Appendix 39Excursus on Gilgamesh

There are many points from which to start new trips of exploration into the Gilgamesh Epic, once it is conceded that reasonable questions have to be asked. Among the many we single out two, without intending to "get at the bottom of the matter"; the first concerns the "ferryman," the second concerns "trees."

Face to face with the ferryman Urshanabi, a kind of personified me who was dragged away from the "confluence of the rivers" to check the proper measures of Uruk, it can hardly be taken for a farfetched idea that we ask for comparative "individuals" or "places" in other Mesopotamian texts. There is, indeed, no need for a frantic search: the Enuma elish offers us an equally decisive item from which depends the whole skeleton map, namely Nibiru (or neberu).

There are three passages of the so-called "Babylonian Genesis" that give – recognizable at first glance – details of the surveying of the new world as accomplished by Marduk/Jupiter. In Speiser's translation they read thus (ANET, pp. 67, 69):

4.141ff. He crossed the heavens and surveyed the regions.

He squared Apsu's quarter, the abode of Nudimmud [Ea],

As the lord measured the dimensions of Apsu.

The Great Abode, its likeness, he fixed as Esharra

The Great Abode, Esharra, which he made as the firmament.

Anu, Enlil, and Ea he made occupy their places.

5.1-8 He constructed stations for the great gods,

Fixing their astral likenesses as constellations. [Heidel: The

stars, their likeness(es), the signs of the zodiac, he set up]

[n1 The terminus is "Lumashi" -stars, and it is not yet certain which stars are meant. F. Kugler (Sternkunde und Sterndienst in Babel. [1907-13], vol. 1, p. 259) voted for zodiacal signs; E. Weidner (Reallexikon der Assyriologie [1932], vol. 3, p. 83) confined this signification to the 5th century B.C. and later, whereas O. Neugebauer (The Exact Sciences in Antiquity [1962], p. 140) stated that the zodiacal signs (instead of constellations) were not yet introduced at 418 B.C. There are texts which include among the Lumashi-stars Cygnus, Cepheus, Aquila, Orion, Sirius, Centaurus (A. Jeremias, HAOG, p. 200; P. Gassmann, Planetarium Babylonicum, 250), and this appears to rule out the zodiac. C. Bezold (Boll-Bezold, Antike Beobachtungen farbiger Sterne [1916], p. 149; see also Bezold, Babylonisch-Assyrisches Glossar [1926], p. 160) proposed to understand the Lumashi-stars as "Jupiter-stars"; this was accepted by. Meissner (Babylonien und Assyrien [1932], vol. 2, p. 408) but Weidner (RLA 3, p. 80) claimed that Bezold had started from erroneous premises.]

He determined the year by designating the zones:

He set up three constellations for each of the twelve months.

After defining the days of the year (by means) of (heavenly) figures,

He founded the station of Nebiru to determine their (heavenly) bands,

That none might transgress or fall short.

Alongside he set up the stations of Enlil and Ea.

6.62f. They raised high the head of Esagila equaling Apsu.

Having built a stage-tower as high as Apsu,

They sat in it an abode for Marduk, Enlil (and) Ea.

Leaving aside the specific charm of these passages – i.e., the circumstance that the places of Anu, Enlil, Ea in 4.146, and their stations in 5.8 are not the same – we concentrate on EE 5.6:

"He founded the station of Nibiru to determine their (heavenly) bands" (Speiser),

or: "He founded the station of Nibiru to make known their duties" (Heidel),

or: "Er setzte ein den Nibirupunkt, um festzusetzen ihre Verknotung" (= riksu; Weidner, Handbuch Babyl. Astr., p. 33),

and on 5.8: "Alongside he set up the stations of Enlil and Ea" (Speiser),

or: "He established the stations of Enlil and Ea together with it" (Heidel),

or: "Den Enlilpunkt und den Eapunkt setzte er bei ihm fest" (Weidner).

That means the position of the “Ways of Anu, Enlil, Ea" was a function of Nibiru;

that only the setting up of the points, or stations, of Enlil and Ea is mentioned suggests that Marduk/Jupiter claims the "Anu-ship" for himself [n2 This dignity must have got lost after the first (?) flood (or by means of it?), otherwise Marduk could not ask reproachfully for the whereabouts of "Niniginangargid, the great carpenter of my Anu-ship" (Era Epic, tabl. 1.155; Gossmann, Das Era-Epos [1956], p. 98).]. The experts seem to be quite happy with the equation "Nibiru = Jupiter" (see below). But what is his "station," or point? Considering that upon this very station of Nibiru rests the whole tripartition of the universe during the age ruled by Marduk/Jupiter, it is surprising how little the professionals care.

The plain meaning of nibiru is "ferry, ferryman, ford" – mikis nibiri is the toll one has to pay for crossing the river – from eberu, "to cross." [n3 Cf. C. Bezold, Glossar, p. 13f.; E. Ebeling, RLA 3, p. 2f.; P. Jensen, Kosmologie, p. 128; E. Weidner, Handbuch, p. 26; P. Gossmann, Planet., 311: "Nibiru ist eigentlich die 'Uberfahrtsstelle.' Der 'Stern der Oberfahrtsstelle' ist der Marduk-stern Jupiter, wenn er den Meridian uberschreitet."]. Alfred Jeremias insisted that Nibiru "in all star-texts of later times" indicated Canopus, taking this star for the provider of the meridian of the city of Babylon [n4 HAOG, p. 134; Weidner (RLA 2, p. 387): "Ob der Stern Marduk-Nebiru wirklich = Canopus, bleibt freilich ebenfalls unsicher." On p. 247, n. 2, Jeremias generalizes without much ado: "Kulminationspunkt der Sterne im Ortsmeridian."]. There have been other identifications (including even a comet!) – the summer solstice [n5 Weidner, Handbuch p. 33, but that was written at least thirty years earlier than his articles in RLA.], or the celestial North Pole [n6 Meissner, Bab. und Assyr. 2, p. 408.]; the opinions and verdicts collected by Gossmann (Planet., 311) show clearly that Nibiru remains an unknown factor for the time being.

This deplorable situation is not improved by means of the next occasion, when the ominous word is hurled at us anew, in EE 7.124ff., where fifty names are given to the new ruler, Marduk/Jupiter, among which is Nibiru.

Speiser translation:

Nebiru shall hold the crossings of heaven and earth;

Those who failed of crossing above and below,

Ever of him shall inquire.

Nebiru is the star which in the skies is brilliant.

Verily, he governs their turnings, to him indeed they look

Saying: "He who the midst of the Sea restlessly crosses,

Let 'Crossing' be his name who controls its midst.

May they uphold the course of the stars of heaven;

May he shepherd all the gods like sheep."

Heidel translation:

Nibiru shall be in control of the passages in heaven and on earth,

For everyone above and below who cannot find the passage inquires of him.

Nibiru is his star which they caused (?) to shine in the sky.

He has taken position at the solstitial point (?), may they look upon him,

Saying: "He who crosses the middle of the sea without resting,

His name shall be Nibiru, who occupies the middle thereof;

May he maintain the course of the stars in heaven;

May he shepherd all the god like sheep... "

Von Soden (ZA 47, p. 17):

Nebiru soll die Ubergange vqn Himmel und Erde besetzt halten,

denn droben und drunten fragt jeder, der den Durchgang nicht finder, immer wieder ihn.

