Page:The Chaldean Account of Genesis (1876).djvu/316

 accounts, the Bible stating that only eight persons, all of the family of Noah, were saved, while the inscription includes his servants, friends, and boatmen or pilots; but certainly the most remarkable difference between the two is with respect to the duration of the deluge. On this point the inscription gives seven days for the flood, and seven days for the resting of the ark on the mountain, while the Bible gives the commencement of the flood on the 17th day of the second month and its termination on the 27th day of the second month in the following year, making a total duration of one year and ten days. Here it may be remarked, that those scholars who believe in two distinct documents being included in Genesis, hold that in the Jehovistic narrative the statement is that the flood lasted forty days, which is certainly nearer to the time specified in the cuneiform text. Forty is, however, often an ambiguous word, meaning "many," and not necessarily fixing exactly the number. There is again a difference as to the mountain on which the ark rested; Nizir, the place mentioned in the cuneiform text, being east of Assyria, probably between latitudes 35° and 6° (see "Assyrian Discoveries," pp. 216, 217), while Ararat, the mountain mentioned in the Bible, was north of Assyria, near Lake Van. It is evident that different traditions have placed the mountain of the ark in totally different positions, and there is not positive proof as to which is the earlier traditionary spot. The word Ararat is derived from an old Babylonian Avord Urdu, meaning "highland," and might be a