The times dispatch. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1903-1914, 1913-08-24
Discovery Of an Ancient
Tablet from Babylonia,
Which Gives an En-
tirely New Chronology
to the World, Makes
Its Creator a Goddess,
and Relates a New
Version Of the Flood

THE oldest story yet found OF the Creation
OF Man and OF the Deuge has been dis
covered upon an ancient baked clay tab.
let at the University OF Pennsylvania The
tablet is one dug up at Nippur, In ancient
Babylonia some years ago by one Of the mu-
suem expeditions 1t has Just been translated
by DR.. Arno Poebel, the distn guished Oriental
scholar. The tablet goes back at least to the
time OF Abraham (210o B. CO. and perhaps
earlier. and differs in many ways from the
story heretofore known as the Babylonian
Creation Story, and much more from the Bibli-
cal account.
The striking novel features are these
That 1t was female deity who created
mankind known as 'the blackheaded." from
the color OF the hair
That new dcities characteristics OF
the goddess are discovered in the original
documents. although they have been limited at
in other ways The character OF the female
goddess is now made important from the eari
est time and equal with the two male ruler
gods. Later tablets speak Of them as unim-
portant
That the first seven prediluvian cities and
the special god of each are discovered.
That the older Babylonian name OF the
scripturai Noah is ziugidda-
That deluge ruins OF the prediluvian cities
we're not all destroyed, some not until neohis.
toric times. There is historic basis to much of
the statement in this splc
Parallelisms with the story found in
Genesis
The Creation is according TO the second &C.
count as found in the second chapter OF
Genesis, beginning with verse 3. whereby man
is created first, then the ground and then the
beasts. The ancients always mentioned the
most important things In order and thus re-
yersed ideas of evolution.
The wckedness OF caused determine.
zion by the gods upon the destruction of the
race but Zugidda was saved because he was
a pious
The saved by building an
ark in which he collected men and animals.
Although In Genesis God liz represented as
deliberately saving Noah. in this tablet the re-
spite of mankind is through the agency of one
of the gods, who informs Ziugidda of his i'm.
pending fate. who thus is enabled to prevent
mankind from disappearing. Other important
features will be shown later.
This tablet belongs to the period Of Ham.
murabi (the Amraphel Of Genesis), a contem.
porary of Abraham and Is especially import
ant 1t offers new chronology for the world
When taken in connection with another tablet
which states that 100000 years elapsed be-
tween the Creation and the Flood, and the state.
ment made on this tablet that 1929 years had
elapsed between the flood and an event pre-
cedng the reign of Hammurabi by 230 years.
we get an enormous total for the time in which
mankind has existed, that is much more
In accord with the conclusions of science than
any heretofore suggested. The total to our
time would be 515,366 years from the Creation
About thirty-seven years ago George Smith,
the English scholar and explorer. brought back
from Babslonia the cylinders which gave
Babylonian account of the origin OF mankind
and much Of his earlier history, and these not
only excited great interest in the scholastic
world. but had profound effect upon the theo-
logical teachings. The parallelism between the
Babylonian story and that of Genesis devel.
oped school in theological criticism.
But the cylinders of Smith only dated back to
the reign of Assurbanipal in the, seventh cen.
fury, B. c.
The cylinder is written in Sumerian the
ancient language Of the country that existed
before the Babylonians occupied It,
The tablet Is badly broken. Originally 1t
about seven inches square. This would
seem a small space to write history of the
Creation and the Destruction of Man, but by
the use of what is called Geographic signs,
that is characters which convey not merely
letter but whole sentence. the ancients could
write on very small surfaces whole epic
poem. And that is what this tablet contains
According TO- this story. the great black
headed goddess. Nintu was the creator of all
things.
Like the first chapter Of Genesis. the story
opens, judging from the first lines under the
broken top, on the origin OF the heavens as
we'll as the earth
1t is a. curious feature of BabyIonian nv.
thology that the gods are represented ash ex.
listing before there was either heaven or al
earth 1t appears that Nntu, the female god.
created mankind and she is now found lament.
ing that the other gods seem bent on their
destruction She speaks of the human beings
as my creations" Mention is made Of the or.