In the perpective of the western world, ‘‘Homer’’ had long been the solitary beginning of literature, nay the origin of poetry, concentrated in one person, ‘‘the original genius of Homer.’’ With the development of scholarship, a more historical approach had to take over, owing to at least three discoveries: (1) The analysis of Homeric language proves that there have been generations of singers, of oral performance underlying the texts we have (see Chapters 13 and4, by J. Foley and Jensen); (2) The archaeological exploration of Greece and Crete have brought to light Bronze Age civilizations vaguely remembered in ‘‘Homer,’’ the ‘‘Mycenaean Age’’ (see Chapter 9, by Sherratt); (3) The recovery of Near Eastern literature of the Bronze Age and post-Bronze Age gives a comprehensive context to Greek epic in what constitutes a Near Eastern-Aegean cultural community (koine).
In the following, there will be first an overview of the manifold interconnections both in the Bronze Age and after; then the transfer of oriental myths from ‘‘orient’’ to Greece will be in focus; finally, parallels of Eastern epic with ‘‘Homer’’ will be discussed, including some cases where literary borrowing seems the most likely diagnosis.
High cultures first developed in Egypt and in Iraq/Mesopotamia in the third millennium, with Syria-Palestine in between and Anatolia right to the side. These civilizations were distinguished by advanced forms of societal organization, with a power system centered on kings and temples, and with the current use of writing (see Chapters 14, 15, and 10, by Sasson, Noegel, and Haslam). Writing, used first for trade and administration, soon developed ‘‘literature’’ in a closer sense, works consciously formed from the resources of language. Writing existed in two strikingly different forms, ‘‘hieroglyphs’’ in Egypt, i. e. elaborate pictures, ‘‘cuneiform’’ in Mesopotamia, i. e. more abstract signs made up of ‘‘wedges’’ in clay tablets. Cuneiform was used for two languages from the beginning, Sumerian and Akkadian. Akkadian became an international means of communication from Anatolia through Syria to Egypt in the second millennium. As against the complications of the original writing systems with hundreds of signs in different functions, which required professional scribes, there were attempts at simplification from the second millennium onwards, first with syllabic systems requiring about 80 signs, then with the alphabet, which can do with about 26 phonetic letters. The alphabet appears in a peculiar form in Ugarit at the coast of Syria (see Chapter 16, by Wyatt), in the thirteenth century bce; its triumphal career is under way by the first millennium.
Bronze Age civilizations had a complicated history with ups and downs that need not be recorded here. While central Syria remained exposed to Mesopotamian, Egyptian, and Anatolian influences or even attacks, civilizations of their own evolved in North Syria and Anatolia: Hurrites based in North Syria, and Hittites in central Asia Minor, with Hattusa (Turkish name: Boghazkoy) for their capital. Both Hurrites and Hittites adopted Mesopotamian cuneiform to write their own languages, using ‘‘international’’ Akkadian besides (see Chapter 17, by Beckman).
The Bronze Age system swept into Europe to become the first European high culture in Crete: ‘‘Minoan’’ culture flourished from the first half of the second millennium, with palaces such as Knossos, Phaistos, Mallia, and Kydonia (Chania); it came to use a syllabic writing system, ‘‘Linear A,’’ which remains undeciphered. This culture reached mainland Greece by about 1600 bce, by which point it is known as ‘‘Mycenaean.’’ Its palaces were at Pylos, Mycenae, Tiryns, and Thebes; it used a modified linear script, ‘‘Linear B,’’ which has been deciphered as representing an archaic form of Greek. Linear B also appears at Knossos and Kydonia, which means that Northern Crete was dominated by Mycenaean Greeks by then. Unfortunately Linear B so far seems to be confined to administrative texts.
Among connections with neighboring cultures already in the Bronze Age, those between Crete and Egypt stand out for intensity and continuity. The periodization of ‘‘Minoan’’ history, as established by Arthur Evans (Evans 1921-35), follows that of Egypt on account of the many findings of Egyptian objects in Crete: Early Minoan, Middle Minoan, Late Minoan corresponding to Old, Middle, and New Kingdom in Egypt. Among striking documents of the Egypian connection, there is the ship fresco in Minoan Thera, which represents a trip to Egypt or Libya (Marinatos 1973: pl. xl-xli). Typical Minoan frescoes, dating from the sixteenth century, were found in Egypt, at Auaris-Tell Daba’a (Bietak and Marinatos 1995; Marinatos 1998). An inscription fTom Amenophis III, of about 1400, refers to foreign regions under two headings: ‘‘Kaftu’’ (Crete), with place names such as Knossos, Amnisos, Kydonia, and ‘‘Tanaju,’’ which must be Greece, country of the ‘‘Danaoi,’’ and with the place name Mukana (Mykene) (Edel 1966; Helck 1979: 28-33). The Greek name for Egypt, ‘‘Aigyptos,’’ is attested in the Mycenaean language; it derives from Egyptian ‘‘Hikuptah’’ (Memphis).
