Flood myth

A flood myth or deluge myth is a narrative in which a

great flood, usually sent by a deity or deities, destroys
civilization, often in an act of divine retribution. Parallels
are often drawn between the flood waters of these myths
and the primaeval waters found in certain creation myths,
as the flood waters are described as a measure for the
cleansing of humanity, in preparation for rebirth. Most
flood myths also contain a culture hero, who "represents
the human craving for life".[1]

The flood myth motif is found among many cultures as

seen in the Mesopotamian flood stories, Deucalion and
Pyrrha in Greek mythology, the Genesis flood narrative,
Pralaya in Hinduism, the Gun-Yu in Chinese mythology,
Bergelmir in Norse mythology, in the arrival of the first
inhabitants of Ireland with Cessair in Irish mythology, in
the lore of the K'iche' and Maya peoples in Mesoamerica,
the Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwa tribe of Native Americans "The Deluge", frontispiece to Gustave
in North America, the Muisca, and Cañari Confederation, Doré's illustrated edition of the Bible.
in South America, Africa, and some Aboriginal tribes in
Australia.

Contents
Mythologies
Historicity
Art
See also
References
Bibliography

Mythologies
Though the account of Noah in the Hebrew Bible has long been the most studied flood story by scholars,
in the 19th century Assyriologist George Smith translated the first Babylonian account of a great flood.[2]
Further discoveries produced several versions of the Mesopotamian flood myth, with the account closest
to that in Genesis found in a 700 BC Babylonian copy of the Epic of Gilgamesh.[3]:20–27 The known
versions of the Mesopotamian flood myths have as their protagonists Atrahasis (in the 18th century BC
Atrahasis Epic), Ziusudra (in the 17th century BC Sumerian Flood Story), and Utnapishtim (in the 7th
century BC Gilgamesh flood myth).[4] The Sumerian King List relies on the flood motif to divide its
 history into preflood (antediluvian) and postflood periods. The
preflood kings were claimed to have had enormous lifespans,
whereas postflood lifespans in the list were much reduced. The
Sumerian flood myth found in the Deluge Tablet was the epic of
Ziusudra, who heard the gods' plan to destroy humanity, in
response to which he constructed a vessel that delivered him from
great waters.[5] In the more detailed Mesopotamian accounts of
the flood, the Gilgamesh flood myth and the epic of Atrahasis,
Tablet XI or the Flood Tablet of the
the highest god Enlil decides to destroy the world with a flood
Epic of Gilgamesh
because humans have become too noisy.[4] The god Ea, who
created humans out of clay and divine blood, secretly warns the
hero Utnapishtim of the impending flood and gives him detailed instructions for building a boat so that
life may survive.[4][6]

In the c. 6th century BC[7] Book of Genesis, the god Yahweh, who
created man out of the dust of the ground,[8] decides to flood the earth
because of the sinful state of mankind. It is also Yahweh who then gives
the protagonist Noah instructions to build an ark in order to preserve
human and animal life. When the ark is completed, Noah, his family, and
representatives of all the animals of the earth are called upon to enter the
ark. When the destructive flood begins, all life outside of the ark
perishes. After the waters recede, all those aboard the ark disembark and
have Yahweh's promise that he will never judge the earth with a flood
again. He causes a rainbow to form as the sign of this promise.[9]

In Hindu mythology, texts such as the Satapatha Brahmana (dated to

George Smith, who
around the 6th century BC)[10] and the Puranas contain the story of a
discovered and translated
great flood, "Pralaya",[11] wherein the Matsya Avatar of the Vishnu the Epic of Gilgamesh
warns the first man, Manu, of the impending flood, and also advises him
to build a giant boat.[12][13][14] In Zoroastrian Mazdaism, Ahriman tries
to destroy the world with a drought, which Mithra ends by shooting an arrow into a rock, from which a
flood springs; one man survives in an ark with his cattle.[15]

In Plato's Timaeus, written c. 360 BC, Timaeus describes a flood myth similar to the earlier versions. In
it, the Bronze race of humans angers the high god Zeus with their constant warring. Zeus decides to
punish humanity with a flood. The Titan Prometheus, who had created humans from clay, tells the secret
plan to Deucalion, advising him to build an ark in order to be saved. After nine nights and days, the water
starts receding and the ark lands on a mountain.[16]

Historicity
A world-wide deluge, such as described in Genesis, is incompatible with modern scientific understanding
of natural history, especially geology and paleontology.[17][18] In an early example of ichnology,
Leonardo da Vinci explains in his notebooks that the fossils of marine shells would have been scattered
in such a deluge, and not gathered in groups, which were evidently left at various times on mountains in
Lombardy; he also doubts that so much water could have evaporated away from the Earth.[19]

