Atra-Hasis () is an 18th-century BC Akkadian epic, recorded in various versions on clay tabletsAncestor of the West: Writing, Reasoning, and Religion in Mesopotamia, Elam, and Greece. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. . p. 40. and named for one of its protagonists, the priest Atra-Hasis ('exceedingly wise'). The narrative has its origins in Sumerian historiography and comprises four focal points: An organisation of allied upper and lower gods shaping Mesopotamia agriculturally; a political conflict between them, pacified by manufacturing of a first human couple to serve as their labour force; the human's mass reproduction within a few millennia; and a devastating deluge linked to the intention of the upper gods to destroy their imperfect artificial creatures.
Atrahasis is a relatively late epic of the flood myth ubiquitous in Mesopotamia; its oldest known versions date from the Ur III period, followed by an almost unbroken chain of transmission comprising Akkadian, Babylonian, Biblical and Qur’anic accounts (cf. flood myth). Recent research suggests that the relatively rapid rise in sea levels at the end of the last Ice Age may have formed the actual backdrop to this narrative – such an event suggests that ‘it is likely to have made an impression on the emerging settled communities (…), particularly given that the population living in the affected areas had become fully literate within three millennia of the last flood.' (J. Rose)
Atra-Hasis himself is first mentioned in the Sumerian King List as a ruler of Shuruppak, which, according to another of its accounts, was one of the earliest city-states in the period before that great deluge."Sumerian King List." WB 62, circa 2000 BC. The oldest known copy of the epic tradition concerning Atrahasis can be dated by colophon to the reign of Hammurabi’s great-grandson, Ammi-Saduqa (1646–1626 BC).The variant versions are not direct translations of a single original. However, various Old Babylonian dialect fragments exist, one more was recovered in Ugarit, and the epic continued to be copied into the first millennium BC.
The story of Atrahasis also exists in Assyrian dialect versions, rediscovered in the Library of Ashurbanipal, though its translations have been uncertain due to the artifact being in fragmentary condition and containing ambiguous words. Nonetheless, its fragments were first assembled and translated by George Smith as The Chaldean Account of Genesis, the hero of which had his name corrected to Atra-Hasis by Heinrich Zimmern in 1899. In 1965, Wilfred G. Lambert and Alan MillardLambert, Wilfred G., and Alan Millard. 1965. Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the British Museum. London. published many additional texts belonging to the epic, including an Old Babylonian copy (written c. 1650 BC) which is the most complete recension of the tale to have survived. These new texts greatly increased knowledge of the epic and were the basis for Lambert and Millard’s first English translation of the Atrahasis epic in something approaching entirety.Lambert, Wilfred G., and Alan R. Millard. 1999 . Atrahasis: The Babylonian Story of the Flood. London: Eisenbrauns. .
Myths and facts The epic of Atra-Hasis contains the myth of the creation of mankind by Enlil, Anu and Enki, also known as Anunnaki and Igigi, the superior and the inferior gods. They seem to have been united in an organization similar to that which existed in Greece between Zeus – as ‘pure spirit or air’ the leading party – and the groups round Poseidon (water) and Hades (earth).Walter Burkert traces the model drawn from Atrahasis to a corresponding passage, the division by lots of the air, underworld and sea among Zeus, Hades, and Poseidon in the Iliad, in which “a resetting through which the foreign framework still shows” (pp. 88–91).Burkert, Walter. 1992. The Orientalizing Revolution: Near Eastern Influence on Greek Culture in the Early Archaic Age. Harvard University Press. The Eridu Genesis resembles Atrahasis in some central aspects. It recounts the dawn of civilisation—how the gods brought their various inventions down from a sacred Mount to earth, even hinting that the groups of prehistoric man previously roamed Mesopotamia as free nomads.
Overview In the main, the epic reports on a conflict between some groups of Sumerian gods and draws on the myth of the separation of air and earth ‘above’ and ‘below’ in the midst of the cosmic freshwater primordial ocean to clarify their hierarchical relationship. (Cf. Enūma Eliš and The Seven Tablets of Creation).King, L.W. (1902). The Seven Tablets of Creation. Tablet IV, lines 137–140. Enlil – "Lord Wind" – represents the leading party in the council of gods; the party of Anunnaki around Anu belongs more to the upper heaven, and that of Igigi around Enki more to that below the earth sphere.
All three parties are bound by the Tablet of Destinies, which Enlil is the only one to possess. In the Sumerian myths, it was bestowed on him by the earth mother goddess Ninḫursag herself (cf. Anzu myth). His aptitude as the greatest warrior and chief strategist of the divine tribal alliance gives him power over the other parties of gods; only he has the ability to transform present circumstances back into their original state – redefining the course of fate.
As a permanent legal document the tablet was provided with a seal, a sign mechanically applied by means of a special technique, which in ancient Mesopotamia was regarded as a symbol of a contract. Contracts have been directly related to tribute payments to be made: often to shares of the food produced (see the cattle to be divided equitably between Prometheus and Zeus), but generally to assistance in battle or labour, such as the construction of mighty irrigation channels as described in the epic discussed here. As far as the male groups of gods were concerned, the separate task of reproduction fell to the seven divine wombs, the shassuratu presided over by Ninḫursag (Mami).
