The word Atrahasis means extra wise and refers to the earliest known name of Noah, who built an ark and saved mankind from destruction. This is that story, from ancient Sumeria, which many scholars believe was the original from which all known flood stories came from. This was the most popular story in the ancient world and has survived for over five thousand years. It is the only one that all cultures, worldwide, seem to share. Why? Was there really a great flood? And why do we not explore the oldest known version carefully for clues? That is the purpose of this book, which also includes a number of other interesting flood story fragments and documents.

Originally published: Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969.

Most cultures have myths of origin. The Babylonians were the first to combine blocks of traditions about primeval time into primeval histories where humans had a central role. In the first millennium there were different versions that influenced the concepts of primeval history within Jewish religion, both in the Bible and in the parallel Enochic tradition. Atrahasis and the traditions of primeval dynasties had crucial impact on Genesis; the traditions of the primeval apkallus as cosmic guardians were lying behind the Enochic Watcher Story. The book offers a comprehensive analytic comparison between the images of primeval time in these three traditions. It presents new interpretations of each of these traditions and how they relate to each other.

The stories translated here all of ancient Mesopotamia, and include not only myths about the Creation and stories of the Flood, but also the longest and greatest literary composition, the Epic of Gilgamesh. This is the story of a heroic quest for fame and immortality, pursued by a man of great strength who loses a unique opportunity through a moment's weakness. So much has been discovered in recent years both by way of new tablets and points of grammar and lexicography that these new translations by Stephanie Dalley supersede all previous versions. -- from back cover.

The Atrahasis Epic is one of the oldest creation and flood narratives, originally written in ancient cuneiform text and told over three tablets. This book takes the commonalities between the most well known translations and presents them in story form, as opposed to the verse format they were was originally translated into. The Epic is offered as an easy- to- read representation of both the ancient creation and flood stories synonymous with the Genesis accounts. For further understanding of the ancient Epic, the story is segmented into easily digestible sections with the addition of the author's explanations, comments and observations expressed in detailed footnotes that follow and blend with the Atrahasis story.

In The Formation of the Hebrew Bible David Carr rethinks both the methods and historical orientation points for research into the growth of the Hebrew Bible into its present form. Building on his prior work, Writing on the Tablet of the Heart (Oxford, 2005), he explores both the possibilities and limits of reconstruction of pre-stages of the Bible. The method he advocates is a ''methodologically modest'' investigation of those pre-stages, utilizing criteria and models derived from his survey of documented examples of textual revision in the Ancient Near East. The result is a new picture of the formation of the Hebrew Bible, with insights on the initial emergence of Hebrew literary textuality, the development of the first Hexateuch, and the final formation of the Hebrew Bible. Where some have advocated dating the bulk of the Hebrew Bible in a single period, whether relatively early (Neo-Assyrian) or late (Persian or Hellenistic), Carr uncovers specific evidence that the Hebrew Bible contains texts dating across Israelite history, even the early pre-exilic period (10th-9th centuries). He traces the impact of Neo-Assyrian imperialism on eighth and seventh century Israelite textuality. He uses studies of collective trauma to identify marks of the reshaping and collection of traditions in response to the destruction of Jerusalem and Babylonian exile. He develops a picture of varied Priestly reshaping of narrative and prophetic traditions in the Second Temple period, including the move toward eschatological and apocalyptic themes and genres. And he uses manuscript evidence from Qumran and the Septuagint to find clues to the final literary shaping of the proto-Masoretic text, likely under the Hasmonean monarchy.

From the subjects of adoption to Zoroastrianism, this encyclopedia treats readers to numerous entries on the life and times of ancient Mesopotamia. Readers will learn important terms, read biographies of central figures, and analyze brief narratives of pivotal events that transformed Mesopotamia.