In ancient Mesopotamia, the Sumerian King List reads:

 After kingship came down from heaven ... the kingship was taken to Shuruppak. In
Shuruppak, Ubara-Tutu became king; he ruled for 5 sars and 1 ner. In 5 cities 8 kings; they
ruled for 241,200 years. Then the flood swept over.[20]

Excavations in Iraq have revealed evidence of localized flooding at Shuruppak (modern Tell Fara, Iraq)
and various other Sumerian cities. A layer of riverine sediments, radiocarbon dated to about 2900 BC,
interrupts the continuity of settlement, extending as far north as the city of Kish, which took over
hegemony after the flood. Polychrome pottery from the Jemdet Nasr period (3000–2900 BC) was
discovered immediately below the Shuruppak flood stratum. Other sites, such as Ur, Kish, Uruk, Lagash,
and Ninevah, all present evidence of flooding. However, this evidence comes from different time
periods.[21] The Shuruppak flood seems to have been a localised event caused through the damming of
the Karun River through the spread of dunes, flooding into the Tigris, and simultaneous heavy rainfall in
the Nineveh region, spilling across into the Euphrates. In Israel, there is no such evidence of a
widespread flood.[22] Given the similarities in the Mesopotamian flood story and the Biblical account, it
would seem that they have a common origin in the memories of the Shuruppak account.[23]

Floods in the wake of the last glacial period may have

inspired myths that survive to this day.[24] It has been
postulated that the deluge myth in North America may be
based on a sudden rise in sea levels caused by the rapid
draining of prehistoric Lake Agassiz at the end of the last
Ice Age, about 8,400 years ago.[25]

The geography of the Mesopotamian area was considerably

changed by the filling of the Persian Gulf after sea waters Earth's sea level rose dramatically in the
rose following the last glacial period. Global sea levels millennia after the Last Glacial Maximum
were about 120 m (390 ft) lower around 18,000 BP and
rose until 8,000 BP when they reached current levels,
which are now an average 40 m (130 ft) above the floor of the Gulf, which was a huge (800 km × 200 km
(500 mi × 120 mi)) low-lying and fertile region in Mesopotamia, in which human habitation is thought to
have been strong around the Gulf Oasis for 100,000 years. A sudden increase in settlements above the
present water level is recorded at around 7,500 BP.[26][27]

Adrienne Mayor promoted the hypothesis that global flood stories were inspired by ancient observations
of seashells and fish fossils in inland and mountain areas. The ancient Greeks, Egyptians, and Romans all
documented the discovery of such remains in these locations; the Greeks hypothesized that Earth had
been covered by water on several occasions, citing the seashells and fish fossils found on mountain tops
as evidence of this history.[28]

Another hypothesis is that a meteor or comet crashed into the Indian Ocean around 3000–2800 BC,
created the 30-kilometre (19 mi) undersea Burckle Crater, and generated a giant tsunami that flooded
coastal lands.[29] Some of the largest tsunamis in history, resulting from the Chicxulub impact, 66 million
years ago, were thought to have affected roughly the entire Americas (or nearly all of the Western
Hemisphere).[30]

In the late 17th century, there were famous speculations accounting for the Genesis flood by natural
causes. Thomas Burnet’s Telluris Theoria Sacra (Sacred Theory of the Earth) had water rising from the
hollow earth. William Whiston's A New Theory of the Earth postulated that major changes in the earth’s
history could be attributed to the action of comets.

Speculation regarding the Deucalion myth has also been introduced, whereby a large tsunami in the
Mediterranean Sea, caused by the Thera eruption (with an approximate geological date of 1630–
1600 BC), is the myth's historical basis. Although the tsunami hit the South Aegean Sea and Crete, it did
not affect cities in the mainland of Greece, such as Mycenae, Athens, and Thebes, which continued to
prosper, indicating that it had a local rather than a regionwide effect.[31]

One quite controversial hypotheses of long-term flooding is the Black Sea deluge hypothesis, which
argues for a catastrophic deluge about 5600 BC from the Mediterranean Sea into the Black Sea. This has
been the subject of considerable discussion.[32][33] The Younger Dryas impact hypothesis is another
proposed natural explanation for flood myths, but this idea is similarly controversial.