The interrelations of Minoan/Mycenaean culture with Syria/Palestine should not be underrated either. The palace of Mari on the Euphrates is clearly similar to the palace of Knossos in the iconography of its frescos, which date from about 1800 BCE. The goddess is presenting royal insignia to the king (Amiet 1977: 146, fig. 65; cf. Marinatos 1993: 155, fig. 133). In excavations being conducted at Qatna, Syria, since 2002, Minoan frescoes are turning up, too. A linear writing system appears first at Byblos, in Syria, hence in Crete and Greece and, with three further forms, in Cyprus. Ugarit had close contacts with Cyprus, called Alasia in Ugaritic correpsondence; tablets with Cypriot linear writing have been found at Ugarit, too (Masson 1974; Woodard 1997: 5f.). More distant connections are attested by a hoard of Mesopotamian seals found at the Mycenaean palace of Thebes (Porada 1981). Distinct Mycenaean immigration seems to have reached Cyprus in the twelfth century (Karageorghis 1976). One city continuously inhabited since then is Paphos; it contains the sanctuary of Aphrodite, called ‘‘Wanassa’’ (the ‘‘Queen’’) in perfect Mycenaean language. Cypriot linear writing, used for Greek, is attested by about 1100 BCE and remained in use until the third century bce (Masson 1983).
The third region for Mycenaean-eastern contacts was Asia Minor, dominated by the Hittite kingdom of Hattusa with its vast archives. New findings and analyses have brought some clarity to geography as seen from Hittite evidence (Starke 1997). Their power clearly extended towards the Aegean. Two rock monuments with inscriptions in Hittite hieroglyphs, between Smyrna and Sardis, had been known for a long time: the warrior reliefs at
Karabel (Hawkins 1998) and the “Niche” at Mount Sipylos (Andre-Salvini 1996). In Hittite correspondence, the country ‘‘Ahhiyava’’ has commanded attention. This evidently is what the Greeks called ‘‘Achaia,’’ a name which unfortunately turns up in quite different regions. Discussion centers on a city called ‘‘Wilusa’’ in Hittite, with a king Alaksandus about 1300 BCE. Is this Greek ‘‘Wilios’’ - Ilios, Troy (Starke 1997; Latacz 2001)? Has Alaksandus anything to do with Alexandros-Paris in the Iliad (see Chapter 21, by Edwards)? Does this bring the ‘‘Trojan War’’ back to real history (Latacz 2001)? There are no written documents from ‘‘Troy,’’ but for one seal in Luwian hieroglyphs of the twelfth century (Hawkins and Easton 1996; Latacz 2001: 67-93). We know about various Minoan and Mycenaean settlements in Asia Minor by the Bronze Age, notably Miletus (Gorman 2001: 20-31). A distinctly Mycenaean sword was dedicated by King Tutchalia to his storm-god at Hattusa, as booty ‘‘fTom Assuwa,’’ the inscription says (Hansen 1994); ‘‘Assuwa’’ will refer to some part of the Aegean coast, called ‘‘Asie’’ by Greeks.
Most Bronze Age civilizations around the Aegean collapsed about 1200 bce in a strange catastrophe; it struck Greece, Crete, Hittite Anatolia, Syria, and Palestine. Palaces, large stone architecture, and even metal work practically disappeared for some centuries in Greece; writing systems fell out of use and were forgotten, such as the Ugaritic alphabet, Hittite cuneiform, and Greek Linear B. Less affected were Egypt and Mesopotamia, the islands and Cyprus. The reasons for this multiple catastrophe are obscured by the breakdown of literacy. What remains is guesswork: invasions or economic failure, social upset, plague or drought? Egyptian sources speak of ‘‘people of the sea’’ attacking (ANET 262f.); the most tangible of these are the Philistines who occupied Palestine (Dothan and Dothan 1992).
The new world that gradually emerged around the eastern Mediterranean had Philistines in Palestine, flourishing coastal cities such as Tyre and Sidon in Phoenicia, small dynasties of Aramaeans and Luwians from Northern Syria to Anatolia, a major kingdom of Phrygians, probably of western immigrants, farther northwest with Gordion for their capital (Gusmani et al. 1997), and another powerful kingdom, Urartu, around the lake of Van. Urartaeans wrote cuneiform; their language is closely related to Hurrian. Luwian cities, such as Tell Halaf-Guzana, Malatya, Carchemish, and Karatepe, continued to use a form of Hittite hieroglyphs, while the Aramaean-Phoenician alphabet was on the move; it had had its greatest success in the western regions, among the Palestinians, Phoenicians, Aramaeans and soon the Greeks and the Phrygians; the Etruscans in the West followed suit. The main effect of the alphabet was to take literacy from the hands of royal or temple bureaucrats and make it available for the enterprising individual (Sommer 2000). Assyrian administration too adopted alphabetic Aramaean, besides cuneiform. A prince at Karkem-ish, about 800 bce, said that he knew twelve languages and four forms of writing, which probably included cuneiform and the alphabet besides Luwian hieroglyphs (Hawkins 2000; vol. II, p. 131, nr 24) - a perfectly ‘‘international’’ situation at the crossing of the Euphrates.