Nebiru ist sein Stern, den Sie am Himmel sichtbar werden lieBen;

er fasste Posten am Wendepunkt, dann mogen sie auf ihn schauen

und sagen: "Der die Mitte es Meeres (Tiamat) ohne Ruhe uberschreitet,

sein Name sei Nebiru, (denn er nimmt die Mitte davon ein.

Die Bahn der Sterne des Himmels soIlen sie (unverandert) halten... "

How secure and unshakable the ground is upon which we walk, according to the inscrutable decree of the experts, may be guessed from the translation of lines 128-32 by Albrecht Gotze [n7 "Akkadian d/tamtum," in Festschtift Deimel (1935), pp. 185-91.] who starts from the conviction that eberu = "to bind, to enclose" which, combined with the "solution" that tam-tim means "struggle," apparently permits him to get rid of the "midst of Tiamat"

Who enclosed (in his net) indeed amidst the struggle without loosening,

May his name be "encloser," who seizes amidst (it).

Of the stars of heaven may he uphold their courses

May he shepherd the gods, all of them like sheep.

F. M. Th. Bohl [n8 "Die funfzig Namen des Marduk,“ AfO II (1936), p. 210.] was at least perplexed enough to admit: "Der Passus gehort zu den sachlich schwierigsten der Tafel, ohne dass der ziemlich vollstandig erhaltene Kommentar hierbei wesentliche Hilfe leistet." But he did not further the case by holding opinions incompatible among themselves since based upon doubtful identifications. On the one hand, he claimed Nibiru to be the name given to "the planet and his hypsoma"; on the other hand, he took Nibiru for a star or constellation marking the point where Jupiter entered the "Way of Anu," to which he adds: "The time of observation is the night of the Vernal Equinox, when the Sun stands at the crosspoint of Equator and Ecliptic in the constellation Aries." He does not reveal from where he has this surprising knowledge; he seems to rely on the identification of "l-Iku" with Aries/Cetus, which is not the case: the Pegasus-square it is [n9 Bohl mentions this identification, with reference to Bezold and Schott, p. 211, n.47.], but the constellation is not mentioned in 7.1 24ff., so what? Apart from this, we do not know whether, in the time of the Enuma elish, Aries was taken for Jupiter's hypsoma; there seem to be reasons for recognizing – already at this time – Cancer (more precisely: Procyon) = Nangar = the Carpenter, as Jupiter's exaltation [n10 See E. Weidner, "Babylonische Hypsomatabilder," OLZ 22 (1910), cols. 14ff.; Weidner, Gestirn-Darstellungen auf Babylonischen Tontafeln (1967), pp. 9f., 134, n. 166, and plates V, VI (VAT 7847). A passage from the Taittiriya Brahmana (5.1.1) also has to be considered: "When Jupiter was first born, he defeated the nakshatra Pushya by his brilliance." P. Sengupta, who quoted the line in his intro­duction to Burgess' translation of the Surya Siddhanta (1935, p. xxxiv), misinterpreted it thoroughly by claiming it described "the discovery of Jupiter," and by adding, "the star group of Pushya (delta eta gamma Cancri) has no bright stars in it and the planet Jupiter was detected when it came near to this star group."

To the fully initiated expert who sternly points with outstretched finger to the circumstance that the nakshatra Pushya was formerly called Tishya (see, e.g., Scherer, Gestirnnamen, p. 150), and that means, Sirius, we can, for the time being, only answer that we are aware of this particular circumstance. Premature "solutions" are of no avail.].

In the third place, if Bohl takes l-Iku for Aries ruling the vernal equinox, how could Jupiter enter there the "Way of Anu"? [n11 To be sure, Bohl does not say so explicitly, his wording being as unprecise as possible. He claims that at the time of New Year (vernal equinox) "the orbit of Jupiter was observed particularly carefully." "Man beobachtete – so durfen wir annehmen – wie er (wohl von der ausseren Ea-Sphare her [sic!]) in den Anu-Bereich eintrat, diesen Bereich durchquerte (eberu, itburu) und ihn dadurch gleichsam feierlich in Besirz nahm."]. The "Way of Anu" represents a band, accompanying the equator, reaching from 15 (or 17) degrees north of the equator to 15 (or 17) degrees south of it; the "Way of Enlil" runs parallel to that of Anu in the North, the "Way of Ea" in the South [n12 For these much discussed "Ways," see van der Waerden, "The Thirty-Six Stars," JNES 8 (1949), p.16; Weidner, Handbuch, pp. 46-49; Meissner, Bab. und Assyr. 2, pp. 407f.; Bezold-Kopff-Boll, "Zenit- und Aquatorialgestirne," SHAW (1913); Schaumberger, 3. Erg., pp. 321-30.]. That, due to the precessional shifting of the crossroads of ecliptic and equator, the stars standing in these three "Ways" are not the same all the time, goes without saying.

But, as a matter of fact, "l-Iku," darkly hinted at by Bohl, does come into play, namely, in EE 6.62, quoted above: "They raised high the head of Esagila equaling Apsu." And concerning this Esagila (or Esagil) we hear in the ritual text of the New Year festival in Babylon [n13 See Sachs translation, ANET, p. 232,1. 274f] that the Urigallu-priest "shall go out to the Exalted Courtyard, turn to the north and bless the temple Esagil three times with the blessing: 'Iku-star, Esagil, image of heaven and earth.'" "l-Iku," the Pegasus-square (= alpha beta gamma Pegasi, alpha Andromedae) is, indeed, of the utmost importance, l-Iku representing the fundamental field measure [n14 About 3,600 square meters; see Heidel, GE, p. 82, n. 173.], and Ungnad (Das wiedergefundene Paradies [1923], p. 11) understood the constellation, enclosed by Pisces, for the "Paradise," the primordial field, so to speak. More important, Utnapishtim tells Gilgamesh (GE 11.57) about his ark, which was, like the apsu, an exact cube: "One iku was its floor space." [n15 A. Schott translation: "Ein 'Feld' gross war seine Bodenflache." Compare for details, Schott, "Zu meiner ubersetzung des Gilgamesch-Epos," ZA 42 (1934), pp. 37f., 40] (Before, 11.31, Ea had ordered Utnapishtim: "Like the apsu thou shalt ceil her.") Remembering what we heard above: "Since the ark disappeared there was a stone in its place... which was called foundation stone," i.e., Eben Sretiyyah, that covered the abyss, this cubic ark, the floor space of which was one iku, cannot be without interest for us, the less so, when the gods "raised high the head of Esagila (= l-Iku) equaling Apsu."

