The employment of the royal title by itself accords with the tradition from Berossus that before the Deluge, as in later periods, the land was governed by a succession of supreme rulers, and that the hero of the Deluge was the last of them. In the Gilgamesh Epic, on the other hand, Ut-napishtim is given no royal nor any other title. He is merely referred to as a "man of Shuruppak, son of Ubar-Tutu", and he appears in the guise of an ancient hero or patriarch not invested with royal power. On this point Berossus evidently preserves the original Sumerian traditions, while the Hebrew Versions resemble the Semitic-Babylonian narrative. The Sumerian conception of a series of supreme Antediluvian rulers is of course merely a reflection from the historical period, when the hegemony in Babylonia was contested among the city-states. The growth of the tradition may have been encouraged by the early use of lugal, "king", which, though always a term of secular character, was not very sharply distinguished from that of patesi and other religious titles, until, in accordance with political development, it was required to connote a wider dominion. In Sumer, at the time of the composition of our text, Ziusudu was still only one in a long line of Babylonian rulers, mainly historical but gradually receding into the realms of legend and myth. At the time of the later Semites there had been more than one complete break in the tradition and the historical setting of the old story had become dim. The fact that Hebrew tradition should range itself in this matter with Babylon rather than with Sumer is important as a clue in tracing the literary history of our texts.
The rest of the column may be taken as descriptive of Ziusudu's activities. One line records his making of some very great object or the erection of a huge building;(1) and since the following lines are concerned solely with religious activities, the reference is possibly to a temple or some other structure of a sacred character. Its foundation may have been recorded as striking evidence of his devotion to his god; or, since the verb in this sentence depends on the words "at that time" in the preceding line, we may perhaps regard his action as directly connected with the revelation to be made to him. His personal piety is then described: daily he occupied himself in his god's service, prostrating himself in humility and constant in his attendance at the shrine. A dream (or possibly dreams), "such as had not been before", appears to him and he seems to be further described as conjuring "by the Name of Heaven and Earth"; but as the ends of all these lines are broken, the exact connexion of the phrases is not quite certain.
(1) The element gur-gur, "very large" or "huge", which occurs in the name of this great object or building, an- sag-gur-gur, is employed later in the term for the "huge boat", (gish)ma-gur-gur, in which Ziusudu rode out the storm. There was, of course, even at this early period a natural tendency to picture on a superhuman scale the lives and deeds of remote predecessors, a tendency which increased in later times and led, as we shall see, to the elaboration of extravagant detail.
It is difficult not to associate the reference to a dream, or possibly to dream-divination, with the warning in which Enki reveals the purpose of the gods. For the later versions prepare us for a reference to a dream. If we take the line as describing Ziusudu's practice of dream-divination in general, "such as had not been before", he may have been represented as the first diviner of dreams, as Enmeduranki was held to be the first practitioner of divination in general. But it seems to me more probable that the reference is to a particular dream, by means of which he obtained knowledge of the gods' intentions. On the rendering of this passage depends our interpretation of the whole of the Fourth Column, where the point will be further discussed. Meanwhile it may be noted that the conjuring "by the Name of Heaven and Earth", which we may assume is ascribed to Ziusudu, gains in significance if we may regard the setting of the myth as a magical incantation, an inference in support of which we shall note further evidence. For we are furnished at once with the grounds for its magical employment. If Ziusudu, through conjuring by the Name of Heaven and earth, could profit by the warning sent him and so escape the impending fate of mankind, the application of such a myth to the special needs of a Sumerian in peril or distress will be obvious. For should he, too, conjure by the Name of Heaven and Earth, he might look for a similar deliverance; and his recital of the myth itself would tend to clinch the magical effect of his own incantation.
The description of Ziusudu has also great interest in furnishing us with a close parallel to the piety of Noah in the Hebrew Versions. For in the Gilgamesh Epic and in Berossus this feature of the story is completely absent. We are there given no reason why Ut-napishtim was selected by Ea, nor Xisuthros by Kronos. For all that those versions tell us, the favour of each deity might have been conferred arbitrarily, and not in recognition of, or in response to, any particular quality or action on the part of its recipient. The Sumerian Version now restores the original setting of the story and incidentally proves that, in this particular, the Hebrew Versions have not embroidered a simpler narrative for the purpose of edification, but have faithfully reproduced an original strand of the tradition.
