Early on in The Ark Before Noah, the author describes a conversation with a colleague who thinks he has enough for a paper, but not for a book. Alas, the book feels like a paper surrounded by a bunch of other topics. The opening discuses the general field of cuneiform archeology. There were some early great discoveries. There were also some key multilingual stones that helped with translation. The tablets that were found include a number of different writings, from bureaucratic loggings to literature. Then there is a discussion of the flood story. There are different stories from different cultures. It changes from story to story. In one, the world was destroyed because people were too loud. The Gilgemesh version is the most popular pre-biblical one. However, there were other ones. The Bible and Koran both mention a flood. There have been some attempts to discover the "flood" in Mesopotamia. However, it was a region that was subject to regular flooding, so it is hard to tell if the "floods" that were found were related to "the flood".
Ancient history is fascinating field that is still open to many new discoveries and interpretations.
No comments:
Post a Comment