Progress and crisis in these centuries were due to two main factors: the development of Mediterranean trade by Phoenicians and Greeks turning West, and the onslaught of Assyrian military power from the East.
Trade was the enterprise of Phoenicians, mainly from Tyre and Sidon, especially in search of metals. Their city in Cyprus, Kition, was founded by about 900 (Karageorghis 1976). The Phoenicians went on to establish their presence in Africa, Sardinia, Sicily, and Spain; their new city, Carthage, was founded in 814. The Phoenicians were followed by the Greeks, who took up connections with Syria and founded their own colonies in southern Italy and Sicily; the center of activity was at first Euboea, with Chalkis and Eretria (Boardman 1999); in the eighth century Corinth took over. One group of enterprising Greeks, in particular those of Euboea, had been called ‘‘Iawones,’’ which became ‘‘lones’’ in classical Greek, while the orientals took this name to designate Greeks in general: Hebrew ‘‘Jawan,’’ Akkadian ‘‘Iauna,’’ ‘‘Yunan’’ in modern Arabic and Turkish. In fact it was the Phoenician-Greek initiative that shifted the center of civilization from the Near East to the Mediterranean, giving a unique chance to the Greeks as the most eastern people in the Near West.
As for Assyria, the king had long held the title ‘‘Lord of the Whole, Lord of the Four Quarters of the World.’’ But it was the kings of Assur who embarked on unlimited conquest: relying on their superior military power, they began to plunder the neighboring tribes, kingdoms, or cities, year on year; booty and devastating tributes were used to entertain the army. Building prestigious palaces in new capitals, the fine reliefs of which now fill western museums, they turned west, by the ninth century, to reach the Mediterranean. The climactic point came in the eighth and seventh centuries: Damascus was conquered about 800, Israel in 722, Cyprus about 700, Sidon was destroyed in 672; Egypt came under Assyrian domination 671-655.
The main adversary of Assyria in eastern Anatolia, Urartu, collapsed about 700 under a northern invasion by ‘‘Cimmerians’’ (‘‘Gimirra’’ in Akkadian, ‘‘Kimmerioi’’ in Greek); so did Phrygia (Ivantchik 1993). In these fierce times a usurper, Gyges, became king of Lydia, with Sardis for his capital. There was flourishing gold production in that region by then, and Gyges was remembered by the Greeks for that (Archil. fr. 19,1). The Greek cities of Asia Minor succumbed to his power. Gyges also sought recognition from the East and made obeisance to Assurbanipal, king of Nineveh, who in turn considered him his vassal (Ivantchik 1993). Thus a direct road from Asia Minor to Mesopotamian Nineveh was discovered, one that remained in constant use, and was later called the ‘‘King’s Road.’’ The Greeks remembered forms of ‘‘soft living’’ imported from Lydia, the most characteristic of which was lying on couches, instead of using chairs for a symposium; the first visual record of this is the relief ‘‘Assurbanipal’s garden party’’ (Amiet 1977: fig. 634; Burkert 2003a: 16).
To sum up: In the first centuries of the first millennium BCE the Eastern-Greek relations were channeled in two main currents: the Phoenician line, with Assyrians in the background and Cyprus as a meeting place, and the Lydian line, also leading to Assyria. Greek contacts with Syria existed from the ninth century; the land connection was finally established by Gyges after 700. Egypt became a dominating partner when the Assyrians retreated and Psammetichus I (twenty-sixth dynasty) gained power, bringing a large-scale influx of Greek mercenaries and Greek traders. These had installed their market-place at Naukratis in Egypt by 600; Cyprus too became dominated by Egyptian products and style.
The unique luck of Greeks, in contrast to Phoenicians, was to be touched but not to be crushed by the eastern developments. When the Assyrians had occupied Syria, Cyprus, and part of Anatolian Cilicia, the Greeks must have had contact with them. It seems that refugees from Syria came to Crete, while at the same time Greek entrepreneurs engaged in trade and piracy in Syria. Greek mercenaries, together with Carian ones from Anatolia, were to infiltrate the current wars. A cuneiform letter of about 738, from Syria, mentions invaders fTom ‘‘the country Iaunaia,’’ that is, Ionians who were plundering the Syrian coast (Saggs 1963; Burkert 1992: 12). There was a naval battle between Ionians and Assyrians near Tarsos in Cilicia about 700 (Momigliano 1974: 409-13).
Closer and more persistent were the contacts with Phoenicians. Greeks and Phoenicians met at Kommos, a port of southern Crete, and at Ischia, in view of the Italian mainland; both turned up in Etruria, and both settled in Sicily, where fierce antagonism was to develop.