The plot of the epic follows a simple pattern:
The creation of earth and all creatures that inhabit it is already complete. An organisation of at least three male parties of gods exist; they seem to specialise in ‘thinkers and workers’. The gods doing the hardest farm labour are dissatisfied and rise up against Enlil (master of the universe). With help of divine women, the victorious party arranges the production of a first pair of humans who, with all their descendants, are to serve all the gods as labour slaves for eternity. As a result of their unrestrained multiplication, an overpopulation crisis breaks out. The upper gods try to get this under control in various ways, one last time by triggering a global flood to wipe out humanity. A single fertile human couple survives – thanks to an act of sabotage by one of the lower gods. In the end, the quarrelling rulers of Mesopotamia agree on a utopian method to reduce the reproduction of their creatures to a tolerable level.
Synopsis
Tablet I The epos taking place according to its incipit, "When the gods had to work like humans (inuma ilu awilum = when the gods were humans)", there was a quarrel between the upper Anunnaki and the Igigu, the lower gods. While the latter had the task of ensuring the supply of the land through construction of irrigation canals by digging out the beds of big rivers, the Anunnaki ruled from above, presumably watching over the implementation of their plans and dividing the fruits of this great civilising project as they saw fit. After 40 years, however, the lesser gods rebelled and refused to do strenuous labor. At night, they surrounded the dwelling place of Enlil, who was considered the main god of Sumerian civilisation, the separator of air and earth in the midst of the cosmic ocean.
Enlil was surprised and called for Anu and Enki. Nusku, one of the sons and Enlil's ambassador here, tried to negotiate with the rebellious party, but had no success. Enlil, who also was the benevolent, wise leader of all the gods, didn't want a battle with the risk of serious injuries and deaths, and to avoid this he devised the plan to create easily controllable (obedient) humans to do the hard labour in place of the rebellious gods. He asked Mami – leader of the 7 goddess wombs – if she could help. Mami declared that she could only fulfil this request with Enki's assistance. Enki, agreeing, advised the assembly of all gods that they should first cleanse themselves for everything else. They do. On the fifteenth day of this project, he cut up Geshtu-E – 'ear', a partie of lesser gods who listened to the higher ones wisdomOn some tablets the slained under-god is called Weila or Aw-ilu. – into pieces (cf. Plato's dissection of the rebellious spherical people into weak single individuals) and began to create the first human being to the sound of drums. He took clay from the soil of the steppe (Mami was regarded as primordial mother earth, so with the clay from her body female fertility came into play here), mixed it with the spilt blood and added a touch of cosmic water, bringing it to its living form. When the creature awoke, Mami approached, handed it a carrying basket and taught it to work for the gods from then on.(There is a gap in the tablet; when it resumes, a woman is placed beside the man, whereby both start their sexual reproduction at Mami's command. Whether the original text let create the woman in the same way as the man or introduced her in a different manner can only be speculated upon due to the missing passage. However, two things are certain: 1- The pairing of man and woman here serves to pacify a political conflict, embodying a narrative that also appears in other myths. Cf. Pandora as a fatal gift for Epimetheus, crafted by the leading group of gods around Zeus with help of Athena; and the taming of the animal-man Enkidu through seduction by an irresistibly beautiful women. 2- The biblical Genesis, about a thousand years younger, was influenced in many ways by the Sumerians, but shows one striking difference above all: Instead of an alliance of three humanly quarreling groups of gods, the singular-omnipotent God of monotheistic religion now appears as The Creator. Like in Atrahasis, the manufacture of man then begins first and again from the clayey soil of the steppe Eden; only after this does the story shift to the theme of woman, "Eve". Fashioned from a part of the male body, "Adam" for this intervention is cast into a deep sleep, with God's following argument: "It is not good that man should be alone; I will make him a helper comparable to him." Gen. 2, 18-22)
To complete the construction of humans in the optimal way, Mami encouraged the young couple to celebrate a seven-day feast in honour of Isthar, the goddess of war and sexuality.* Both obeyed. After 9 months, the land of the gods gave birth to its first human child, whose purpose in life was to be the same as that of his parents.
(* Cf. Gilgamesh epic: there, too, the gods arranged a seven-day sexual act to pacify a kind of cold war. Protagonists are Enkidu: an almost invincible, rebellious animal-man or son of the "Gazelle" clan, and the female temple servant Shamkat, endowed with all advantages necessary for that purpose. Enkidu, who had previously destroyed so many animal traps with his fierce group of relatives, fell into this new type of trap: after having sex for 7 days, he was weakened – his herd of alleged animals fled into the steppe in horror. He was shocked of his lonely separation, but Shamkat, unaware that she was only following the gods' plan to domesticate Enkidu, transforming the beast into human, tried to comfort him: "Don't grieve; you have knowledge now, just like the gods!" See also Adam's initial loneliness in paradise, and, after Eve's creation, their shared enjoyment of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge.)