Aventinus 17

Johannes Turmayr's 1520 History of Bavaria, Chapter 17 and 18 - translated and annotated by Ras Feqade, AD 2020.

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## 17. Of Abraham, how God spoke to him, made him a prince, noble and father of all believers.

When King Mann reached the 33rd year of his power, Abraham was fifty years old, and the same year according to the Jews' reckoning is the the fortieth jubilee, the year of mercy and 2000 from the beginning of the world. And when Abraham was seventy-five years old, God appeared to him, bade him leave his birth friends, move to a foreign country, which He would show him, where He wanted to make his descendants into great nobles. In his, Abraham's, name and seed, the whole world, all peoples together, no one excluded, would be blessed; whoever despises Abraham badly, does not approve of him well, would perish. In this way God makes Abraham a noble and father of all believers, embodied in his name, who was before Abram, and created that he should call himself Abraham and not Abram: in the Jewish language that means the father of the great people, more than one.

[Aventinus' attempt at synchronization is erroneous for multiple reasons. First of all, he equates the 2000th year of the world with forty jubilees, on the assumption that one jubilee = 50 years. But in the actual Book of Jubilees, one jubilee is actually a length of 49 years, not 50. Since Abraham was born in Anno Mundi 1876 (counting from Adam), that is 2187 BC, his 50th year was thus AM 1926, or 2137 BC. This would be near the end of the reign of Mannus' successor Ingevon, and the time Jubilees indicates Abram married Sarai (AM 1925), but Aventinus does not tell us anything happened in Abraham's 50th year, only uses it as a reference to the supposed completion of the 40th jubilee. In fact, counting by 49 year jubilees, Abraham's 50th year was thus counted as the 40th jubilee, third subae (seven year period), first year.

The remainder of this chapter continues summarizing the life of Abraham as in Genesis, and concludes with the observation attributed to St. Paul, that from the 75th year of Abraham until Moses received the commandments on Mt Sinai, 430 years elapsed. Since his 75th year was 2112 BC and the Commandments were given to Moses in 1653 BC, 459 years had elapsed between those two points.]

## 18. How and where Noah died, and of his housewives, who established the first nunnery; and Noah built the city of Genoa.

In the 43rd year of Mann's administration and rule, as one counts from the Deluge 350 years, from the beginning of the world 2006 years, Noah departed with death in Italy and was honored by the whole world for a god, and hero of all men, and father of gods. The Latin tongue calls him Janus from the wine he invented, the Greek Ogyges, Armenian Saga, he is as much said in our country as, the holy father of the Pope; The Germans called him Heaven and all heroes and gods came from him. His first wife, called Vesta by the Latins, first built the nunnery, where they had to learn, in Italy. Such now had to keep eternal chastity; whoever didn’t hold it, who broke her virginity, she was buried alive by all grace under the trench.

[This refers to the death of Janus II or Bar-wein, Noah's fourth son who was then ruling Italy, in 2203 BC. Noah himself or Janus I had already passed as we have seen in 2406 BC, but confusion of the two Januses is commonplace. Janus II thus passed away in the 43rd year of Mannus as stated here, which was 552 years after the Deluge, and 1860 years after Adam.]