To be sure, this does not teach us where Marduk was supposed to be when he received the title Nibiru – it might have been decisive for the planet to rise heliacally together with l-Iku, the celestial model of Esagil (representing the "foundation-stone-covering-the-apsu," maybe?), but when [n16 One clue, at least (probably manr more), to the situation is contained in the Cuneiform Tablet K 3476 dealing with the Babylonian New Year festival, translated and commented on by Heinrich Zimmern ("Zum babylonischen Neujahrsfest," BVSGW 58 [1906] 3, pp. 127-36), which says that "Marduk lies with his feet within Ea" (lines 20-21: "(Das ist) Marduk [... ] [der (?) mit (?)] seinen Fussen innerhalb (?) Eas liegr"). In a note, Zimmern proposes to understand this line as an "allusion to a constellation connected with Marduk (Auriga?) that reaches into a constellation connected with Ea (Aries?)." S. A. Fallis, not tending to astronomical notions, made it that "Marduk lies (?) before (?) Ea"; the unmistakable presence of the planet Venus in the second part of the sentence (kakkabuDIL. BAT) forced him to the concession: "perhaps it refers to certain astronomical conditions" (The Babylonian Akitu Festival [1926], p. 217). In 1926, sufficient literature about the "Three Ways" was available.]?

The heliacal rising of "l-Iku" – precisely, beta Pegasi coincided with the winter solstice of 4000 B.C.; around 1000 B.C. it took place on January 25 [n17 See W. Hartner, “The Earliest History of the Constellations in the Near East," JNES 24 (1965), pp. 13, 15.]. "l-Iku," the Pegasus-square, is called "the habitation of the deity Ea, the leader of the stars of Anu [n18 Bezold-Kopff-Boll, p. 23.]" in the "Series mulAPIN" (Plow-star, Triangulum), called by Weidner "a Babylonian compendium of astronomy." [n19 "Ein babylonisches Kompendium der Himmelskunde," AJSL 40 (1914), pp. 186-208.]. According to van der Waerden ("The Thirty-Six Stars," p. 17) this series is a compilation "made about 700 B.C. or somewhat earlier [n20 See also A. Schott, "Das Werden der babylonisch/assyrischen Positions-Astronomie und einige seiner Bedingungen," ZDMG 88 (1934), pp. 331, 333.] – in which material from different periods between -1400 and -700 was used": thus, l-Iku as "leader" of the stars standing in the "Way of Anu" would rise in the end of January, quite a time away from the vernal equinox when the New Year's festival was held.

This is all very nice so far, and certainly not without highest interest, but do we know meanwhile what Nibiru, "ferry, ferryman, ford," was supposed to be? Even without worrying about Jupiter and his whereabouts? We know it not, and we feel tempted to say: "quod erat demonstrandum," namely, that the many verbose translations, eloquent articles, and books have not cleared up the decisive points of the cosmological system ruling the Enuma elish, the Gilgamesh Epic, the Era Epic and the other alleged "poems." Nibiru is only one case among many, but it is a rather significant model case for proving that no concrete problem is going to be solved as long as the experts of astronomy are too supercilious to touch "mythical" ideas – which are firmly believed to be plain nonsense, of course – as long as historians of religion swear to it that stars and planets were smuggled into originally "healthy" fertility cults and naive fairy tales only "very late" – whence these unhealthy subjects should be neglected by principle – and as long as the philologists imagine that familiarity with grammar replaces that scientific knowledge which they lack, and dislike.

But even when the different specialists would condescend to renounce their common haughtiness, we do not think that there is much chance to arrive at a satisfying solution of concrete details, and the adequate understanding of the system as a whole, without taking into account comparable systems of other parts of the earth: Mesopotamia is by no means the only province of high culture where the astronomers worked with a tripartition of the sphere – even apart from the notion allegedly most familiar to us, in reality most unknown – that of the "Ways" of Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades as given by Homer. The Indians have a very similar scheme of dividing the sky into Ways [n21 See W. Kirfel, Die Kosmographie der Inder nach den Quellen dargestellt (1920), pp. 140f. At first glance, it looks as if only the circle of lunar mansions was subdivided into these three ways, but the domains are extended far beyond the limits of the "inhabited world" in both directions, north and south, as are the Ways of Enlil and Ea.] (they even call them "ways"). And so have the Polynesians, who tell us many details about the stars belonging to the three zones (and by which planet they were "begotten"); but nobody has thought it worth listening to the greatest navigators our globe has ever seen; nor has any ethnologist of our progressive times thought it worth mentioning that the Polynesian megalithic “sanctuaries" (maraes) gained their imposing state of "holiness" (taboo) when the "Unu-boards" were present, these carved Unu-boards representing "the Pillar of Rumia," Rumia being comparable to the "Way of Anu," where Antares served as "pillar of entrance" (among the other "pillars": Aldebaran, Spica, Arcturus, Phaethon in Columba).

But now, is Nibiru as important as all that? We think so. Or, to say it the other way around: once his astronomical term, and two or three more, are reliably settled, one can begin in earnest to get wise to, and to translate, Mesopotamian "poetry."

II.

The epics of Gilgamesh and Era offer too many trees for our modest demands. The several wooden individuals have, however, the one advantage that the expert's delight in uttering deep words about "the world-tree" wilts away.

There is, first, the mesh-tree, contained in the hero's name, [n22 The identity of the tree is not settled. R. Labat (Manuel d'Epigraphie Akkadienne [1963], no. 314) proposes «cиdre (?micocoulier?) [Celtis australis, "gemeiner Zurgelbaum" – Celtis occidentalis is the American nettle tree] gisMEZ-MA-GAN-(NA) musskanu-murier (?miscocoulier de Magan?)" (Cf. Labat, no. 206: «GIS, bois, arbre. Dйterminatif prйcйdant les noms d'arbres et d'objets en bois.") See also F. Delitzsch, Assyrisches Handworterbuch (1806), p. 410 s.v. miskanu, musukanu, "ein Baum.... wechselt mit mis-ma-kan-na, d.i. MIS-Holz von Makan." (Even this mes-wood from Magan cannot be dismissed as "not applicable" for the GE, because in the Sumerian myth "Gilgamesh and the Land of the Living" (Kramer, ANET, p. 49, 1.111-15), when the hero is allegedly admonishing Enkidu not to shrink away from Humbaba, Gilgamesh utters the most enigmatical words: "1) O thou help me [and] I will help thee, what can happen to us? After it had sunk, after it had sunk, After the Magan-boat had sunk, After the boat 'the might of Magilum' had sunk.")

See also F. Hommel, Ethnologie und Geographie des Alten Orients (1926), pp. 539, 783. According to Meissner, quoted by Weidner ("Gestirn-Darstellungen auf Babylonischen Tontafeln," SOA W 254 [1967], p. 18), gisMES = mesu is the rowan. As concerns the astrological system of connecting trees (and stones, and animals, etc.) with the zodiac, the tablets translated by Weidner put the mes-tree two times with Aquarius (pp. 18,35), once with Aries (p. 31). Wood of the mesu-tree and of the huluppu-tree occurs as building material for the chariot (narkabtu) of Ningirsu, in the Gudea Cylinder A VII, 16-18 (cf. A. Salonen, Prozessionswagen [1946], p. 6; Salonen, Die Landfahrzeuge des Alten Mesopotamien [1951], pp. 111 f.).

This tree is also part of the name of MES.LAM.TA.E3.A, taken for the oldest name known of the god Nergal (see J. Bollenrucher, Gebete und Hymnen an Nergal [1904], p. 7) and the name of the one of the Gemini, MES.LAM.TA.E.A., means "who comes forth from MES.LAM." MES.LAM was the name given to Nergal's sanctuary in Kutha, and means "the luxuriantly growing MES-tree," according to Gossmann (Das Era-Epos, p. 67), who continues with respect to the name MES.LAM.TA.E.A.: "Spater diente der Name in erster Linie als Bezeichnung eines der beiden Zwillinge (Planetarium Babylonicum, 271), bezw. als Tummelplatz philologischer Spielereien. Auf Grund solcher Philologeme wurde der Name auf Marduk und Gilgamesh libertragen (Tallqvist, 374)."