The decisive ‘‘Phoenician’’ import to Greece - be it from Phoenicians in the strict sense or from Aramaeans farther north - was the alphabet. The transfer included wax tablet, leather scroll, and text arrangements. Greeks at Cyprus went on to use their linear form of writing; the others adopted ‘‘Phoenician’’ signs (Phoinikeia). The Greek alphabet has some modernizations, especially the consistent writing of vowels; but Greeks continued to learn the immutable sequence of letters, apparently laid down by the first Bronze Age inventor, in spite of the fact that alpha, beta, gamma are Semitic words that do not make sense in Greek. The Greek word for writing tablet, deltos, and one word for the wax on the tablet, malthe, are Semitic, too. A bowl with Phoenician inscription had reached Crete by the ninth century (Niemeyer 1984: pl. 8). More impressive are the bronze ‘‘horse plates’’ in North Syrian style of Hazael, king of Damascus (ninth century), which somehow came to Greece and had been dedicated to Greek gods at Samos and Eretria by the eighth century (Kyrieleis and Rollig 1988). Did any Greek take notice of their Aramaean inscription? The first apparently Greek letters so far attested were written in Latium shortly after 800 bce (Peruzzi 1998), and an explosion of Greek literacy occurred by the second half of the eighth century. The first hexameters written in Greek letters, of about 730 bce, are found on the ‘‘Dipylon vase’’ at Athens and the ‘‘Nestor vase’’ at Ischia (Jeffery 1990: 76 n. 1; 239 n. 1). The Athenian inscription is the only one that keeps the letter alpha lying on its side, as does Semitic aleph. At Ischia Greeks at any rate were intermingling with Phoenicians/Aramaeans, as the mixture of inscriptions shows (Bartonek 1997).
Unfortunately the modern form of writing was normally used on perishable materials: leather, wood, and - later - papyrus. As a result, there is a sudden blackout of documentation, in distinct contrast to the Bronze Age situation. This does not mean that there was less writing and reading, less literature in Syria, Cyprus, and the adjacent West. It just means that only those parcels of literature survived that became selected as ‘‘classic’’ in specific literary traditions, be it Greek or Hebrew (see Chapter 19, by Niditch). For the rest, tiny scraps of evidence must do.
Surely there was no divide between Akkadian, Aramaean, and Phoenician, nor between these and Greek. We have stories about Nineveh in the Hebrew book of Jonah, and in the Aramaean tale of Ahiqar (TUATIII, part 2: 320-47); this book was also read in Egypt and somehow got into the Greek ‘‘Life of Aesopus.’’ The name of Gilgamesh appears once in an Aramaean text from Qumran (Milik 1976: 313), apart from a curious reference in Aelianus (NA. 12.21). It is less clear whether we should postulate the existence ofLuwian literature that follows the great Hittite period; Lydia remains totally obscure to us. We cannot identify either the places or the exact time of literary contacts, even if the line Syria - Euboea/Athens - Ischia obtrudes itself. All that can be done is to catalogue similarities. But it should be kept in mind that we are not bringing bits and pieces together from afar: we are moving within a cultural koinee from Nineveh through Karkemish to Egypt, to Cyprus, to Sardis, and to Euboea.
For Greek mythology, the publication of the Hittite text ‘‘Kingship in heaven’’ (Guterbock 1946; ANET 120; TUAT III, part 4: 828-30) came as a fundamental shock. The text so closely resembles not only the system of Hesiod’s theogony but also the scandalous detail in it that independent development seems impossible. Both texts introduce divine generations prior to the ruling storm-god, with a prominent position for the god ‘‘Heaven’’ (Anu/Uranos). The concept of ancient, vanquished gods is shared with Phoenician and Babylonian mythology. But the appalling detail, from Kumarbi to Hesiod, is the castration of ‘‘Heaven,’’ effected by Kumarbi in Hittite, by Kronos in Greek; Kronos uses a sickle, whereas Kumarbi bites and swallows Anu’s manhood. Nevertheless the line from Hittite to Hesiod is not without problems, especially since the motif of swallowing Heaven’s phallus has recently turned up in the theogony of Orpheus (Burkert 2003a: 98-100). Kumarbi is the name of a Hurrite god, also known at Ugarit. Thus a Hurrite-Syrian-Ionian line could be constructed as well as a Luwian-Ionian one.
The other Hurrite-Hittite text which seems to point towards Hesiod is the tale about a dangerous antagonist arising to challenge the ruling storm-god, with a battle and the defeat of the usurper in the end. In Hittite this is Ullikummi, son of Kumarbi, born from a rock (Guterbock 1952b; ANET 121-5; TUATIII, part 4: 830-44); the text points to Mount Hazzi, which is ‘‘Kasion Oros’’ in Greek, a mountain north of Ugarit with a sanctuary of the storm-god - Teshub in Hurrite, Hadad in Syrian, and Zeus in Greek - which was still in existence in late antiquity (Burkert 2001). In Greek the usurper is Typhon; the Iliad has an enigmatic reference (Il. 2.783), where en Arimois might point to Aramaeans. Has Greek Typhon/Typhoeus anything to do with the Semitic word for the ‘‘north mountain,’’ har Zaphon? Even a perfect koine situation leaves uncertainties.
