Babylonian and Assyrian Literature Part 1

Babylonian and a.s.syrian Literature.

by Anonymous.

SPECIAL INTRODUCTION

The great nation which dwelt in the seventh century before our era on the banks of Tigris and Euphrates flourished in literature as well as in the plastic arts, and had an alphabet of its own. The a.s.syrians sometimes wrote with a sharp reed, for a pen, upon skins, wooden tablets, or papyrus brought from Egypt. In this case they used cursive letters of a Phoenician character. But when they wished to preserve their written doc.u.ments, they employed clay tablets, and a stylus whose bevelled point made an impression like a narrow elongated wedge, or arrow-head. By a combination of these wedges, letters and words were formed by the skilled and practised scribe, who would thus rapidly turn off a vast amount of "copy."

All works of history, poetry, and law were thus written in the cuneiform or old Chaldean characters, and on a substance which could withstand the ravages of time, fire, or water. Hence we have authentic monuments of a.s.syrian literature in their original form, unglossed, unaltered, and ungarbled, and in this respect Chaldean records are actually superior to those of the Greeks, the Hebrews, or the Romans.

The literature of the Chaldeans is very varied in its forms. The hymns to the G.o.ds form an important department, and were doubtless employed in public worship. They are by no means lacking in sublimity of expression, and while quite unmetrical they are proportioned and emphasized, like Hebrew poetry, by means of parallelism. In other respects they resemble the productions of Jewish psalmists, and yet they date as far back as the third millennium before Christ. They seem to have been transcribed in the shape in which we at present have them in the reign of a.s.surbanipal, who was a great patron of letters, and in whose reign libraries were formed in the princ.i.p.al cities. The a.s.syrian renaissance of the seventeenth century B.C. witnessed great activity among scribes and book collectors: modern scholars are deeply indebted to this golden age of letters in Babylonia for many precious and imperishable monuments. It is, however, only within recent years that these works of h.o.a.r antiquity have pa.s.sed from the secluded cell of the specialist and have come within reach of the general reader, or even of the student of literature. For many centuries the cuneiform writing was literally a dead letter to the learned world. The clue to the understanding of this alphabet was originally discovered in 1850 by Colonel Rawlinson, and described by him in a paper read before the Royal Society. Hence the knowledge of a.s.syrian literature is, so far as Europe is concerned, scarcely more than half a century old.

Among the most valuable of historic records to be found among the monuments of any nation are inscriptions, set up on public buildings, in palaces, and in temples. The Greek and Latin inscriptions discovered at various points on the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean have been of priceless value in determining certain questions of philology, as well as in throwing new light on the events of history. Many secrets of language have been revealed, many perplexities of history disentangled, by the words engraven on stone or metal, which the scholar discovers amid the dust of ruined temples, or on the _cippus_ of a tomb. The form of one Greek letter, perhaps even its existence, would never have been guessed but for its discovery in an inscription. If inscriptions are of the highest critical importance and historic interest, in languages which are represented by a voluminous and familiar literature, how much more precious must they be when they record what happened in the remotest dawn of history, surviving among the ruins of a vast empire whose people have vanished from the face of the earth?

Hence the cuneiform inscriptions are of the utmost interest and value, and present the greatest possible attractions to the curious and intelligent reader. They record the deeds and conquests of mighty kings, the Napoleons and Hannibals of primeval time. They throw a vivid light on the splendid sculptures of Nineveh; they give a new interest to the pictures and carvings that describe the building of cities, the marching to war, the battle, by sea and land, of great monarchs whose horse and foot were as mult.i.tudinous as the locusts that in Eastern literature are compared to them. Lovers of the Bible will find in the a.s.syrian inscriptions many confirmations of Scripture history, as well as many parallels to the account of the primitive world in Genesis, and none can give even a cursory glance at these famous remains without feeling his mental horizon widened. We are carried by this writing on the walls of a.s.syrian towns far beyond the little world of the recent centuries; we pa.s.s, as almost modern, the day when Julius Caesar struggled in the surf of Kent against the painted savages of Britain. Nay, the birth of Romulus and Remus is a recent event in comparison with records of incidents in a.s.syrian national life, which occurred not only before Moses lay cradled on the waters of an Egyptian ca.n.a.l, but before Egypt had a single temple or pyramid, three millenniums before the very dawn of history in the valley of the Nile.