It is not in the best scientific style to dispose of difficult formulae by declaring them philological pastimes. Since MES.LAM appears to be a "fixed" topos, we can hardly expect that "to come forth from MES.LAM" has been a monopoly of Nergal-Mars. But see below p. 449.] about the location of which Marduk asks stern questions of Era, followed by the cedar of Huwawa/Humbaba which was – as we have been taught by the specialists – felled by Gilgamesh and Enkidu. Yet, according to the "latest news" available to us [n23 S. N. Kramer, The Sumerians (1963), p. 277.], Huwawa is "the guardian monster of the 'land of the cut cedar.' " Admittedly, also at an earlier occasion, Kramer stressed his opinion that "the far distant 'Land of the Living' was also the 'Land of the Felled Cedar,'" [n24 In Gilgamesh et sa lйgende, ed. by P. Garelli (1958), p. 64. In "Gilgamesh and the Land of the Living," JCS I (1947), p. 4, he had styled it more modestly: "the far distant Land of the Living (also known as cedar land)."], but we have not yet found evidence of any thought, any consequence which should follow such alarming statements. But one cannot expect earnest thoughts to be wasted on Sumerian conceptions from a scholar who wrote about the fathers of hydraulic engineering (irrigation) that "to the Sumerian poets and priests the real sources of the Tigris and Euphrates in the mountains of Armenia were of little significance. They did not understand, as we do, that the volume of the waters of the two rivers depended upon 'feeding' from their tributaries, or that it was the melting winter snows which produced the annual overflow, or that the Tigris and Euphrates 'emptied' their swollen waters into the Persian Gulf. Indeed, their view was just the opposite; it was the Persian Gulf which was responsible for the waters of the Tigris and Euphrates and for their all-important overflow. Mythologically expressed, it was Enki who filled the Tigris and Euphrates with sparkling water. and who, by riding the sea, makes its waters and those of the Tigris and Euphrates, turbulent and violent... In short, as the Sumerians say it, it was not the rivers that 'fed' the sea,... but rather the sea that 'fed' the rivers." [n25 "Dilmun, the Land of the Living,” BASOR 96 (1944), p. 28; we pass in silence the identification of this "Land of the Living" with Dilmun, as claimed in this article, and as upheld in all later publications.].

Apart from the mes-tree and the unexplained cedar of Huwawa/ Humbaba – whether it was felled by our heroes or not – the Gilgamesh Epic confronts us with the huluppu-tree, taken for a willow by Labat (nos. 371,589), for an oak by the Assyrian Dictionary (vol. 6, pp. SSf.), for a kind of Persea by Salone (Landfahrzeuge, pp. 111f.) – all the identifications decently equipped with a question mark. This specimen crosses our way in the Sumerian version of the Gilgamesh Epic, part of which was incorporated as Tablet XII in the Akkadian Epic; the Sumerian text has been translated by C. J. Gadd [n26 "Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet XII," in RA 30 (1933), pp. 129-43.], and by S. N. Kramer [n27 "Gilgamesh and the Huluppu- tree," Assyriological Studies 10 (1938). Ct. Kramer, Sumerian Mythology (1944), pp. 33-37, and From the Tablets of Sumer (1956), pp. 222-26.]. We quote the summary given by Kramer in his first translation (1938, p. 12) for the simple reason that it is shorter than the one offered in JAOS 64 (1944), pp. 19-21. In the meantime, this text had been given a different name, i.e., "Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Nether WorId." The first half of the first sentence is of course, no quotation, and it is not likely to be subscribed to by the author.

On occasion of a new distribution of the "Three Ways," [n28 As concerns the beginning of this text, one shock after the other receives the reader who studies eagerly the various "translations": it is hard to believe that they are meant to render the same Sumerian original. Out of the first lines Kramer (Sumerian Mythology, pp. 30ff.) built up the Sumerian creation story which he took (and takes?) for unknown; in JAOS 64, p. 19, he stressed again: "The first thirteen lines of this passage contains some of our basic data for the analysis of the Sumerian concept of the creation of the universe." Of the following lines 14-25 he constructed a dragon-fight. By means of hitherto unpublished pieces, Kramer claimed, in 1958 (Gilgamesh et sa lйgende, p. 66), that "the first seven lines of the poem can now be completely restored." He added, however: "Unfortunately, the meaning of the passage is by no means certain and the mythological implications are rather obscure, as is obvious from the following tentative translation:

The days of creation, the distant days of creation,

The nights of creation, the far-off nights of creation,

The years of creation, the distant years of creation,

After in (?) days of yore everything needful had been brought into existence,

After in (?) days of yore everything needful had been commanded,

After in the shrines (?) of the land bread (?) had been tasted (?)

After in the ovens of the land, bread (?) had been baked (?)."

Nobody is likely to contradict the stated uncertainty of the meaning; it would be advisable to mind the utterance of Margarete Riemschneider (Augengott und Heilige Hochzeit [1953], p., 190): "So lange sie sinnlos sind, stimmen unsere ubersetzungen nicht." The objections raised by stern expert reviewers (T. Jacobsen, "Sumerian Mythology," JNES 5 [1946], pp. 128-52; M. Witzel, "Zur sumerischen Mythologie," Or. 17 [1948], pp. 393-415) remain throughout within the usual frame of specialists on grammar and "religion," and it is hard to decide who carries off the laurels in this race of arbitrary interpretations. The remarkable point of the new "distribution" seems to be that Ereshkigal belongs henceforward to the "nether world."

(In 1938 Kramer translated line 12: "After Ereshkigal had been presented (?) as a gift (?) to (?) the netherworld"; in his Sumerian Mythology, after having "discovered" the dragon-fight, he made it: "After Ereshkigal had been carried off into Kur as its prize." Witzel (Or. 17, p. 402) rendered the line: "Als (der) Ereshkigal mit der Unterwelt Geschenk 'aufgewartet' worden war.")

Since we do not know yet which star or constellation Ereshkigal was meant to represent, this does not tell us more than that the (unknown) asterism had "entered" the Way of Ea, i.e., that it had sunk below the 15th (or 17th) degree of southern latitude.] "on that day," it happened that "a huluppu tree (very likely a willow) which had been planted on the bank of the Euphrates and nourished by its waters was uprooted by the South Wind and carried off by the Euphrates. A goddess wandering along the bank seized the floating tree, and at the word of Anu and Enlil she brought it to Inanna's [Le., Ishtar's] garden in Uruk. Inanna tended the tree carefully and lovingly, hoping to have made of its wood a throne and bed for herself. After ten years had passed and the tree had matured, Inanna, to her chagrin, found herself unable to realize her hopes. For in the meantime a dragon had set up its nest at the base of the tree, the Zu-bird had placed his young in its crown, and in its midst the demoness Lilith had built her house. But Gilgamesh, informed of Inanna's distress, rushed to her aid. Making light of his weighty armor, the giant slew the dragon with his huge bronze ax, seven talents and seven minas in weight. Thereupon the Zu-bird fled with his young to the mountain, while Lilith, terror-stricken, tore down her house and escaped to the desert. After Gilgamesh had uprooted the liberated tree, his followers, the men of Uruk, cut down its trunk and gave part of it to Inanna for her throne and bed. Of the remainder – i.e., root and crown – “Gilgamesh makes for himself the pukku and mikku, two wooden objects of magic significance."