A more general theme is the fight between the god and a snake or dragon. It comes in numerous variants, and might be a universal theme. But there are distinctive traits to show dependencies. The dragon appears as a multi-headed monster, usually seven-headed, on Sumerian seals and in a sequence of texts, from Sumerian via Ugarit to the Hebrew Bible, and is also manifest in the multi-headed water snake Hydra, the antagonist of Herakles (Burkert 2003b, 56f., 239). Another variant introduces a one-headed monster snake. The tale of Illuyankas, told in two versions in Hittite (ANET 125f.; TUATIII, part 4: 80811), finds its most striking parallel with the Typhon version in the library of Apollodorus (1.6.3; Burkert 1992: 103). The fight of two gods with a huge snake appears in a stone relief at Luwian Malatya (Akurgal 1976: pl. 104) - called ‘‘Illuyankas’’ by scholars, while the strange rays on its back point directly to much older Mesopotamian seals, and to the cuneiform sign for ‘‘snake’’ (MUSH). The dragon also takes the form of a monster of the sea. This is Tam in an Egyptian text evidently reproducing an Ugaritic tale; the attractive goddess Astarte has to cajole the monster towards his defeat (ANET 17). Greek myth has Perseus rescuing Andromeda from the sea monster; the tale is localized at Ioppe/Jaffa in Palestine, and the earliest vase painting illustrating this fight copies the iconography of Assyrian seals, with misunderstandings (Burkert 2003b: 72). It is hopeless to reconstruct a single line of tradition for the snake combats; coexisting variants found different applications in Greek mythology and imagery, as they had been wandering between the neigboring civilizations for some time.
One piece of Egyptian royal ideology seems to have engendered a Greek myth: The supreme god, accompanied by his servant, visits the queen in the guise of her husband in order to generate a new pharaoh, or else Herakles (West 1997b: 458 f.). Another impressive myth that seems to arise in Akkadian and Sumerian literature and spread to Israel, Greece, and India is the story of the flood (Caduff 1986; Bremmer 1998). This will be dealt with in the next section.
Greek epic as literature, against the background of Near Eastern literature, appears as narrative in an elaborate literary style, i. e. poetry about gods, sons of gods, and great men from the past (see Chapters 1 and 7, by Martin and Louden). Such epics mainly exist in Akkadian, with Atrahasis and Gilgamesh as the foremost examples and Erra as the latest representative. Hurrite-Hittite mythological compositions are related to the genre, as are the few texts from Ugarit.
On account of very different languages one might expect to encounter quite different principles of style and structure in the East and the West. Yet whoever cares to look at the evidence will be struck by the similarities (Burkert 1992: 114-20; Morris 1997; West 1997b). This has been known for a long time (Bowra 1952). To start with the openings of Gilgamesh and the Odyssey: attention is called to a hero who wandered wide and saw many things, while his name is intentionally withheld (Burkert 1992: 117. West 1997b: 403f.).
No less striking is the similarity of the meeting and dialogue of Gilgamesh with his dead friend Enkidu and of Achilles with the ‘‘soul’’ of Patroklos (Burkert 1992: 200; West 1997b: 344f.).
But it is in the styles that the really important parallels begin: in Greek as in Akkadian, a long verse is employed, repeated indefinitely without strophic division. In this texture there recur formulaic verses, the repetition of verse groups, standard epithets, and typical scenes such as the ‘‘assembly of the gods.’’ Epithets had always appeared to be characteristic of Homeric style, such as ‘‘cloud-gathering Zeus’’ or ‘‘Odysseus of many counsels,’’ ‘‘Odysseus of many sufferings.’’ In Akkadian and Ugaritic epic too the chief characters have their epithets (West 1997b: 220ff.): the hero of the flood is ‘‘Utnapishtim the faraway,’’ and the dangerous ‘‘Seven’’ in Erra are ‘‘champions without peer’’; Ugaritic has ‘‘the Virgin Anat,’’ and ‘‘father of gods and men’’ for a superior god. The epithets are ornamental insofar as they are not essential for the actual context nor specially modeled for it; all the same, they are extremely helpful in filling out a verse or half-verse. Besides formulaic epithets, comparisons are a popular device in Akkadian epic as in related poetry, including Hebrew psalms; lions are favorites (West 1997b: 218 ff.).
As for repetitions of verse groups, a striking feature is the exact verbal correspondence between command and performance, reporting and repetition of the report. The Mesopotamian scribes, weary of wedges, even use a ‘‘repeat’’ sign. In formulaic verse the complicated introduction of direct speech is especially notable. In Akkadian this reads, in a literal translation: ‘‘He set his mouth and spoke, to X. He said (the word)’’ (West 1997b: 196-8). This makes three synonyms, and a whole line. It is the same with the well-known Homeric formula: ‘‘Towards him/her, raising his voice, the winged words he/she spoke.’’ It is natural for a narrative to move from day to day, but to employ stereotyped formulae for sunset and sunrise, pause and action, is a specific technique, both in Gilgamesh and in Homer. In Gilgamesh, the new day is introduced with the formula: ‘‘At the brightening of some of morning,’’ less poetic and still equivalent to Homer’s ‘‘But when early-born rosy-fingered Eos appeared.’’