But the interest of a.s.syrian Literature is not confined to hymns, or even to inscriptions. A nameless poet has left in the imperishable tablets of a Babylonian library an epic poem of great power and beauty. This is the Epic of Izdubar.

At Dur-Sargina, the city where stood the palace of a.s.syrian monarchs three thousand years ago, were two gigantic human figures, standing between the winged bulls, carved in high relief, at the entrance of the royal residence. These human figures are exactly alike, and represent the same personage--a Colossus with swelling thews, and dressed in a robe of dignity. He strangles a lion by pressing it with brawny arm against his side, as if it were no more than a cat. This figure is that of Izdubar, or Gisdubar, the great central character of a.s.syrian poetry and sculpture, the theme of minstrels, the typical hero of his land, the favored of the G.o.ds. What is called the Epic of Izdubar relates the exploits of this hero, who was born the son of a king in Ourouk of Chaldea. His father was dethroned by the Elamites, and Izdubar was driven into the wilderness and became a mighty hunter. In the half-peopled earth, so lately created, wild beasts had multiplied and threatened the extermination of mankind. The hunter found himself at war with monsters more formidable than even the lion or the wild bull. There were half-human scorpions, bulls with the head of man, fierce satyrs and winged griffins. Deadly war did Izdubar wage with them, till as his period of exile drew near to a close he said to his mother, "I have dreamed a dream; the stars rained from heaven upon me; then a creature, fierce-faced and taloned like a lion, rose up against me, and I smote and slew him."

The dream was long in being fulfilled, but at last Izdubar was told of a monstrous jinn, whose name was Heabani; his head was human but horned; and he had the legs and tail of a bull, yet was he wisest of all upon earth.

Enticing him from his cave by sending two fair women to the entrance, Izdubar took him captive and led him to Ourouk, where the jinn married one of the women whose charms had allured him, and became henceforth the well-loved servant of Izdubar. Then Izdubar slew the Elamite who had dethroned his father, and put the royal diadem on his own head. And behold the G.o.ddess Ishtar (Ashtaroth) cast her eyes upon the hero and wished to be his wife, but he rejected her with scorn, reminding her of the fate of Tammuz, and of Alala the Eagle, and of the shepherd Taboulon--all her husbands, and all dead before their time. Thus, as the wrath of Juno pursued Paris, so the hatred of this slighted G.o.ddess attends Izdubar through many adventures. The last plague that torments him is leprosy, of which he is to be cured by Khasisadra, son of Oubaratonton, last of the ten primeval kings of Chaldea. Khasisadra, while still living, had been transported to Paradise, where he yet abides. Here he is found by Izdubar, who listens to his account of the Deluge, and learns from him the remedy for his disease. The afflicted hero is destined, after being cured, to pa.s.s, without death, into the company of the G.o.ds, and there to enjoy immortality. With this promise the work concludes.

The great poem of Izdubar has but recently been known to European scholars, having been discovered in 1871 by the eminent a.s.syriologist, Mr.

George Smith. It was probably written about 2000 B.C., though the extant edition, which came from the library of King a.s.surbanipal in the palace at Dur-Sargina, must bear the date of 600 B.C. The hero is supposed to be a solar personification, and the epic is interesting to modern writers not only on account of its description of the Deluge, but also for the pomp and dignity of its style, and for its n.o.ble delineation of heroic character.

[Signature: Epiphanius Wilson]

ISHTAR AND IZDUBAR

[_Translated by Leonidas Le Cenci Hamilton, M.A._]

ALCOVE I

TABLET I: COLUMN I

INVOCATION

O love, my queen and G.o.ddess, come to me; My soul shall never cease to worship thee; Come pillow here thy head upon my breast, And whisper in my lyre thy softest, best.

And sweetest melodies of bright _Sami_,[1]

Our Happy Fields[2] above dear _Subartu_;[3]

Come nestle closely with those lips of love And balmy breath, and I with thee shall rove Through _Sari_[4] past ere life on earth was known, And Time unconscious sped not, nor had flown.