(It goes without saying that there is no whiff of "magic significance" to be found in the text.) Here the summary of 1938 comes to its end, and we continue with JAOS 4, p. 20:

"Follows a passage of twelve lines which describes Gilgamesh's activity in Erech with this pukku and mikku, with this 'drum' and 'drumstick' [see below]. Despite the fact that the text is in perfect condition, it is still impossible to penetrate its meaning. It is not improbable, however, that it describes in some detail the overbearing and tyrannical acts which, according to the first tablet of the Epic of Gilgamesh, brought woe to the inhabitants of Erech, and which, again according to the Babylonian epic only, led to the creation of Enkidu."

According to this verdict, Kamer does not even try to translate literally the lines 24-35 which are allegedly in "perfect condition." Gadd (RA 30, p. 131) renders the passage as follows:

22. He makes its root into his pukku [giSRIM (ellag)]

23. Its top he makes into his ikku [gisE.AG]

24. He says "ellag," except () "ellag" let him not speak

2 5. Saying... except (?... let him not speak

26. The men of his city say "ellag"

27. He viewed his little company which did not...

28.?? his lament they make [a-gestin-nu a-gestin-nu]

29. He that had a mother, (she) brought bread for her son

30. He that had a wife, (she poured out water for her "brother"

31. The Wine (?) was taken away (dgestin-an-na]

32. (In) his place where the pukku was set he draws a circle

33. The pukku he raised before him and went into the house

34. In the morning his place where the circle was drawn he viewed

35. The adults (?) do not...

36. (But) at the crying of a little girl...

Kramer continues: "When the story becomes intelligible once again, it continues with the statement that 'because of the outcry of the young maidens,' the pukku and mikku fell into the nether world. Gilgamesh put in his hand as well as his foot to retrieve them, but was unable to reach them. And so he seats himself at the gate of the nether world and laments:

O my pukku, O my mikku.

My pukku whose lustiness was irresistible,

My mikku whose pulsations could not be drowned out.

[n29 In From the Tablets of Szemer (1956), p. 224, Kramer translated: "My pukku with lustiness irresistible, My mikku with dance-rhythm unrivaled."]

(With the following line, representing line I of Tablet XII, the Akkadian translation sets in) [n30 Thus, directly after Urshanabi's checking of the measures of Uruk (11.307), there follows as catchline line 308 = 12.1: "In those days, when..."]:

In those days when verily my pukku was with me in the house of the carpenter, [n31 A. Heidel (p. 95) translates lines 1-3: "O that today I had left the pukku in the house of the carpenter! O that I had left it with the wife of the carpenter, who was to me like the mother who bore me! O that I left it with the daughter of the carpenter, who was to me (like) my younger sister." In a footnote he explains: "Had Gilgamesh left his pukku and his mikku in the house of the carpenter, they would have been safe and would not have fallen into the underworld." He adds: "The translation of the first three lines is somewhat tentative." Of only the first three lines?]

(When) verily the wife of the carpenter was with me like the mother who gave birth to me

(When) verily the daughter of the carpenter was with me like my younger sister,

My pukku, who will bring it up from the nether world,

My mikku, who will bring it up from the "face" of the netherworld?

His servant Enkidu, his constant follower and companion, thereupon volunteers to descend to the nether world and bring them up for him... Hearing his servant's generous offer, Gilgamesh warns him of a number of the nether world tabus which he is to guard against... But Enkidu heeds not the instructions of his master and commits all those very acts against which Gilgamesh has warned him. And so he is seized by Kur and is unable to reascend to the earth."

We can do, here, without the following description of the goings-on in the "underworld," a description which is common to the Sumerian myth of the huluppu-tree, and to Tablet XII of the Akkadian Epic. Kramer (JAOS 64, p. 23) closes his inquiry on the Sumerian sources of the Gilgamesh Epic: "In conclusion, a comparison of the text of the 'twelfth' tablet of the Epic of Gilgamesh with that of our Sumerian poem Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Nether World, proves beyond all doubt what has long been suspected, that is, that the 'twelfth' tablet is an inorganic appendage attached to the Babylonian epic whose first eleven tablets constitute a reasonably well-integrated poetic unit." We do wish neither to consent nor to disagree; we do not like those "beyond all doubt's," and similar verdicts, considering how frightfully little we know of the Epic. (If there is something that is, really, "beyond all doubt," it is only this, that the eleven tablets of the Epic do not "constitute a reasonably well-integrated poetic unit," not the translated Epic.)

Of course, it would be to ur great advantage were we to know more about the objects "pukku' and "mikku," that have withstood the honest efforts of several scholars, first among whom is Sidney Smith ("b/pukk/qqu and mekku," R 30 [1933], pp. 153-68). Nets have been proposed, wind instruments (pipes and horns), and Margarete Riemschneider (Augengott, pp. 50f. voted for a particular trap, the very same rather uncanny trap which is known to us from the Pyramid Texts (representing the "palace" of Upper Egypt). Most interpreters have accepted Landsberger's first proposition "drum" and "drumstick" [n32 Marius Schneider votes for "drum" (Rahmentrommel) and "harp" or "lyre," in his article "Pukku und Mikku. Ein Beitrag zum Aufbau und zum System der Zahlenmystik des Gilgamesh-Epos," Antaios 9 (1967), pp. 280f]; there is nothing to say against this solution per se, as long as the significance of celestial drums is recognized (see chapter VIII, "Shamans and Smiths"), and under the condition that comparable celestial drums are properly investigated – e.g., those of the Chinese sphere.

For the time being there is no cogent reason to stick to "drum" and "drumstick," the less so as Landsberger dropped his earlier notion – about which he states explicitly that he never substantiated it-for the sake of "hoop" and "driving stick." [n33 "Einige unerkannt gebliebene oder verkannte Nomina des Akkadischen," WZKM 56 (1960), pp. 124-26. It is advisable to take into consideration that Landsberger does not recognize the occurrence of the word pukku in GE 1.11.22, be­cause Schott and Schmoekel brought the alleged drum pukku into the first tablet of their translations without hesitating. At first glance, it might seem irrelevant whether or not pukku occurs in the first tablet. A little concentrated thinking will correct this impression: pukku having been made from the wood of the felled huluppu-tree, the whole timetable of the Epic, particularly the appropriate allocation of the 12th tablet and the Sumerian poem of the huluppu-tree, might hinge upon the valid answer to this very question: whether or not pukku does make its appearance in the first tablet.]. In the present situation, however, we know nothing of the function of pukku and mikku, and this fact should prevent idle speculations.

No less lamentable than the loss of these objects is the circumstance that we do not know more about Inanna's unwelcome subtenants in her huluppu-tree, about Lilith, and about the dragon at the root; that he corresponds to Nidhoggr of the Edda does not enlighten us concerning his identity. The Zu-bird, at least, is known to us: the planet Mars it is [n34 See Gossmann, Planetarium Babylonicum, 195: mul dIMDUGUDmusen.], but we do not yet risk drawing specific conclusions from this identification to the "nest" or "house" of the planet that was taken away from him.