Among typical scenes the assembly of the gods (puhur ilani) is prominent. This is a fixed concept in Akkadian, which recurs in Ugaritic and is elaborated also in Ullikummi (West 1997b: 177-80). The ‘‘assembly of gods’’ has even invaded the Hebrew Bible, at the beginning of Job (see Chapter 19, by Niditch). One may state that the oriental assembly of the gods is more a kind of senate, whereas Homer makes them a family, including the current quarrels between parents and scolding and blows for their offspring.
At least in Gilgamesh more complicated forms of narrative technique are tried out, and these also characterize Homer’s Odyssey. The story of the flood is introduced into Gilgamesh in the form of direct speech, by the main participant, Utnapishtim ‘‘the far-away.’’ The Odyssey too incorporates most of Odysseus’ adventures in a first-person tale by Odysseus himself at the Phaeacians’ palace. The double action at the beginning of Gilgamesh, leading to the first meeting of Enkidu and Gilgamesh, is built up in the way that the narrative first follows Enkidu’s adventures and then introduces Gilgamesh, his position in the city and his preparations for the encounter through the direct speech of the prostitute addressing Enkidu. The Odyssey engineers a complicated double plot to bring Telemachus and Odysseus together.
Battle scenes invite comparisons, too. One notable example of combat poetry is the Egyptian text about Pharaoh Ramses II in the battle of Qadesh, when the hero finds himself alone amidst the enemies, prays to his father, the god Amun, and then sets out to kill all the enemies in his onslaught (Lichtheim 1976: 57-72). A suggestive Akkadian text, in fully ‘‘Homeric’’ style, is incorporated in the Annals of Sennacherib, referring to the battle of Halule (691 bce): the king takes up his armor piece by piece, mounts his chariot, and finally rides victoriously through splatters of blood (LuckenbiU 1927: §§ 252-4; cf. Il. 20.498-501; Burkert 1992: 118 f.). The genre of combat stories is also represented in the Hebrew Bible, especially by the ‘‘Song of Deborah and Barak’’ (Judg. 4).
Assembling motifs in such a way may sthl not yet be considered probative: “Parallels’’ may be found everywhere. Yet there are more complex structures for which sheer coincidence becomes quite unlikely: a system of major deities dividing the cosmos by lots; a decree of the ruling god to destroy mankind because it has become a burden to the earth; a family scene among gods with appropriate characters for father, mother, and daughter. It should be stressed once more that we are not bringing together distant worlds, but moving within the Near Eastern and Mediterranean koine.
First, some passages from the Iliad which show correspondences to important passages of Atrahasis, Gilgamesh, and EnUma Elish, the most important Akkadian classics. There is one passage in Homer where cosmogony unexpectedly comes to the fore. Aristotle (Met. 983b27) found here the very beginning of natural philosophy: Hera, in her lying speech within the section called the ‘‘Deception of Zeus’’ by the ancients, says she is going to Oceanus, ‘‘origin of the gods,’’ and to ‘‘Mother Tethys’’; somewhat later Oceanus is even called ‘‘the origin of all’’ (Il. 14.201 = 302; 14.246 cf. 15.189). Oceanus and Tethys, the primeval couple, Hera alleges, have not fulfilled their nuptial rights for a long time, separated by ‘‘strife.’’ This has its closest parallel in the beginning of the Babylonian epic EnUma Elish (I.1-5; Dalley 1989: 233): ‘‘When above,’’ this text begins, ‘‘skies were not yet named nor earth below pronounced by name, Apsu, the first, their begetter, and Tiamat who bore them all, had mixed their waters together... then gods were born within them.’’ Apsu is ground water, Tiamat is the sea; mixing together, ‘‘begetter’’ and ‘‘mother,’’ they were the origin of all.
It is clear: Hera’s incidental inventions correspond to the beginning of EnUma Elish to a surprising degree. Tethys, however, was not an active figure in Greek mythology; no one had anything further to tell about her. But note the names: Ti-amat is normally written in the cuneifom text, but the normal form of the Akkadian word is tiamtu or tamtu, ‘‘sea,’’ and the orthography taw(a)tu is found too. If one could proceed from ‘‘Tawtu,’’ ‘‘Tethys’’ is an exact transcription (Burkert 1992: 93; but see West 1997b: 147). Eude-mus, pupil of Aristotle, who evidently had at least a partial translation of EnUma Elish, wrote ‘‘Tauthe’’ (fr. 150 Wehrli). Thus right in the middle of the Iliad, the water cosmogony with a mysterious name for the ‘‘mother’’ directly stems from an Akkadian classic.
