The myths of the Sumerians and the origins of the man
KRAMER AND THE HISTORY OF THE SUMERIANS
Kramer, a professor of Assyriology, believes that the Sumerian civilization is the first civilization and a highly evolved civilization. In his essay The Sumerians at the Roots of History, Kramer talks about the first cosmology, first moral principles, first laws, first medical prescriptions, etc.
Today, however, there are different theses that assert that the Sumerian civilization, however ancient, was not the first civilization: we have to give way to the oldest India. In fact in the European area of the Mediterranean the oldest civilization was the Sumerian, but the oldest civilization in absolute terms is not simple to find because of the divergence of theses on the subject and because confusion could also arise about the origin of the various peoples.
The Sumerian civilization was undoubtedly highly evolved for the period in which it arose, so much so that Z. Sitchin came up with a different theory about their origins.
The Sumerians occupied the territory of Mesopotamia, south of present-day Iraq. The oldest written records (clay tablets) date back to 3,500 B.C. By this time small city-states such as Ur, Lagash, Nippur and Eridu with a lugal, i.e., a local prince, at the head, were already springing up in Mesopotamia.
Sumerian culture should not be confused with that of the Assyro-Babylonians who came later, that is, around the fourth millennium B.C. In addition to the Sumerians there were other civilizations that were equally evolved in the same area but did not have their same historical importance.
The first king whose inscriptions are certain is Enmebaragesi of Kish, about 2,650 B.C. The city that emerges is Lagash, on which all the politics of the time revolved for several decades, considering for example that one of its lugals, Urukagina, was also known as a great legislator.
He held power over the territory until the advent of the city of Umma whose leader Lugalzaggisi defeated Urukagina. Lugalzaggisi thought big, he turned his gaze as much to the west, toward the Mediterranean regions, as to the east: we have with him the first thought of a "universal monarchy" known to history, and this brought about a great evolution in social, economic and institutional life.
The Sumerian numbering system was sexagesimal, that is, in base 60. Tablets from 3,000 B.C. show that there was a symbol for 1, one for 10, one for 60, one for 600 and one for 3,600. The system was positional, so the number was inferred based on the position of the symbols themselves.
Beginning in 2,000 B.C., a new numbering system became established that used only two symbols: one to represent the 1 and the other for the 10. The system was always positional (partly also additive, used, for example, to write large numbers) and sexagesimal. The disadvantage of this number system was that it lacked both a zero and a symbol to separate the numbers (like our comma), so the digits could give rise to ambiguity. In fact the separator was there but was not used. Why had the people of Mesopotamia chosen precisely a sexagesimal system? Because it was a rather simple system to use, not only for fractions as much as in astronomy. The evolution of this number system is attested by clay tablets and mathematical texts containing commercial and legal notions.
From this numbering system came, from 2,400 B.C., the first tables for multiplication, division and other operations. Later algebra and the study of astronomy developed. Concerning the discipline of astronomy, works of high importance were also written.
Sumerian (and Babylonian) writing was cuneiform, and it is very difficult to decipher the characters.
Around 2,400 B.C. the Sumerians were assailed by the Akkadians, people from the nearby desert led by Sargon I who established a vast empire whose centers of power were Ur and Agade. The Akkadians assimilated many features of Sumerian culture such as writing and the number system. However, as early as the second millennium B.C. the city states became independent again.
Around 2,460 B.C. new peoples arrived: that of the Semites, who came from the Arabian desert and were later led by the great Sargon of Akkad who defeated Lugalzaggisi and became founder of the empire; then (around 2,300-2,100 B.C.) the Gutei who brought destruction and starvation and defeated the Semites. Slowly, under the sovereignty of Gudea, Lagash was reborn and then also Ur with its dynasty that ruled over the four parts of the world but in which the monarch assumed a very significant title: "King of Sumer and Akkad" i.e., the two peoples, Sumerians and Semites, had united historically.
The next invaders of the Sumerians were the Hittites who entrusted the role of capital to Babylon. Between 1,793 and 1,750 B.C. the city of Babylon extended its rule under the leadership of Hammurabi, thus the first codified legal settings saw the light of day.
Next came the Assyrians (885 B.C.) who were in turn conquered by the Chaldeans, a people from southern Mesopotamia. In 311 B.C. the Seleucid dynasty was established, named after Seleucus, one of Alexander the Great's generals. This was how the Sumerians came into contact with Greek culture.
COSMOLOGY AND MYTHOLOGY
The Sumerians had no real philosophy but had pondered and investigated the nature of the universe and were so convinced of their ideas that they never felt the need to formulate them in writing-in fact, their way of viewing the universe and life must be extrapolated from myths and hymns.
The religion of the Sumerians was polytheistic. They had about a hundred gods, some more important, some less so.
According to the Sumerians, the visible universe was in the form of a hemisphere, at the base of which was the earth and above the sky. This hemisphere was called An-Ki (An= sky, Ki= earth). Around the earth was the sea, and below this sea, in the diametrically opposite part of the sky, were the underworld, which they called Kur. Beyond the sea, between the sky and the earth, they positioned the wind, lil, a word that also means breath, air, spirit.
Of this universe, the Sumerians claimed that the first element to be created was the sea (the infinite primeval Ocean). From the sea came heaven and earth, and from heaven and earth came the gods.
The most important gods were four:
- An (god of the sky)
- Enlil (god of the air)
- Enki (god of the abyss and ocean)
- Ninhursag (goddess known as the majestic lady. It is claimed that originally her name was Ki, earth, the bride of An, sky).
Most likely in Archaic times the most important god was An, who was considered the supreme king of the pantheon, however, as early as 2,500 B.C. we can learn that this role was later fulfilled by Enlil who was considered the Father of the gods. The reasons for this substitution are unknown to us.
