The Ark Before Noah
Page 16
Enki’s rope volume estimate: 14,430 sūtu.
Our rope volume calculation: 14,624 sūtu.
Enki’s calculation differs from ours by a smidgeon over 1 per cent. This is no accident or coincidence.
Just to be clear:
1. What might look like ‘myriad’ in the Ark Tablet, ŠÁR, means literally 3,600.
2. Enki is certainly thinking in terms of Babylonian sūtus.
3. The total length of one-finger-thickness rope needed to make Atra-hasīs’s Super Coracle works out at 527km. I repeat, five hundred and twenty-seven kilometres. A good way to think of that? It is approximately the distance from London to Edinburgh.
Enki imparts no further dimensions in the Ark Tablet. After his initial speech the narrative changes tack: it becomes an account by Atra-hasīs of what he himself has done, written in the first person.
ARK TABLET: RIBS
Coiling the rope and weaving between the rows eventually produces a giant round floppy basket. The next job is to provide the whole with a stiffening framework of ribs. Hornell’s coracle building description continues:
The inner framework, giving strength and rigidity to the coiled walls of the quffa, is formed of a multitude of curved ribs, closely set; usually split branches of willow, poplar, tamarisk, juniper or pomegranate are employed; when these are not available the midribs of date-palm trees are used, but these are less esteemed. According to the size of the craft to be built, 8, 12 or 16 of these split branches are chosen of a length sufficient both to extend across the floor at its centre and also to pass up one side as a rib. These principal ‘frames’ are disposed in two series, one at right angles to the other. As half of those in each series pass down the side and across the bottom from opposite sides, their lower sections overlap and interdigitate, forming a strong double band across the floor; an equal number are similarly disposed at right angles to the first series, thereby giving two series of flooring or burden bands crossing one another on the floor. The quadrant spaces between these series of frames or main timbers are filled with very closely set ribs, bent, after soaking in warm water, to fit the concavely curved form of the walls of the quffa on the inside; sometimes the sharpness of the bend causes a splintering at the point where the side begins to turn inwards towards the gunwale. As the width of the quadrants bounded by the four series of frames widens with distance from the centre, the first-placed ribs are slightly longer than those on each side of them and those intercalated later are progressively slightly shorter, pair by pair. The lower ends are pointed in order to fit close together at the centre.
As each of these ribs and frames is placed in position, it is sewn with coir cord to the basketry walls. Two men are necessary for this operation, one inside the quffa to pass the cord through the wall of the basketry to his companion on the outside, who, in turn, threads it back to the inside, after hauling it taut. On the exterior the cord is seen passing obliquely upward from one seam to another; on the inside it passes horizontally over the rib from side to side and then emerges on the outside to repeat the oblique stitch to the seam above. On the inner side of the quffa the regularity of the series of horizontal stitches imparts an appearance of annulated ribbing that is characteristic and pleasing in its symmetry.
Atra-hasīs summarises this very succinctly.
“I set in place thirty ribs
Which were one parsiktu-vessel thick, ten rods long …
Ark Tablet: 13–14
The Babylonian word for rib is ṣēlu, and there are nice cases of it applied to boats, such as the entry in the bilingual dictionary which explains that Sumerian giš-ti-má = Babylonian ṣēl eleppi, ‘rib of a boat’, or the exorcistic incantation in which a demon ‘wrecks the ribs of the patient as if they were those of an old boat’. There must have always been old vessels beyond repair or waterproofing rotting in the mud by the rivers, not to mention carcasses of water buffalo or camels with their ribs exposed, white and gleaming. In the cuneiform the word is spelled ṣe-ri, with ‘r’ for ‘l’, but this does sometimes happen in Babylonian.
His ark-quality ribs, Atra-hasīs tells us, are as thick as a parsiktu and ten nindan long. This word parsiktu is not actually spelt out on the tablet but, as occurs in other tablets from southern Iraq, is written with an abbreviation, the sign PI. As one might say, ‘PI’ for parsiktu. In line 16 the whole word parsiktu, applied to the stanchions, has to be supplied by the reader, for the scribe abbreviates even further, writing ‘½’, to stand for ‘½ PI’.