The connection of Dios Apate with Akkadian literature has become more close with the publication of Atrahasis (Lambert and Millard 1969). The oldest version of this text is dated to the seventeenth century bce; various Old Babylonian tablets have survived in fragmentary form; the library of Assurbanipal contained several editions with slight variants. A fragment of another recension has been found at Ugarit; this text had been in circulation, nay popular, for more than a thousand years.
‘‘When gods were in the ways of men,’’ the text starts; with no humans yet in existence, the gods had to do all the necessary work themselves, digging canals and building ditches. So they created men to act as robots: ‘‘They shall bear the burden.’’ But soon, ‘‘after 600 (and?) 600 years,’’ these creatures multiplied, to become a nuisance. The earth was crying out, the gods were disturbed; hence they decided to annihilate mankind again - and they failed. First there was a plague, then a famine, and finally the flood. Yet the cunning god of the deep, Enki, in alliance with the man ‘‘outstanding by wisdom,’’ Atrahasis, plays off the gods one against the other, and finally Atrahasis builds his ark. The final part of the text is an older parallel to Gilgamesh XI, the story of the flood as it had been known since the nineteenth century.
At the beginning of the Atrahasis text, the Babylonian pantheon is introduced in a systematic fashion: ‘‘Anu, their father, was king; their counsellor was the warrior Enlil; their chamberlain was Ninurta; and their sheriff Ennugi.’’ These verses are copied in the Gilgamesh epic, but not the following lines: ‘‘They grasped the flask of lots by the neck, they cast the lots; the gods made the division: Anu went up to heaven,’’ a second god - gap in the text; probably Enlil - ‘‘took the earth for his subjects,’’ and ‘‘the bolts, the bar of the sea, were set for Enki, the far-sighted.” Anu, Enlil, and Enki, sky-god, weather-god, water-god, make up the usual triad of cosmic gods. The Atrahasis text repeatedly comes back to this threefold division.
In Homer’s Iliad, however, there are those famous, oft-quoted verses in which the world is divided among the appropriate Homeric gods (Il. 15.190-3; Burkert 1992: 89f.; West 1997b: 109-11). Poseidon is speaking: ‘‘When we threw the lots I received the grey sea as my permanent abode, Hades drew the murky darkness, Zeus however drew the wide sky of brightness and clouds; the earth is common to all, and spacious Olympus.’’ This differs from the system of Atrahasis insofar as the earth together with Olympus is declared to be a joint dominion. Still, the basic structure is quite similar: three distinct areas of the cosmos, heaven, the depths of the earth, and the waters, assigned to the three major gods, male gods altogether; and in both instances the division has been established by drawing lots. The three brothers and their realms do not play any further common part in Homer, nor do they make a triad in Greek cult. By contrast, in Atrahasis the pertinent passage is fundamental for the narrative, and is referred to repeatedly. There is hardly another passage in Homer which comes so close to being a translation of an Akkadian epic.
From Atrahasis we are led to notice another important connection beyond the Iliad. The basic idea, human overpopulation that oppresses the earth, recurs in a prominent Greek text, the very beginning of the ‘‘Trojan Cycle,’’ the Cypria, an epic that was popular down to the classical epoch (see Chapter 24, by Burgess). The opening lines have been preserved as a fragment (fr. 1 Bernabe = fr. 1 Davies). This was the ultimate cause of the Trojan War: Zeus, as he noticed the oppression of the earth, ‘‘took pity and deep in his heart he decided to relieve the all-nourishing earth of men, by setting alight the great conflict of the Ilian War.’’ As a variant, a prose narrative tells how Zeus, in order to lighten the burden of the earth, first caused the Theban War and later the Trojan one, rejecting other options, such as lightning or flood. The variants cannot be combined directly; but they come together in recalling Atrahasis, in the earth suffering, the decision of the ruling god. This is not to forget that the story ofthe flood also came to Greece, in several variants and localizations (Caduff 1986; Bremmer 1998), probably through oral communication; in its early phases it cannot be pinned down to definite literary works.
As regards the Cypria, there is a further hint at the East: the title Cypria evidently refers to the island of Cyprus. While iconography indicates that at least the ‘‘Judgment of Paris,’’ a main episode of the Cypria, was known around 650 bce (Schefold 1993: 127-9, fig. 120a), we are led to an epoch when Cyprus, though flourishing with a mixture of eastern luxury and ‘‘Homeric’’ life-style, was formally under Assyrian sovereignty (Karageorghis 1969); memorial steles of Assyrian kings such as Sargon had been set up there (Luckenbill 1927: 100-3, cf. 261). We do not know why it was the ‘‘Homeric’’ theme of the Trojan War which produced a ‘‘Cypriot epic.’’ But it is a fact.