For the Sumerians, the gods were immortal but still lived like humans: they needed to eat, drink, and could also be killed. They claimed that the gods behaved virtuously but at the same time these same gods introduced evil, violence, lies and oppression into the world in order to maintain cosmic order. Evil then is seen by the Sumerians as a necessary principle, and we find this same assumption in Vedism and Taoism.
The hymns for the gods extol goodness, righteousness and justice, this testifies to the fact that the Sumerian civilization was a civilization with great moral ideals in fact they had a god (Utu, god of the sun) whose task was precisely to maintain moral order. In addition to Utu, the goddess Nanshe also did not tolerate offenses against truth and justice.
Some elements of Sumerian mythology we also find in Greek mythology, for example the fact that the sun god traveled in a chariot.
The Sumerians also believed, as generally all ancient peoples did, in a lost golden age, an age of abundance and peace and in which everyone spoke a common language. For the Sumerians, this golden age would end because of the jealousy of the god Enki toward the god Enlil. Enki, because of his anger, replaced the common language with the multiplicity of languages, a theme similar to that of the tower of Babel.
THE ORIGINS OF THE SUMERIANS ACCORDING TO SITCHIN
Deciphering clay tablets is no easy. One of the few who possesses this ability is professor Zecharia Sitchin, author of books on Sumerian civilization, including The Planet of the Gods and The Spaceships of Sinai.. Sitchin claims that the Sumerians were the product of mating with an alien race that looked similar to us (because we are "in their image and likeness"). These would be intelligent beings whom the Sumerians called Anunnaki (sons of the god An) and whom the Bible calls Nephilim.
They were giants (Genesis 6:4) and came from a planet that has an elliptical orbit similar to that of comets, transiting between Mars and Jupiter every 3,600 years: the 12th planet. Basically, according to Professor Sitchin, Darwin's natural selection was there and produced the higher primates from which we descend. Then, thanks to the Anunnaki, there was the leap to Homo sapiens.
According to his theory, things would have gone like this: the Anunnaki would have started visiting the earth half a million years ago, and their deeds are what we read in the Old Testament or the poem of Gilgamesh. They would later colonize the land. Needing people to work in the mines in Africa they would have created "man," which corresponds to Homo sapiens, who was generated specifically to work in the mines. Man would therefore have been born in present-day Africa, corresponding with Darwinian theory.
Once created, man would have had two opportunities:
- he would steal from the aliens the secret to evolve, that is, to not just be a worker
- Earth women would have mated with extraterrestrials, in fact the Bible reports that: "the gods fell in love with the daughters of men." In Genesis (6:2) we read that "the sons of God, seeing that the daughters of men were suitable, took to themselves as many as they liked as wives." From this mating would be born, according to the author, giants, that is, a perfect race (Atlanteans were giants and perhaps lemurs as well) and many of these divine (alien) beings would still be here on earth.
Some claim that a blond, blue-eyed individual is born from the mating between a divine being and a man. Others, on the other hand, claim that this kind of individual is born from the mating of two demigods.
That is:
- alien + man = demigod 1
- other alien + other man = demigod 2
- demigod 1 + demigod 2 = very blond being with blue eyes.
(Of course, this should not lead us to assume that all blond people with blue eyes are demigods, although in recent years many individuals with these characteristics are being born.)
Some reflections are necessary here. On the book Anthropology of Aliens (M. Centini, D. Grezzo and D. Tacchino) there is a part (tab 9) where a type of aliens described as blond and asexual beings, similar to angels, is mentioned. We also find a picture and it is surprising to see how the facial expressions of these aliens and particularly their (very large) eyes resemble the depictions of the Sumerians in Kramer's book. The pictures given in Kramer's essay, as well as the myths of the Sumerians, leave a lot of room to think that Sitchin's theory is not fanciful at all.
Drunvalo Melchizedek, on the other hand, in The Ancient Secret of the Flower of Life proposes a similar view to Sitchin's but with a slight variation: for him we were born from the mating of two alien races: the Anunnaki (three-dimensional) and the Syrians (four-dimensional); the latter were also giants. Two thousand years after this mating, the first human individuals would be born, precisely in Gondwana, an island (or area, it is not known exactly whether it was an island or a set of lands) located west of Africa and which no longer exists today. Not surprisingly, the creation myths of West African peoples assert that they originated from an island, Gondwana, precisely. This would again find confirmation in the claim that the human race originated in Africa.
According to Sitchin, the human race was born 300,000 years ago. According to Melchizedek 200,207 years ago.
In Kramer's text we read that "underlying the ideas and ethical ideal of the Sumerians was the 'dogma' that man was made of clay to serve the gods."
The Sumerians have two mythical poems that fully reflect Sitchin's assumption. Of these poems one is entirely devoted to the creation of man, the other illustrates why man was created and speaks of a contrast between two minor gods. The first poem explains that six types of imperfect beings were created before the birth of man: the last two types were a barren female and an asexual being.
Could these imperfect beings be the ones we know as primitive humans?
The second mythical poem, on the other hand, speaks of two gods (the cattle god Lahar and his sister Ashnan, goddess of grain) who were created in the creation hall of the gods so that the Anunnaki would have enough to feed and clothe themselves. This poem thus led the Sumerians to believe that man was born to serve the gods, and from this stemmed their devotion to the deities.
As we can see, then, the myths of the Sumerians leave plenty of room for Sitchin's and Melchizedek's theories about the creation of man not to be dismissed as figments of pure fantasy; on the contrary, by comparing the various sources we can see that all the pieces of the puzzle fit together.
