the god who rules the rain will
cause to fall upon you, on a certain evening, an abundant rain. When the
dawn of the next day appears, the deluge will begin, which will cover
the earth and drown all living things.'" Shamashnapishtim repeated the
warning to the people, but the people refused to believe it, and turned
him into ridicule. The work went rapidly forward: the hull was a hundred
and forty cubits long, the deck one hundred and forty broad; all the
joints were caulked with pitch and bitumen. A solemn festival was
observed at its completion, and the embarkation began.** "All that I
possessed I filled the ship with it all that I had of silver, I filled
it with it; all that I had of gold I filled it with it, all that I had
of the seed of life of every kind I filled it with it; I caused all
my family and my servants to go up into it; beasts of the field, wild
beasts of the field, I caused them to go up all together. Shamash had
given me a sign: 'When the god who rules the rain, in the evening shall
cause an abundant rain to fall, enter into the ship and close thy door.'
The sign was revealed: the god who rules the rain caused to fall one
night an abundant rain. The day, I feared its dawning; I feared to see
the daylight; I entered into the ship and I shut the door; that the ship
might be guided, I handed over to Buzur-Bel, the pilot, the great ark
and its fortunes."

* The sense of this passage is far from being certain; I
have followed the interpretation proposed, with some
variations, by Pinches, by Haupt, and by Jensen. The
stratagem at once recalls the history of King Midas, and the
talking reeds which knew the secret of his ass's ears. In
the version of Berossus, it is Kronos who plays the part
here assigned to Ea in regard to Xisuthros.

** The text is mutilated, and does not furnish enough
information to follow in every detail the building of the
ark. From what we can understand, the vessel of
Shamashnapishtim was a kind of immense kelek, decked, but
without masts or rigging of any sort. The text identifies
the festival celebrated by the hero before the embarkation
with the festival Akitu of Merodach, at Babylon, during
which "Nebo, the powerful son, sailed from Borsippa to
Babylon in the bark of the river Asmu, of beauty." The
embarkation of Nebo and his voyage on the stream had
probably inspired the information accor