Art

18th century Matsya-avatara of Nanabozho in The Great Flood, by

engraving of the Lord Vishnu pulls Ojibwe flood story anonymous painter,
great flood Manu's boat after from an illustration The vom Rath
having defeated the by R.C. Armour, in bequest,
demon his book North Rijksmuseum
American Indian
Fairy Tales, Folklore
and Legends,
(1905)

The Flood of Noah

and Companions, by
Léon Comerre, c.
1911. Oil on canvas.
Fine Arts Museum
of Nantes
See also
List of flood myths
Atlantis

References
1. Leeming, David (2004). Flood | The Oxford Companion to World Mythology (https://books.g
oogle.co.uk/books?id=kQFtlva3HaYC&pg=PA138). Oxford University Press.
ISBN 9780195156690. Retrieved 17 September 2010.
2. "Secrets of Noah's Ark - Transcript" (https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/video/secrets-of-noahs
-ark). Nova. PBS. 7 October 2015. Retrieved 27 May 2019.
3. Cline, Eric H. (2007). From Eden to Exile: Unraveling Mysteries of the Bible (https://books.g
oogle.com/?id=bJW-zhffwk4C&printsec=frontcover&dq=From+Eden+to+Exile:+Unraveling+
Mysteries+of+the+Bible#v=onepage&q=From%20Eden%20to%20Exile%3A%20Unravelin
g%20Mysteries%20of%20the%20Bible&f=false). National Geographic. ISBN 978-1-4262-
0084-7.
4. Finkel, Irving. The Ark Before Noah. Doubleday, 2014.
5. Bandstra 2009, p. 61, 62.
6. Pritchard, James B. (ed.), Ancient Near Eastern Texts Relating to the Old Testament
(Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1955, 1969). 1950 1st edition at Google Books
(https://books.google.com/books?id=885iAAAAMAAJ). p.44: "...a flood [will sweep] over the
cult-centers; to destroy the seed of mankind; is the decision, the word of the assembly [of
the gods]."
7. Davies, G.I (1998). "Introduction to the Pentateuch" (https://books.google.com/books?id=3s
urkLVdw3UC&pg=PA12&dq=Oxford+Bible+Commentary+Introduction+to+the+Pentateuch#
v=onepage&q=Oxford%20Bible%20Commentary%20Introduction%20to%20the%20Pentate
uch&f=false). In John Barton (ed.). Oxford Bible Commentary (https://archive.org/details/oxf
ordbiblecomme0000unse). Oxford University Press. ISBN 9780198755005.
8. Davidson, Robert (1973). Genesis 1–11 (https://books.google.com/?id=7cIb7DvR5BsC&pri
ntsec=frontcover&dq=genesis#v=onepage&q&f=false). Cambridge University Press. p. 30.
ISBN 9780521097604.
9. Cotter, David W. (2003). Genesis (https://books.google.com/books?id=6lCVzr4cT9QC&print
sec=frontcover&dq=Genesis+David+W.+Cotter#v=onepage&q=great%20flood&f=false).
Collegeville, MN: Liturgical press. p. 49. ISBN 0814650406.
10. "Early Indian history: Linguistic and textual parametres." (http://www.people.fas.harvard.ed
u/~witzel/Erdosy1995.pdf) in The Indo-Aryans of Ancient South Asia, edited by G. Erdosy
(1995), p. 136
11. The great flood – Hindu style (Satapatha Brahmana) (http://www.vedanta-atlanta.org/storie
s/flood.html).
12. Matsya (http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/369611/Matsya) Britannica.com
13. Klostermaier, Klaus K. (2007). A Survey of Hinduism (https://books.google.com/books?id=E
_6-JbUiHB4C&pg=PA97&lpg=PA97&dq=the+great+flood+in+Hinduism#v=onepage&q=th
e%20great%20flood%20in%20Hinduism). SUNY Press. p. 97. ISBN 978-0-7914-7082-4.
14. Sehgal, Sunil (1999). Encyclopaedia of Hinduism: T–Z, Volume 5 (https://books.google.co
m/books?id=zWG64bgtf3sC&pg=PA401&dq=Noah%27s+Ark+in+Hinduism#v=onepage&q=
Noah%27s%20Ark%20in%20Hinduism). Sarup & Sons. p. 401. ISBN 81-7625-064-3.
15. Smith, Homer W. (1952). Man and His Gods. New York: Grosset & Dunlap. pp. 128–29.
16. Plato's Timaeus. Greek text: http://www.24grammata.com/wp-
content/uploads/2011/01/Platon-Timaios.pdf
17. Montgomery, David R. (2012). The Rocks Don't Lie: A Geologist Investigates Noah's Flood
(https://books.google.com/books?id=92tuITDWvCYC#v=onepage&q=geology%20rocks%20
creationism). Norton. ISBN 9780393082395.
18. Weber, Christopher Gregory (1980). "The Fatal Flaws of Flood Geology" (http://ncse.com/ce
j/1/1/fatal-flaws-flood-geology). Creation Evolution Journal. 1 (1): 24–37.
19. Da Vinci, Leonardo (1971). Taylor, Pamela (ed.). The Notebooks of Leonardo da Vinci. New
American Library. pp. 136–38, 142–48.
20. Langdon, S. (1923). The Weld-Blundell Collection, vol. II. Historical Inscriptions, Containing
Principally the Chronological Prism, W-B. 444,. [PDF] Oxford University Press. Available at:
http://etana.org/sites/default/files/coretexts/20340.pdf [Accessed 22 Sep. 2018].
21. Bandstra 2009, p. 62: (Parrot, 1955)
22. Bandstra 2009, p. 62.
23. Hendel, Ronald S.(1987), "Of Demigods and the Deluge: towards an interpretation of
Genesis 6:1-4" (Journal of Biblical Literature, Vol 186 No 1)
24. "Biblical-Type Floods Are Real, and They're Absolutely Enormous" (http://discovermagazin
e.com/2012/jul-aug/06-biblical-type-floods-real-absolutely-enormous).
DiscoverMagazine.com. 2012-08-29. Retrieved 2015-08-18.
25. Early days among the Cheyanne & Arapahoe Indians by John H. Seger, page 135 ISBN 0-
8061-1533-5
26. Lost Civilization Under Persian Gulf? (https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/12/1012
08151609.htm), Science Daily, Dec 8, 2010
27. Rose, Jeffrey I. (December 2010), "New Light on Human Prehistory in the Arabo-Persian
Gulf Oasis" (https://zenodo.org/record/896327), Current Anthropology, 51 (6): 849–883,
doi:10.1086/657397 (https://doi.org/10.1086%2F657397)
28. Mayor, Adrienne (2011). The First Fossil Hunters: Paleontology in Greek and Roman
Times: with a new introduction by the author. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
ISBN 978-0691058634.
29. Carney, Scott (November 7, 2007). "Did a comet cause the great flood?" (http://discovermag
azine.com/2007/nov/did-a-comet-cause-the-great-flood). Discover Magazine. Retrieved
17 September 2010.
30. Braun, David Maxwell (4 March 2010). "Asteroid terminated dinosaur era in a matter of
days" (http://voices.nationalgeographic.com/2010/03/04/asteroid_terminated_dinosaur_era_
in_days/). National Geographic Society (blogs). Retrieved 29 July 2017.
31. Castleden, Rodney (2001) "Atlantis Destroyed" (Routledge).
32. "'Noah's Flood' Not Rooted in Reality, After All? (http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2
009/02/090206-smaller-noah-flood.html)" National Geographic News, February 6, 2009.
33. Sarah Hoyle (November 18, 2007). "Noah's flood kick-started European farming" (http://ww
w.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-11/uoe-fk111507.php). University of Exeter. Retrieved
17 September 2010.