The parsiktu is both a measuring vessel – a scoop – and a capacity measure. This is not surprising as many Mesopotamian metrological terms derive from vessel names. What is surprising is that a volume measure should be used to convey thickness. The vessel, we know, had a capacity of about sixty litres. Assuming it to be a box-shaped scoop with robust walls of about two fingers thickness we therefore arrive, as demonstrated in Appendix 3, at a parsiktu with an overall ‘thickness’ (width) of approximately one cubit or fifty centimetres.
Atra-hasīs, in response to Enki, is speaking colloquially and expressively. He declares that the boat ribs he produced were ‘as thick as a parsiktu’, much as we might say that something is ‘as thick as two short planks’ without knowing exactly how thick or short a plank might be, or whether there is even such a thing as uniformity in plank dimensions: everyone knows what you mean. At fifty centimetres across a parsiktu was close to a cubit thick, but Atra-hasīs avoids the word cubit for thickness even though he uses the nindan to define length. The point he wanted to put across was that these ribs were thicker than coracle ribs had ever been before. He was not a man, one might say, to be content with spare ribs.
Nota Bene: The expression ‘as thick as a parsiktu’ has no parallel in cuneiform literature beyond one perfectly extraordinary, extremely important and directly related case, which is discussed later in Chapter 12.
Each of Atra-hasīs’s coracle ribs is ten nindan long, which comes out at sixty metres, and about fifty centimetres thick. Once installed, each J-shaped rib ran down from the top of the coracle to the flat floor and out across the floor where, as Hornell describes, the ends form a kind of lattice, over and under. Once the main series of ribs is in place the remainder can be fitted in so that their ends will all lie interlocked together (or, as Hornell put it so magnificently, they will interdigitate), forming the floor itself, which achieves mat-like strength and solidity. Bitumen is then poured all over it.
Hornell mentions up to sixteen ribs for the normal coracle; the thirty set in by Atra-hasīs is modest for such a giant vessel and one can imagine that the framework would need to be supplemented by cross-bracing and other precautions.
Hornell lists the species of tree used by the Iraqi coracle-makers for these ribs, and they are all in fact attested in cuneiform inscriptions:
Willow: ḫilēpu – used for door panels and furniture; grows along rivers and canals.
Euphrates poplar: ṣarbatu – the most common tree of lower Mesopotamia; wood cheap; used for inexpensive furniture and often as fuel; can however furnish logs (a letter request: ‘eleven times sixty poplars suitable for roofing’).
Tamarisk: bīnu – a native and ubiquitous small tree or shrub; wood only for small objects (literary context: ‘You, Tamarisk, have a wood which is not in demand’).
Juniper: burāšu – juniper proper used for wooden objects and furniture.
Pomegranate: nurmû – there is no evidence for the use of pomegranate tree wood.
Annoyingly, these types of wood do not seem to turn up in cuneiform boat texts, at least so far.
ARK TABLET: STANCHIONS
I set up 3,600 stanchions within her
Which were half (a parsiktu-vessel) thick, half a nindan high (lit. long)
Ark Tablet: 15–16
Here Atra-hasīs follows Enki in reckoning with the ŠÁR = 3,600. Stanchions at half a parsiktu by half a nindan were a crucial element in the Ark’s construction and an innovation in response to Atra-hasīs
’s special requirements, for they allow the introduction of an upper deck. Very probably they were intended to be square in cross-section, with an area of about 15 × 15 fingers =225 fingers2. Assuming that Atra-hasīs’s ŠÁR, like Enki’s, meant that there were literally 3,600 stanchions, their combined area massed together would represent only about 6 per cent of the total 3,600 m2 floor space, a load-bearing distribution which is, so to speak, not unrealistic (see Appendix 3).
There is no need to visualise these stanchions in serried rows; on the contrary they could be placed in diverse arrangements, while, set flat on the interlocked square ends of the ribs, they would facilitate subdivision of the lower floor space into suitable ‘cabins’ and areas for bulky or fatally incompatible animals.
One striking peculiarity of Atra-hasīs’s reports is that he doesn’t mention either the deck or the roof explicitly, but within the specifications both deck and roof are implicit.