The deadlock is hardly to be overcome by Mesopotamian texts alone, and this goes for the huluppu-tree, the roes-tree, Huwawa's cedar, and that tree in the Era Epic of which Era announces (Tablet 4. 123-26, Gossmann, pp. 30f.; Langdon, MAR 5, p. 144): "Irkalla will I shake and the heavens shall tremble. The brilliancy of Jupiter [ilSUL.P.A.E3] will I cause to fall and the stars will I suppress [n35 Langdon (MAR 5, pp. 144f.) points to the prophecy against Babylon and its king, in Isa. XIII, XIV, "clearly reminiscent of this passage... 'I will make the heavens to tremble and the earth shall be shaken out of her place.' So prophesied the Hebrew writer, and even more obvious is his borrowing from the Irra myth when he compares the king of Babylon to Helel: 'How art thou fallen from Heaven, O Helel, son of morning!' In the cuneiform text of the Irra myth Marduk is called Shulpae, the name of Jupiter in the early morning, and there can be little doubt that Helel is a transcription of a Babylonian title of Marduk-Jupiter, elil, 'the shining one.'"]. The root of the tree will I tear up and its sprout will not thrive."

In case we wished to go on this errand in the future we should start from two Indian nakshatras (lunar mansions) and the legends connected with them: mula (or mura), "the root," also called "the tearer out of the root" (see also appendices #4 and #30), and even "Yama's two unfasteners," i.e., the Sting of Scorpius [n36 The Indians claim that exactly opposite to mula was Betelgeuse, ruled by "Rudra-the-destroying-archer," whereas the Coptic list of lunar mansions (Kircher, Oedipus Aegyptiacus 2 [1653], pt. 2, p. 246) calls the Sting of Scorpius (al-Sha'ula) "Soleka statio translationis caniculae in coelum... unde et Siat vocatur, statio venationis," which is of the utmost importance since it elucidates the role of a "sea-star" common to Sirius and the Scorpion-goddess.], (lambda upsilon Scorpii) – in Babylonian astronomy mulSAR.UR and mulSAR.GAZ, the weapons of Marduk in the "battle" against Tiamat; and the nakshatra containing Antares (alpha Scorpii) which bears the names "the oldest," or "who slays the oldest" [n37 A. Weber ("Die Vedischen Nachrichten von den Naxatra," APA W 2 [1862], pp. 29If.) renders Jyesthaghni: "die altesten (Geschwister) todtend" which reminds us, nolens volens, of Mercer, who translates Pyramid text 399 ab: "It is N. who judges with him whose name is hidden (on) this day of slaying the eldest (gods), and N. is lord of offerings, who knots the cord."] – in Tahiti: "parent pillar of the world."

From India we should turn to the hero Tahaki of Tuamotuan texts [n38 J. F. Stimson, The Legends of Maui and Tabak;, Bull. BPB Mus. (1933), pp. 50-77.], already mentioned, because he represents the almost "professional" avenger of his father. Right from the beginning of events, Tahaki's mother laments that the hero is destined to die in a faraway country; and again and again throughout the unfolding of the legend, Tahaki sings: "I go to the night-realm of Kiho, the last bourne of repose." When still a child, his cousin, with whom he plays diving for pearls, kills and dismembers him; but his foster brother saves the vital parts (unlike the case of Osiris), from which his mother revives him again. He sets out with this brother to free his father from the "goblin myriads" (see above, p. 175). When reaching the home of his grandparents, he wins the love of Hapai, daughter of Tane, the Deus Faber. When Hapai tells her father about the young man, he answers: "If he is really Tahaki go and say to him: 'Tane-of-ancient-waters told me that if you can pass before his face you must be Tahaki; if you can sit upon his four-legged stool, you must be Tahaki; if you can pull up his sacred tree by the roots then you are surely Tahaki.' Then Tahaki went to Tane-of-ancient-waters and stood beside him; and immediately he passed before his face; he sat upon his high four-legged stool – and it broke to pieces under him; the Tahaki pulled up his sacred tree by the roots – and Tahaki looked down and saw the entrance to Havaiki beneath [n39 Compare Handy, on Marquesas Bull. BPB Mus. 69, p. 132): "When Vaka-Uhi had reached a certain spot in the sea, he could see Havaiki down at the bottom of the ocean." We seem to be still circling the spot beneath the whirlpool, described by Adam of Bremen, and by the Cherokee (see pp. 106f.).]. Then Tahaki and Tane-of-ancient-waters chanted a song about the death of Tahaki." [n40 Stimson, p. 73.

The antiphony of the chant does not allow for a summary: there are "First Voice," "Second Voice," "Chorus," "Refrains" sung by Tane, and Tahaki gets some lines in between, also. Noteworthy is the mentioning of a "wayopener," but we do not know who he is, the Polynesians being more prone to "titles" and kenningar than other mythographers. Sung by (a) Tahaki, (b) the first voice, (c) the second voice, we hear (a) "It was Puga-ariki-tahi-"; (b) "The first Puga-ariki who came at last"; () "To Fare-kura-templed abode of the venerated learning of the gods – there in the spirit-world where thou dwellest." This Fare-kura (fare = house, kura = red, or purple; Maori: Whare kura; Samoa: Fale ula, etc.) was, according to the "Lore of the Whare-wananga" of New Zealand, a temple "at Te Hono-i-wairua... in the spot where the teaching of the Wharewananga originated" (i.e., remarks. Smith, p. 82, "where man was first taught the doctrines brought down from Heaven by Tane").

The Te Hono-i-wairua (the gathering place of the spirits) was in Hawaiki, the so-called "primordial home" of the Polynesians, and the sage states (Smith, p. 101): "Whakaahu, a star (Castor,. in the constellation Gemini) was appointed (or set up) at Te Hono-i-wairua in Hawaiki... whilst Puanga (Rigel of Orion) was fixed at the east of Rarohenga (Hades)." Later he explains (p. 113 that "those spirits which by their evil conduct on this earth... left the temple [Whare kura] by the Takeke-roa (or long rapid, descent) to Rarohenga, or Hades," while the others ascended slowly to the "realm of Io the Supreme God," i.e., the same as Kiho-tumu, Kiho-the-All-Source, of Tuamotu.].

Nonetheless, with Tane's consent, the pair still lived together "many months until a certain day when trouble arose between them... So Tahaki went far far away to a distant land hoping that he might be killed there. And the land where Tahaki was slain at last was known as Harbor-of-refreshing-rain."

After an extended excursion into Mexico and the "broken tree," the symbol of Tamoanchan, "the house of descending," where the gods were hurled down for having plucked the forbidden flowers, the broken tree being claimed to be the Milky Way (W. Krickeberg, "Der mittelamerikanische Ballspielplatz und seine religiose Symbolik," Paideuma 3 [1944-49], p. 132), we should return once more to the storehouse of magnificent survivals, Finland, particularly to the many variants of the "cutting of the large oak" (K. Krohn, FFC 52 [1924], pp. 183-99). This was by no means an easy task to accomplish, but the oak had made trouble right from the start. When (in the second rune of the Kalevala) Sampsa Pellervoinen had sowed trees, it was the oak alone that would not grow until four or five lovely maidens from the water, and a hero from the ocean, had cleared the ground with fire and planted an acorn in the ashes; and once it had started, the growth of the tree could not be stopped:

And the summit rose to heaven

And its leaves in air expanded,

In their course the clouds it hindered,

And the driving clouds impeded,

And it hid the shining sunlight,

And the gleaming of the moonlight.

