives. All the other texts from this archive are now in international museums. Thus it must represent the work of one of Mesopotamia's leading medical practitioners of the late 4th c. BC.

Commentary: Part of the text is quite new, and part duplicates, restores and even clarifies a medical text from Assurbanipal's library.

The text has some very unusual contents, with both unusual words and interesting ideas. The first recipe treats a problem that appears on one side of the body with an action to the other side. This peculiar Mesopotamian concept first makes its appearance in a pre- Hammurabi medical text that treats toothache, and also in some later cuneiform cures for nose-bleeds, and may be interpreted as illustrating an underlying philosophy. The action in the present instant is the application of heat, which is not known in any other medical tablet, but which we now know, may have therapeutic benefit.

There is also an interesting procedural parallel with certain therapeutic recipes in Aramaic in the Babylonian Talmud. The vehicle prescribed here for applying the medicament varies according to the time of year; i.e. in summer it should be administered cold, in a kind of juice, but in the winter it must be steeped in hot water. Exactly the same point occurs in the Talmud, implying that this, and other curative procedures, have their roots in the more ancient Babylonian praxis.

Twice the scribe has written the signs he-pi in very small script, once on the obverse, and once on the reverse. The literal meaning of this expression is 'it is broken', and it serves to indicate that the medical tablet from which he was copying these recipes was itself fragmentary or damaged in certain places, implying that it was, even then, a recovered text of some antiquity. This is a very revealing point. It is clear that in both instances there is a word or two missing in the received text. The first is some element of materia medica, so we cannot be sure what it was, but in the second case, it is quite evident that the missing words at the end of the recipe must have been '... he will get better.' It must have been entirely obvious to the scribe himself. Nevertheless, his deep-seated reverence for traditional textual sources and the nature of his training meant that as a copyist, his responsibility was only to transmit the text as received, and not to add to it, or improof it, or even restore it.

There is no clearer sort of evidence available from the tablets themselves than this miniature scribal gloss to highlight this characteristic attitude in ancient Mesopotamian thinking. The scribes were rigorously trained to think in this way: the texts that came down from Antiquity were to be copied and preserved just as they were received. There was no room for individual input, or creative development.

Pseudepigrapha books

Pseudepigrapha are spurious works ostensibly written by a biblical figure. Deuterocanonical works are those that are accepted in one canon but not in all.

Old Testament Pseudepigrapha are extremely numerous and offer accounts of patriarchs and events, attributed to various biblical personages from Adam to Zechariah. Some of the most significant of these works are the Ascension of Isaiah, the Assumption of Moses, the Life of Adam and Eve, the First and Second Books of Enoch, the Book of Jubilees, the Letter of Aristeas, and the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs.

All the New Testament apocrypha are Pseudepigraphal, and most of them fall into the categories of acts, gospels, and epistles, though there are a number of apocalypses and some can be characterized as wisdom books. The apocryphal acts purport to relate the lives or careers of various biblical figures, including most of the apostles; the epistles, gospels, and others are ascribed to such figures. Some relate encounters and events in mystical language and describe arcane rituals. Most of these works arose from sects that had been or would be declared heretical, such as, importantly, the Gnostics. Some of them argued against various heresies, and a few appear to have been neutral efforts to popularize the life of some saint or other early leader of the church, including a number of women. In the early decades of Christianity no orthodoxy had been established, and various parties or factions were vying for ascendancy and regularity in the young church. All sought through their writings, as through their preaching and missions, to win believers. In this setting virtually all works advocating beliefs that later became heretical were destined to denunciation and destruction.