The San Francisco call., 1910-06-12

Once this eminence stood the great temple of
Enll which made the city, in its prosperous days,
the religious center of Babylonia In connection with
the temple large library and school where
thousands of tablets made and kept These tab
lets were found in three separate layers or strata
corresponding with three periods in the history of
Nippur The strata at varying depths, covered
with deposits of dust and debris that stood for inter
walls VIXEN the city neglected ruined
By far the richest stratum was the lowest and
hence of course, the oldest. The tablets found here
covered roughly, the period between Sargon l of
Akkad, the first Semitic conqueror of Babylona and
of the greatest heroes of the ancient world and
the time of the sack of the city by invading host
probably the Elames; that is, from about 5000 B. c.
to about 1000 B. c.
The invaders cared nothing for Babylonian culture
and civilization they found it. They overthrew
the temples of EMIL and to show their contempt for
the god they embarked upon gratuitous course of
destruction that investigators will deeply deplore
They went into the temple library and archives with
hammers and shattered the precious tablets that
formed the great heritage of Nippur Possibly they
were moved by spirit of bravado to defy the dire
curses inscribed upon the books History does not
say whether the maledictions upon the destroyers
reached their mark but certainly modern archaeoo-
gists have a lively grudge against the vandals
AS result of the wanton destruction perfect
tablet of this period is almost never found and
hopeless tumble is all that is left of Nippurs golden
age.
Professor Hilprecht came upon the precious frag-
ment relating to the Babylonian delugc story last
October while unpacking two boxes of the shattered
tablets collected by the fourth expedition in 1900
For ten years he has been making his way through
the vast mass of material publishing several books
on his discoveries. Fifteen years more will probably
be required to complete the task Each day has held
and will hold the auring promise of further tri-
umphs
Professor Hilprecht was running over the 433
specimens in the two boxes and separating the mass
OF them, written in Sumeran, the ancient sacred
language of Babylonia, from few written in
Akkadian, the Semitic dialect OF the country Pick
ing up of the Akkadian fragments which was bad
ly defaced and almost ilegibe he noticed the word
"a-bu-bi," meaning "deluge" Now as all the tablets
IN the lower stratum, in which this was found dated
before 1000 B. C., he Immediately led to hope
that he held what theoogists and AssyroIogsts have
ever sought in vain, authoritative indication of
early Babylonian beliefs concerning the flood The
fragment of unbaked clay, probably hardened in
the sun, dark brown in color two and three-quarter
inches at its gratest width, two and three-eghths
inches at its greatest length and seveeighths of an
inch at its greatest thickness 1t was evidently the
reverse of complete tablet the diverse having been
broken of. The inscription incrusted with
sediment of hardened clay and inter CRYSTALS
VAST AMOUNT OF WORK
4 tried at once to clean the tablet with brush
sufficiently to recognize what followed says Profes-
sor Hiprecht "but my efforts proved in vain, the
crystals and dirt being too firmly attached to the in
cised characters Next turned my attention to the
other contents of the boxes to see whether perchance
] could find another fragment of the same tablet.
Again ] met with no success.
Unable to restrain my curiosity and impatience
any longer left for the time being ali the unpacked