Then the aged Vainamoinen,

Pondered deeply and reflected,

"Is there none to fell the oak-tree,

And o'erthrow the tree majestic?

Sad is now the life of mortals,

And for fish to swim is dismal,

Since the air is void of sunlight,

And the gleaming of the moonlight."

"One sought above in the sky, below in the lap of the earth," as we are informed by variants, but then Vainamoinen asked his divine mother for help.

Then a man arose from ocean

From the waves a hero started,

Not the hugest of the hugest,

Not the smallest of the smallest.

As a man's thumb was his stature;

Lofty as the span of woman.

The "puny man from the ocean," whose "hair reached down to his heels, the beard to his knees," a nounces, "I have come to fell the oak tree/And to splinter it to fragments." And so he does. In several variants the oak is said to have fallen over the Northland River, so as to form the bridge into the abode of the dead. Holmberg (quoted by Lauri Honko, "Finnen," Wb. Myth., p. 369) took the oak for the Milky Way.

Considering that the same puny character was alone able to kill the huge ox – we might call it "bull' quietly – whose mere sight chased all heroes to the highest trees, we can hardly overlook the possibility that we are up to some kind of "grandson" of hairy Enkidu, and the oak would be a faint reflection of the cedar. Whereas an Esthonian variant sounds – although suffering fro atrophy – more like the story of the huluppu-tree. A damsel plants the acorn – it is typical that Krohn (p. 187) calls the versions of Russian Karelia "disfigured," where this acorn is called "taivon tahti," i.e. sky-star – the growing tree endangers the sky, trying to "tear the celestial luminaries, or to darken them." The maiden, therefore, asks her brother to cut off the tree. Out of its wood presents are made for the relatives of the bridegroom, and for the virgin herself a chest is fabricated.

Since we do not mean to undertake the expedition into comparative tree-lore here and now, we have to leave it at that. That mythical "trees" are not of terrestrial provenance, and that we cannot cope with the different specific tree individuals under the heading "the world tree" – not although, but because they are "cosmic" trees – could have been expected by everybody who has spent time and thought on the tree of the Cross; on Yggdrasil (and Ashvatta); on the "Saltwater-tree" of the Cuna Indians; on Zeus' oak, part of which was built into Argo; on the fig tree at the vortex which saved Odysseus; on the laurel which did not yet mark the Omphalos of Delphi, when Apollo slew Python ("nondum laurus erat,” Ovid) – it had to be brought from Tempe after Apollo's indenture of eight great years; on Uller's yew-tree (belonging to Sirius) by mean of whose juice Hamlet's father was murdered; on – apart from the mentioned Mesopotamian tree individuals – the "dark kishkannu-tree" growing in Eridu, where no mortal is ever admitted; on the tamarisk at Be'ersheba in Genesis XXI; on the heather tree that "enfolded and embraced the chest with its growth and concealed it within its trunk," the "chest" being the coffin of Osiris (Plutarch, De Iside et Osiride, ch. 14-15, 356E-357A); and on the king of the country who "cut off the portion that enfolded the chest, and used it as pillar to support the roof of his house," until Isis carried off this "pillar." Those who prefer to overlook these items (and very many more) might recall the many times that we hear of much sighing and crying over trees cut down, sawed in two, and the like [n41 See R. Eisler, Orphisch-Dionysische Mysterien-Gedanken in der christlichen Antike (1925; repro 1966), pp. 246, 248. Compare also the "epitheton" of Ugaritic Baal, 'aliyn, and its possible derivation from Hebrew 'alion ('elon), Oak, Therebynth, holy tree, and allanati as name of the fourth month, i.e., the month of Tammuz. (H. Birkeland, Norsk Tidskrift for Sprogvidenskap 9 [1938], pp. 338-45; W. Robertson Smith, The Religion of the Semites [1957], p. 196, n.4.)] – after all, our very Yima-Jamshid was sawed in two, by Azhi Dahak – as Tammuz "the lord of the great tree, overcome by the rage of his enemies," and the numerous comparisons of Mesopotamian temples with trees (cf. M. Witzel, Texte zum Studium Sumerischer Tempel und Kultzentren [1932], pp. 37f.; Witzel, Tammuz-Liturgien und Verwandtes [1935], pp. 1 08f.).

It would be an imposition to expect the reader to listen to such endless rambling on without telling him the aim that we hope to attain, sooner or later, by digging into these trees and posts: we do want to know which "New Way" it was that has been "opened" by Gilgamesh who was "wood" from the mes-tree, and we wish to find out the chronological sequence of the celestial events as told in the Enuma elish, the Gilgamesh Epic and the Era Epic. The irrelevancy of the scholarly quest for "poets" (and who cribbed from whom) has been understood, meanwhile: it is the celestial phenomena that move and change, and not the "mythopoetic fantasy" or the "doctrines" of poets and pontiffs. We have to find out, therefore, who came first as ruler of "the underworld," Nergal or Gilgamesh, or whether these two should really be the same, which we doubt for the time being. Yet, we have already heard (pp. 437f., n. 22) that Nergal's name MES.LAM.TA.E.A. was given to Gilgamesh. As Lambert states (La Legende de Gilgamesh, pp. 39f.): "After his life on earth Gilgamesh became king of the under world, a Babylonian Osiris.

A formal statement of this is given in a late religious text: 'Meslamtaea is Gilgamesh, Gilgamesh is Nergal, who resides in the underworld.' This comes from one of the texts which explain the functions of deities by equating them with other gods or goddesses, a very significant type of exposition."

This "significant type of exposition" is, in fact, the technique of the Old Norse skalds, and we have some perfect kenningar from Mesopotamia, such as "Ninurta is the Marduk of strength," "Nergal is the Marduk of battle," "Nabu is the Marduk of business," [n42 Jeremias, HAOG, p. 190; see also Meissner, Babylonien und Assyrien 2, p. 133; Witzel, Tammuz-Liturgien, pp. 470f.] "Enzak is the Nabu of Tilmun." [n43 D. O. Edzard, "Die Mythologie der Sumerer und Akkader," Worterbuch de Mythologie I, p. 130.]. Now, the passage quoted by Lambert says: "dgilgames dnergal (u.gur) asib (du) ersetimtim." In the text (quoted above) that addresses Gilgamesh as "supreme king, judge of the Anunnaki... you stand in the underworId and give the final verdict," it is again ersetu, and according to GE 1.56 it is ersetu that has seized Enkidu. Thus, that line might try to tell us "Gilgamesh is the NergaI of Ersetu," whereas Nergal's own "underworld" is Arallu (Aralu). Says Albright [n44 "The Mouth of the Rivers," AJSL 35 (1919), p. 165; see also K. Tallqvist, Sumerisch/ Akkadische Namen der Totenwelt (1934), p. 35.]:

"Eridu is employed as a name of the apsu, just as Kutu (Kutha), the city of Nergal, is a common name of Aralu."