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Bandstra, Barry L. (2009). Reading the Old Testament : an introduction to the Hebrew Bible
(https://books.google.com/books?id=vRY9mTUZKJcC&pg=PA489&lpg=PA489&dq=Bandstr
a,+Barry+L+%282004%29.+Reading+the+Old+Testament:+an+introduction+to+the+Hebre
w+Bible#v=snippet&q=flood&f=false) (4th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/ Cengage
Learning. pp. 59–62. ISBN 978-0495391050.
Flood myth (mythology) (https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/210512) at the
Encyclopædia Britannica
 Bailey, Lloyd R. Noah, the Person and the Story, University of South Carolina Press, 1989.
ISBN 0-87249-637-6
Best, Robert M. Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic, Sumerian Origins of the Flood Myth,
1999, ISBN 0-9667840-1-4.
Dundes, Alan (ed.) The Flood Myth, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1988. ISBN 0-
520-05973-5 / 0520059735
Faulkes, Anthony (trans.) Edda (Snorri Sturluson). Everyman's Library, 1987. ISBN 0-460-
87616-3.
Greenway, John (ed.), The Primitive Reader, Folkways, 1965.
Grey, G. Polynesian Mythology. Whitcombe and Tombs, Christchurch, 1956.
Lambert, W. G. and Millard, A. R., Atrahasis: The Babylonian Story of the Flood,
Eisenbrauns, 1999. ISBN 1-57506-039-6.
Masse, W. B. "The Archaeology and Anthropology of Quaternary Period Cosmic Impact", in
Bobrowsky, P., and Rickman, H. (eds.) Comet/Asteroid Impacts and Human Society: An
Interdisciplinary Approach Berlin, Springer Press, 2007. p. 25–70.
Reed, A. W. Treasury of Maori Folklore A.H. & A.W. Reed, Wellington, 1963.
Reedy, Anaru (trans.), Nga Korero a Pita Kapiti: The Teachings of Pita Kapiti. Canterbury
University Press, Christchurch, 1997.

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