To come back to the Iliad in comparison with Gilgamesk. in Gilgamesh there is one famous encounter of divinity and man, of Ishtar and Gilgamesh (VI. 1-91). When Gilgamesh has killed Humbaba, the demon of the forest, and has cleansed himself of the grime of battle, Ishtar ‘‘raised an eye at the beauty of Gilgamesh’’ and proposes sexual union. But Gilgamesh scornfully rejects her, giving a catalogue of all her partners whom she once ‘‘has loved’’ only to destroy them in consequence; ‘‘If you would love me, you would [treat me] like them.’’ Whereupon Ishtar, enraged, goes up to heaven: ‘‘Forth went Ishtar before Anu (Heaven), her father; before Antum, her mother, her tears were flowing’’; she complains about Gilgamesh’s insults. But father Anu answers with mild reproach: ‘‘Surely you have provoked (the King of Uruk).’’
Compare a scene from the Iliad (5,330-431; Burkert 1992: 96-8; West 1997b: 361 f.): Aphrodite, trying to protect her son Aeneas, has been wounded by Diomedes, her blood is flowing. Beside herself, she goes up to Olympus, she falls into the lap of her mother, Dione, who consoles her, while sister Athena makes scornful comments. But father Zeus has a mild reproach: ‘‘You are not given to the works of war.’’
The two scenes are parallel to one another in structure, narrative form and ‘‘ethos’’ to an astonishing degree. A goddess, injured by a human, goes up to heaven to complain to her father and her mother, and she earns a mild rebuke from her father. Ishtar’s meeting with Gilgamesh is firmly anchored in the structure of the Gilgamesh epic, since Ishtar, in her wrath, brings down the ‘‘Bull of Heaven’’ for the next exploit of Gilgamesh and Enkidu. In Homer we have a genre scene, depicted with gusto but, on the whole, irrelevant. Still, the persons involved are, in fact, identical: the sky-god, his wife, and their common daughter the goddess of love. In analogy to Ishtar’s love affairs, Aphrodite has offered herself to a mortal man, Anchises the father of Aeneas, who suffered some strange fate as a result. By force of an even more special parallelism, Aphrodite has a mother in Olympus here, Dione. This name is just the feminine form of‘‘Zeus,’’ exactly as Antu, the mother of Ishtar in the Gilgamesh text, is the feminine form of Anu, ‘‘Heaven.’’ Anu/Antu are a couple firmly established in cult and myth in Mesopotamia; Dione at Olympus makes her appearance solely in this scene, and nowhere else. Hera seems forgotten for a while, as is the Hesiodic account of Aphrodite’s birth from the sea; later in the Iliad Dione is non-existent, while Hera is back again. ‘‘Homer’’ proves to be dependent on Gilgamesh even at the linguistic level, introducing Dione as a calque on Antu. This Akkadian/Greek connection is hardly less impressive than Tawtu/Tethys, though it works at the level of narrative structure and divine characters instead of cosmic agents.
The influence of Gilgamesh may also be detected in a scene from the Odyssey (4.75967). When Penelope learns about the risky journey undertaken by Telemachus and about the suitors’ plot to kill him, she first bursts into tears and complaints. Then, calming down, she washes and dresses in clean clothes; she goes up to the upper story of the house. Together with her maids, she takes barley corn in a basket, prays to Athena for safe return of Telemachus, throws out the barley and ends with an inarticulate shriek (ololyge). This form of prayer was found puzzling for historians of religion: was it an ‘‘abbreviation of sacrifice,’’ or an otherwise unknown ritual? But look at Gilgamesh (III. 38-45): when Gilgamesh, together with Enkidu, is leaving his city to fight Humbaba, his mother Ninsun takes to ceremonial prayer.
She cleansed herself in water [perfumed with] tamarisk and soapwort, she dressed in a fine garment, the adornment of her body. ..the adornment of her breast.... She leapt up the staircase, she climbed on to the roof, she set up a censer before Shamash, she scattered incense before Shamash, she lifted her arms. (trans. George 2003)
In this form she prays, full of distress and sorrow, for a safe return of her son. The situation, a mother praying for an adventurous son, is not an unusual one. Yet in its details the scene from the Odyssey comes close to being a translation of Gilgamesh (Burkert 1992: 99f.; West 1997b: 421). In fact it is closer to the Gilgamesh text than to a comparable scene in the Iliad (15.189), when Achilles is praying for the safe return of Patroklos. What appears odd in the Odyssey is quite at home in Gilgamesk. burning incense on the roof.
To sum up. there is continuity, nay a koine of culture from Mesopotamia via Syria/ Palestine to Anatolia and Egypt (see Chapter 14, by Sasson). There were channels reaching the Greek world from all three sides. The influence is manifest in myths about cosmogony and divine combats, in which Hittite traditions play a special role (see Chapter 17, by Beckman), and it is especially working in epic poetry, mostly in tales about the gods, both in adumbrations of cosmogony and in special scenes. Some parallels to Akkadian classics come close to translation. Literary influence is to be accepted, even if the links, possibly via Phoenician/Aramaean versions, have disappeared with the perishable writing materials on which they had been drawn.
World History