Thus, it would be the very confidence in the custom of giving many names to the same topos – and in "synonyms" in general – which enforces, so to speak, distorted translations. It is a matter of course that the final decision will rest with those who know Sumerian an Akkadian, in the future: spontaneous angry refusals should not be accepted. Taught by bad experience with the Egyptian dictionary (Aegyptisches Worterbuch) that renders thirty-seven Egyptian special termini with the one word Himmel, we suspect the Assyriologists to handle their "underworld" accordingly – and their "heaven," of course. The authors of the Assyrian Dictionary do try to be as specific as possible, admittedly, so they deliver several particular significations of ersetu vol. 4, pp. 308-13):

"(1) the earth (in cosmic sense);

(2) the nether world;

(3) land, territory, district, quarter of a city, area;

(4) earth (in concrete sense), soil, ground, dry land";

but translations being a function of the expectations of the translator, the categories are bound to look fundamentally different, once several of them are expected to represent sections of the sphere.

But where does the proportion, Gilgamesh belongs to Ersetu, Nergal to Arallu, lead us to? This is not yet to be made out properly; too many riddles lurk behind every word. About the mes-tree, Marduk knew to tell (in the Era Epic) that it "had its roots in the wide sea, in the depth of Arallu, and its top attained High Heaven," asking Era reproachfully "Because of this work which thou, 0 hero, didst command to be done, where is the mes-tree, flesh of the gods, adornment of kings?" (S. Langdon, Semitic Mythology [1931], p. 140). Concerning the Mashu mountain (Mashu = twin) watched by the Scorpion-men, the GE says: "Whose peaks reach to the vault of heaven (And) whose breast reach to the nether world below," this "nether world" being Arallu. We knew all the time, certainly, that we were up to Scorpius (probably with a part of Sagittarius), but the huge constellation offers sufficient space for more than one way of descending. It is for this reason particularly that we hope for a better understanding from the Indian lunar mansions (1) lambda upsilon Scorpii, alias "the root," alias "the tearer out of the root," alias "Yama's two unfasteners," and (2) Antares, "the eldest," alias "who slays the eldest": in the sense of Precession, the sting of the Scorpion antecedes Antares.

If we knew the precise "extension" of the Scorpion-goddess (Ishara tamtim, Egyptian Selket) we should be better off. And this is the reason: GE Tablet 7, col. 4, l0f., dealing with Enkidu's alleged sick-bed hallucinations, makes Enkidu prophesy to that "harlot" –in the texts of Boghazkoi it is she who has the name Siduri – who had lured him into the city:" [On account of thee (?)] the wife, the mother of seven, shall be forsaken." (Speiser: "[On thy account] shall be forsaken the wife (though) a mother of seven." Ebeling, AOTAT, p. 105: "[Um deinetwillen soll] verlassen werden die Mutter der sieben, die Hauptgattin.") This "mother of seven" should be Ishara tamtim, the Scorpion-goddess whose seven sons are notorious with her [n45 Meissner, Babylonien und Assyrien 2, p. 26; Edzard, Wb. Myth., p. 90] – it is preposterous, anyhow, to associate one or the other righteous housewife in Uruk or elsewhere; but whenever well-bred scholars meet a "harlot" they accept it as their duty to discover moral lectures in the text surrounding her, very touchy they are! The first part of the line, however, is not in existence, and it is, again, their expectation that urges the philologists to supply "[On account of thee (?)]." Here, for a change, Freud would come in handy, but for the sake of the translators, not for the text.

The readable part of the line states nothing else but that "the wife, the mother of seven shall be forsaken." But since we do not know yet the whole extension of the Lady Ishara tamtim who was going to be forsaken, we still do not know the position of Gilgamesh’s "new way" –to ersetu, as we assume, or by way of ersetu. Ersetu might have replaced Ishara tamtim, because we learn right in the beginning of the Era Epic (Tablet 1.28-29, Gossmann, p. 8) that Anu begets "the Sevengods" (ilSIBIti) on Ersetu, translated "the Earth," as companions for Era. The one who doubts that "begetting" is done up there might begin to ponder over the Hurrian texts, where MAR.GID.DA, the Big Dipper (alias the Seven Rishis), begets twins on "the Earth." [n46 The Big Dipper does it on the order of Ea. See H. Otten, Mythen vom Goue Kumarbi. Neue Fragmente (1950), pp. 7f.]. it is evident that we are still far away from the first among the proposed goals, but we prefer to confess to this state of things rather than fall into the bottomless pit of speculation – the very many inviting pits, respectively.

(1) The idea of the Bond of Heaven and Earth is given explicitly. Dur-an-ki, was the name of sanctuaries at Nippur, at Larsa, and probably at Sippar. Also in Semitic markas same u irsiti, Bond of Heaven and Earth, is used of the temple E-hursag-kur-kur-ra and of Babylon.

(2) Idea of Bond of the Land. Probably by extension of religious use the royal palace of Babylon is called markas (bond) of the Land. An ancient Sumerian temple-name, which probably expresses an analogous idea, is "dimgal of the Land." This was the name of the temple of Der, an old Sumerian center beyond the Tigris; a name given to Gudea's temple at Lagash; a temple of Sauska of Niniveh; and probably the temple of Nippur was another "dimgal of the Land." The pronunciation and meaning of dimgal are disputed. "Great binding-post" is perhaps a fair translation. The religious terms "dimgal of the Land" and the like perhaps indicate the temple as a kind of towering landmark which was a center of unity by its height.

(3) Idea of the bond with the underworld. Gudea uses dimgal also with reference to the abzu, i.e., the waters of the underworld: he laid two tern ens, ritual foundations-the temen "above" or "of heaven" and the temen "of the abzu," and the latter is called "great dimgal." The idea may be that the temple is as it were a lofty column, stretching up to heaven and down to the underworld-the vertical bond of the world. The same passage mentions, it seems, a place of libation.

За тучами месяц — и полночь темна,
И звери, и птицы в объятиях сна.
И видит Пиран удивительный сон:
Как солнце, сияющий светоч зажжен.
На троне сидящий с мечом Сиявуш
Взывает: «Что дремлешь, о доблестный муж!
Ты сладкие грезы от глаз отгони
И мыслью проникни в грядущие дни.
День праздничный встанет и молод, и нов.
Сей ночью рождается шах Кей-Хосров!»
Пиран, задрожав, пробудился от сна
И с ним солнцеликая встала жена.
«Ступай, — говорит ей Пиран, — торопись,
Войди осторожно в покой Ференгис.
Сейчас Сиавуша я видел во сне,
Подобного солнцу иль ясной луне.
— Проснись! — призывал меня голос его. -
Настало Хосрова-царя торжество».
Вбежала и видит: царицей-луной*
Царевич рожден красоты неземной.
Вернулась, ликуя, с известьем благим,
Дворец огласив восклицаньем своим.
Сказала: «Младенца пленителен вид,
Как месяц, он взоры красою дивит.
Войди же к царице, на чудо взгляни...»

*В оригинале: «Бегом отправилась Гольшехр (жена Пирана) к луне-красавице, увидела отделившегося от луны шаха»

[1]Карбонатизация (обмен кремнекислотного радикала