IV. THE DREAM-WARNING
The top of the Fourth Column of the text follows immediately on the close of the Third Column, so that at this one point we have no great gap between the columns. But unfortunately the ends of all the lines in both columns are wanting, and the exact content of some phrases preserved and their relation to each other are consequently doubtful. This materially affects the interpretation of the passage as a whole, but the main thread of the narrative may be readily followed. Ziusudu is here warned that a flood is to be sent "to destroy the seed of mankind"; the doubt that exists concerns the manner in which the warning is conveyed. In the first line of the column, after a reference to "the gods", a building seems to be mentioned, and Ziusudu, standing beside it, apparently hears a voice, which bids him take his stand beside a wall and then conveys to him the warning of the coming flood. The destruction of mankind had been decreed in "the assembly (of the gods)" and would be carried out by the commands of Anu and Enlil. Before the text breaks off we again have a reference to the "kingdom" and "its rule", a further trace of the close association of the Deluge with the dynastic succession in the early traditions of Sumer.
In the opening words of the warning to Ziusudu, with its prominent repetition of the word "wall", we must evidently trace some connexion with the puzzling words of Ea in the Gilgamesh Epic, when he begins his warning to Ut-napishtim. The warnings, as given in the two versions, are printed below in parallel columns for comparison.(1) The Gilgamesh Epic, after relating how the great gods in Shuruppak had decided to send a deluge, continues as follows in the right-hand column:
SUMERIAN VERSION SEMITIC VERSION
For (. . .) . . . the gods a Nin-igi-azag,(2) the god Ea,
. . . (. . .); sat with them,
Ziusudu standing at its side And he repeated their word to
heard (. . .): the house of reeds:
"At the wall on my left side take "Reed-hut, reed-hut! Wall,
thy stand and (. . .), wall!
At the wall I will speak a word O reed-hut, hear! O wall,
to thee (. . .). understand!
O my devout one . . . (. . .), Thou man of Shuruppak, son of
Ubar-Tutu,
By our hand(?) a flood(3) . . . Pull down thy house, build a
(. . .) will be (sent). ship,
To destroy the seed of mankind Leave thy possessions, take
(. . .) heed for thy life,
Is the decision, the word of the Abandon thy property, and save
assembly(4) (of the gods) thy life.
The commands of Anu (and) And bring living seed of every
En(lil . . .) kind into the ship.
Its kingdom, its rule (. . .) As for the ship, which thou
shalt build,
To his (. . .)" Of which the measurements
shall be carefully measured,
(. . .) Its breadth and length shall
correspond.
(. . .) In the deep shalt thou immerse
it."
(1) Col. IV, ll. 1 ff. are there compared with Gilg. Epic,
XI, ll. 19-31.
(2) Nin-igi-azag, "The Lord of Clear Vision", a title borne
by Enki, or Ea, as God of Wisdom.
(3) The Sumerian term amaru, here used for the flood and
rendered as "rain-storm" by Dr. Poebel, is explained in a
later syllabary as the equivalent of the Semitic-Babylonian
word abûbu (cf. Meissner, S.A.I., No. 8909), the term
employed for the flood both in the early Semitic version of
the Atrakhasis story dated in Ammizaduga's reign and in the
Gilgamesh Epic. The word abûbu is often conventionally
rendered "deluge", but should be more accurately translated
"flood". It is true that the tempests of the Sumerian
Version probably imply rain; and in the Gilgamesh Epic heavy
rain in the evening begins the flood and is followed at dawn
by a thunderstorm and hurricane. But in itself the term
abûbu implies flood, which could take place through a rise
of the rivers unaccompanied by heavy local rain. The annual
rainfall in Babylonia to-day is on an average only about 8
in., and there have been years in succession when the total
rainfall has not exceeded 4 in.; and yet the abûbu is not
a thing of the past.
(4) The word here rendered "assembly" is the Semitic loan-
word buhrum, in Babylonian puhrum, the term employed for
the "assembly" of the gods both in the Babylonian Creation
Series and in the Gilgamesh Epic. Its employment in the
Sumerian Version, in place of its Sumerian equivalent
ukkin, is an interesting example of Semitic influence. Its
occurrence does not necessarily imply the existence of a
recognized Semitic Version at the period our text was
inscribed. The substitution of buhrum for ukkin in the
text may well date from the period of Hammurabi, when we may
assume that the increased importance of the city-council was
reflected in the general adoption of the Semitic term (cf.
Poebel, Hist. Texts, p. 53).