The Euphrates River, although less capricious than the great rivers of China, is subject to major floods and changes in course. The Flood is a common myth in all of Mesopotamia, existing in several versions. The oldest written version, written in Sumerian and discovered at Nippur, is unfortunately in very poor condition.[12] The most well-known version, the one that very likely inspired the biblical account in Genesis, is part of The Epic of Gilgamesh, a Babylonian account written in the first half of the IInd millennium BC in which the description of the event is situated in the Sumerian city of Shuruppak. Here is an extract:
“That stated time had arrived. In the morning he let loaves of bread shower down, and in the evening a rain of wheat. I watched the appearance of the weather—the weather was frightful to behold! I went into the boat and sealed the entry….
Just as dawn began to glow there arose from the horizon a black cloud. Adad rumbled inside of it, before him went Shullat and Hanish, heralds going over mountain and land. Erragal pulled out the mooring poles, forth went Ninurta and made the dikes overflow. The Anunnaki lifted up the torches, setting the land ablaze with their flare. Stunned shock over Adad’s deeds overtook the heavens, and turned to blackness all that had been light. The… land shattered like
a… pot. All day long the South Wind blew blowing fast, submerging the mountain in water,
overwhelming the people like an attack….
When the seventh day arrived, the storm was pounding, the flood was a war—struggling with itself like a woman writhing (in labor). The sea calmed, fell still, the whirlwind (and) flood stopped up.
I looked around all day long—quiet had set in and all the human beings had turned to clay! The terrain was as flat as a roof.”1J
Initially attracted by the desire to find traces of the great events of the Bible in the soil of Mesopotamia, archaeologists have searched for the ruins of the Sumerian villages in the signatures of the geological strata. Their studies have revealed significant and long-duration flood deposits, but only in some cities, and from different eras: At Ur from between 4500 and 4000 BC and then another episode dating from 2800 to 2600 BC; at Kish from three periods between 2800 and 2600 BC; and at Shuruppak, actually about 2900 BC.[13] [14] This city, which had been quite populous before, never again attained such status. No trace was found in the very ancient city of Eridu, despite its proximity to Ur (see Figure 1.3 or Figure 2.1 of Chapter 2 for the geography of these cities.)
