Page:The Chaldean Account of Genesis (1876).djvu/88

 8. on tablets I wrote, I studied, I observed, and

9. for the inspection of my people within my palace I placed

This colophon will serve to show the value attached to the documents, and the date of the present copies.

The fragment of the obverse, broken as it is, is precious as giving the description of the chaos or desolate void before the Creation of the world, and the first movement of creation. This corresponds to the first two verses of the first chapter of Genesis.

1. "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

2. And the earth was without form and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters."

On comparing the fragment of the first tablat of the Creation with the extract from Damascius, we do not find any statement as to there being two principles at first called Tauthe and Apason, and these producing Moymis, but in the Creation tablet the first existence is called Mummu Tiamatu, a name meaning the "sea-water" or "sea chaos." The name Mummu Tiamatu combines the two names Moymis and Tauthe of Damascius. Tiamatu appears also as Tisallat and agrees with the Thalatth of Berosus, which we are expressly told was the sea. It is evident that, according to the notion of the Babylonians, the sea was the origin of all things, and this also agrees with the statement of Genesis, i. 2. where the chaotic waters are called, "the deep," the same word as