ARK TABLET: THE DECK
With regard to the deck, we can hardly doubt the implications of Atra-hasīs’s stanchions. This deck would come halfway up the sides, and, attached to the walls, would undoubtedly greatly strengthen the whole craft as well as enabling the fitting of the upper cabins. No conventional Iraqi coracle ever had a deck at all, needless to say, but, on the other hand, no other coracle had such a job to do.
ARK TABLET: CABINS
Accommodation was needed for Atra-hasīs, his wife and immediate family, not to mention the other humans (discussed in the next chapter). There would be plenty of room upstairs for other life forms too; two conversational Babylonian parrots might cheer things up, for example.
Atra-hasīs says:
“I constructed her ḫinnu cabins above and below.”
Ark Tablet: 17
Although ‘cabin’ sounds anachronistic and cruise-like, the rare word ḫinnu means just that, as we are again informed by our ancient lexicographer:
giš.é-má = bīt eleppi, ‘wooden house on a boat’
giš.é-má-gur8, ‘wooden house on a makurru’.
(The same word occurs in a sophisticated symbolic dream described on a tablet from the time of Alexander the Great, in which the barque of the god Nabu is in a cult procession winding down a thoroughfare in Babylon and his cabin, ḫinnu, is quite clearly described.)
Captain A. Hasīs speaks of cabins in the plural, and the verb applied is rakāsu, ‘to tie’, or ‘to plait’, suggesting that they were at least partly made of reeds rather than wood. Atra-hasīs tells us that he installed them above and below, that is on the upper and lower decks. We might not stray far from the mark if we understand these cabins to resemble the small tied-reed houses in the southern marshes discussed in Chapter 6, especially those that are located within a round fence with animals mooching round about, floating gently.
ARK TABLET: THE ROOF
We can be equally sure that the Ark had a roof. In line 45 Atra-hasīs goes up there to pray to the Moon God, and we know from the instructions in three parallel Flood accounts quoted in Chapter 7 that arks were to be roofed like the Apsû, suggesting a black circular shape consistent with Mesopotamian models of the cosmic Apsû, the waters under the earth. (Anyway, on a different level, without a roof the rain and sea would get in.) For the implications as to structure and material see Appendix 3.
ARK TABLET: BITUMEN
The next stage is crucial: the application of bitumen for waterproofing, inside and out, a job to be taken very seriously considering the load and the likely weather conditions. The primary Akkadian word for bitumen is iṭṭû, which still survives in the modern name of Hít, the most famous of the natural sources of bitumen in Iraq now as then; it was known to Herodotus as Is. The old Sumerian name is ESIR. Bitumen comes bubbling out of the Mesopotamian ground for myriad uses as an unending, benevolent supply. For waterproofing a guffa it is unsurpassable, as we see in Hornell’s description.
After the structure of the quffa is complete, the outside is coated thickly with hot bitumen brought either from Hit on the Euphrates or from Imam Ali. This forms an efficient waterproofing. In addition, a thick layer of bitumen is spread over the floor to level it and to protect the floor lashings from damage. The inner surface of the sides is left bare. If the boatman or quffāji be superstitious, as often is the case, he will embed a few money cowries (Cypraea moneta) and some blue button beads in the bitumen on the outer side in the hope of thereby averting the evil eye … The life of a well-made quffa is long, for bitumen is an ideal preservative against rot, and when the coating cracks and begins to flake off, a fresh application makes the craft nearly as good as new.
There are in fact two Babylonian words for bitumen, iṭṭû, as mentioned, and kupru, both of which types are used by Atra-hasīs. The great bulk is kupru-bitumen, which is written with the Sumerian sign ESIR followed by the signs UD.DU.A (there are traces of signs left which I have restored in line 22, given the spacing in the gap), which mean something like ‘dried’. This is supplemented by a quantity of iṭṭû, written simply ESIR.