Thou art our all in this impa.s.sioned life: How sweetly comes thy presence ending strife, Thou G.o.d of peace and Heaven's undying joy, Oh, hast thou ever left one pain or cloy Upon this beauteous world to us so dear?

To all mankind thou art their G.o.ddess here.

To thee we sing, our holiest, fairest G.o.d, The One who in that awful chaos trod And woke the Elements by Law of Love To teeming worlds in harmony to move.

From chaos thou hast led us by thy hand, [5]Thus spoke to man upon that budding land: "The Queen of Heaven, of the dawn am I, The G.o.ddess of all wide immensity, For thee I open wide the golden gate Of happiness, and for thee love create To glorify the heavens and fill with joy The earth, its children with sweet love employ."

Thou gavest then the n.o.blest melody And highest bliss--grand nature's harmony.

With love the finest particle is rife, And deftly woven in the woof of life, In throbbing dust or clasping grains of sand, In globes of glistening dew that shining stand On each pure petal, Love's own legacies Of flowering verdure, Earth's sweet panoplies; By love those atoms sip their sweets and pa.s.s To other atoms, join and keep the ma.s.s With mighty forces moving through all s.p.a.ce, Tis thus on earth all life has found its place.

Through Kisar,[6] Love came formless through the air In countless forms behold her everywhere!

Oh, could we hear those whispering roses sweet, Three beauties bending till their petals meet, And blushing, mingling their sweet fragrance there In language yet unknown to mortal ear.

Their whisperings of love from morn till night Would teach us tenderly to love the right.

O Love, here stay! Let chaos not return!

With hate each atom would its lover spurn In air above, on land, or in the sea, O World, undone and lost that loseth thee!

For love we briefly come, and pa.s.s away For other men and maids; thus bring the day Of love continuous through this glorious life.

Oh, hurl away those weapons fierce of strife!

We here a moment, point of time but live, Too short is life for throbbing hearts to grieve.

Thrice holy is that form that love hath kissed, And happy is that man with heart thus blessed.

Oh, let not curses fall upon that head Whom love hath cradled on the welcome bed Of bliss, the bosom of our fairest G.o.d, Or hand of love e'er grasp the venging rod.

Oh, come, dear Zir-ri,[7] tune your lyres and lutes, And sing of love with chastest, sweetest notes, Of Accad's G.o.ddess Ishtar, Queen of Love, And Izdubar, with softest measure move; Great Samas'[8] son, of him dear Zir-ri sing!

Of him whom G.o.ddess Ishtar warmly wooed, Of him whose breast with virtue was imbued.

He as a giant towered, lofty grown, As Babil's[9] great _pa-te-si_[10] was he known, His armed fleet commanded on the seas And erstwhile travelled on the foreign leas; His mother Ellat-gula[11] on the throne From Erech all Kardunia[12] ruled alone.

[Footnote 1: "Samu," heaven.]

[Footnote 2: "Happy Fields," celestial gardens, heaven.]

[Footnote 3: "Subartu," Syria.]

[Footnote 4: "Sari," plural form of "saros," a cycle or measurement of time used by the Babylonians, 3,600 years.]

[Footnote 5: From the "Accadian Hymn to Ishtar," terra-cotta tablet numbered "S, 954," one of the oldest hymns of a very remote date, deposited in the British Museum by Mr. Smith. It comes from Erech, one of the oldest, if not the oldest, city of Babylonia. We have inserted a portion of it in its most appropriate place in the epic. See translation in "Records of the Past," vol. v. p. 157.]

[Footnote 6: "Kisar," the consort or queen of Sar, father of all the G.o.ds.]

[Footnote 7: "Zir-ri" (p.r.o.nounced "zeer-ree"), short form of "Zi-aria,"

spirits of the running rivers--naiads or water-nymphs.]

[Footnote 8: "Samas," the sun-G.o.d.]

[Footnote 9: Babil, Babylon; the Accadian name was "Diu-tir," or "Duran."]

[Footnote 10: "Pa-te-si," prince.]

[Footnote 11: "Ellat-gula," one of the queens or sovereigns of Erech, supposed to have preceded Nammurabi or Nimrod on the throne. We have identified Izdubar herein with Nimrod.]

[Footnote 12: "Kardunia," the ancient name of Babylonia.]

COLUMN II