Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume V.djvu/581

 CUNEIFORM INSCRIPTIONS 577 COPY AND TRANSLATION OF THE FIEST TEN LINES OF CYLINDER A, IN THE BRITISH MUSEUM. 1. I am Asshurbanipal, descendant of Asshur and Beltis, 2. son of the great king of Bitriduti (or Eriduti),* 3. whom Asshur and Sin, the lord of crowns, from distant days, 4. the account of his name prophesied to the kingdom, 6. and in the body (of his mother was made to) rule Assyria. 6. Shamas, Vul, (and Ishtar in) their supreme power 7. commanded the establishment of his kingdom. 8. Asshur-ah-iddina (or Esarhaddon), king of Assyria, the father my begetter, 9. the will of Asshur and Beltis, the gods his protectors, fulfilled, 10. who commanded him to form my kingdom. the Lydian kings Gyges and Ardys, the con- quest of Babylonia, Susiana, and Arabia, and various other matters treated by the Greek historians. One of the most recent and in many respects most curious additions to our knowledge has also been made by Mr. Smith. In December, 1872, he read before the Biblical archaeological society in London a paper de- scribing a series of inscriptions upon tablets, originally at least twelve in number, and con- sisting entirely of legends relating to the del- uge. Of these tablets some are missing, some are so broken and mutilated as to be unintelli- gible, and all are more or less injured. But the eleventh tablet, which gives the details of the story of the deluge, is the best preserved, and it contains nearly 300 lines of cuneiform wri- ting. Mr. Smith gives an English translation of its contents. In the general features of its account of the deluge it agrees with that in Scripture. A great flood was- sent upon the earth to punish men for their wickedness. One man, Sisit (the Xisuthrus of the Greeks), re- ceives a divine warning and a command to build a huge ship, and to take into it a chosen few only of mankind, together with some of all other living things. The flood came, then palace of Nineveh. subsided ; the ship grounded upon a mountain ; birds were sent out and returned twice, but the third time returned no more. Then Sisit went forth, built an altar, and made a sacrifice. Fragments of a Tablet from which the Account of the Deluge was deciphered. Such are the main points in which the inscrip- tion agrees with the Mosaic writings ; but in almost all the details, where there is precision in the statements, the accounts diner, and the
 * Supposed to have been the name of the harem of the