Atra-hasīs devotes twenty of his sixty lines to precise details about waterproofing his boat. It is just one of the many remarkable aspects of the Ark Tablet that we are thereby given the most complete account of caulking a boat to have come down to us from antiquity. The technical details behind these lines are to be considered carefully:
I apportioned one finger of bitumen for her outsides;
I apportioned one finger of bitumen for her interior;
I had (already) poured out one finger of bitumen for her cabins;
I caused the kilns to be loaded with 28,800 (sūtu) of kupru-bitumen
And I poured 3,600 (sūtu) of iṭṭû-bitumen within.
The iṭṭû-bitumen was not coming up to the surface (lit. to me);
(So) I added five fingers of lard,
I ordered the kilns to be loaded … in equal measure.
(With) tamarisk wood (?) (and) stalks (?)
I … (= completed the mixture(?)).
Ark Tablet: 18–27
First he works out the quantities of bitumen needed to waterproof all exterior and interior surfaces – including the cabins which he seems to have treated already – to a depth of one finger. Having calculated the amount required for the whole vast operation he is then seen doctoring the mixture in the kilns until it reaches the correct consistency for application. He tests it, perhaps with a dip-stick to gauge flow or viscosity, and finds that it is not yet perfect (line 23); he then adds equal quantities of lard and fresh bitumen to loosen it up. Eventually it is ready.
Fingers of bitumen
Here we have to understand the measure as the Sumerian ideogram ŠU.ŠI (usually written ŠU.SI), standing for the Babylonian ubānu, ‘finger’, one of which comes out at about 1.66 centimetres. Bitumen is thus applied to all ark surfaces to a depth of one finger.
Loading the kiln
The word kīru, ‘kiln’, occurs here in the plural but we do not know how many there were. Although bitumen as a staple commodity is often mentioned in cuneiform texts there is surprisingly little information about technical matters to help us. The Babylonian verb in line 21 is very often used of loading boats, but the bitumen here is not to be loaded aboard but put into the kilns to be heated up, so, ‘I ordered to be loaded’, refers in the Ark Tablet to the process of shovelling the raw material into the waiting kilns.
Quantities of bitumen
Atra-hasīs also tells us the quantity of bitumen that the waterproofing would involve, again expressed by the šár or 3,600 sign. The quantity of kupru-bitumen is 28,800 sūtu, written 8 × 3,600, which works out at 241.92 cubic metres. To this is added 3,600 sūtu, 30.24 cubic metres, of iṭṭû, ‘crude bitumen’, and five finger-thicknesses each of lard and fresh bitumen, whose volume cannot be worked out; the quantity of the latter two components need not have been considerable to make a difference to the whole. Nor do we know how many bitumen kilns there were running, or what their capacity was. We are told that a finger thickness
of bitumen is needed inside and out. Our calculation involving the quantity of rope puts that bitumen total at eight šár, and the tablet confirms that we need eight šār of kupru plus a small amount of a more mastic quality applied separately for an external coat.
We get a glimpse of these operations in some scrappy records from a bitumen-supplier in the city of Larsa in about 1800 BC. The different types of boat-making bitumen shipped include: over fifteen gur of kupru for a 100-gur boat belonging to Æilli-Ishtar; two sūtu of iṭṭû for the kiln; iṭṭû for ‘talpittu’ of a wooden cabin; iṭṭû which has been poured into kupru; iṭṭû which has been poured into boat hulls; these and other supplies had been loaded onto a twenty-gur boat for delivery.
Some of this might have gone to coracle-builders. The little-known boat word talpittu, ‘smearing’, is used twice in this Larsa archive of a bitumen layer for wooden cabins. It derives from the Babylonian verb lapātu, ‘to touch’, and probably reflects the idea that bitumen was applied to a thickness of one finger (ubānu), as with the cabins that Atra-hasīs had to fit in his own giant model in line 20: ‘I had (already) poured out one finger of bitumen onto her cabins.’
We can assume that the bitumen layers were applied to the Ark long before everything and everybody was loaded on board. No one would be painting zoo cages with Babylonian creosote when all the livestock was in residence. If any part of that huge undertaking was described within the Flood Story we can learn nothing from the Ark Tablet, which is very badly damaged after the clear bitumen lines. The same is true of the corresponding part of Old Babylonian Atrahasis, while Gilgamesh XI dispenses with any description of such detail.