gs are to
be reckoned in all, and the duration of their combined reigns amounts
to one hundred and twenty sari. From the beginning of the world to the
Deluge they reckoned 691,200 years, of which 259,200 had passed
before the coming of Aloros, and the remaining 432,000 were generously
distributed between this prince and his immediate successors: the Greek
and Latin writers had certainly a fine occasion for amusement over these
fabulous numbers of years which the Chaldaeans assigned to the lives and
reigns of their first kings.

Men in the mean time became wicked; they lost the habit of offering
sacrifices to the gods, and the gods, justly indignant at this
negligence, resolved to be avenged.* Now, Shamashnapishtim I was
reigning at this time in Shurippak, the "town of the ship:" he and
all his family were saved, and he related afterwards to one of his
descendants how Ea had snatched him from the disaster which fell upon
his people.** "Shurippak, the city which thou thyself knowest, is
situated on the bank of the Euphrates; it was already an ancient town
when the hearts of the gods who resided in it impelled them to bring the
deluge upon it--the great gods as many as they are; their father Anu,
their counsellor Bel the warrior, their throne-bearer Ninib, their
prince Innugi. The master of wisdom, Ea, took his seat with them,***
and, moved with pity, was anxious to warn Shamashnapishtim, his servant,
of the peril which threatened him;" but it was a very serious affair to
betray to a mortal a secret of heaven, and as he did not venture to do
so in a direct manner, his inventive mind suggested to him an artifice.

* The account of Bcrossus implies this as a cause of the
Deluge, since he mentions the injunction imposed upon the
survivors by a mysterious voice to be henceforward
respectful towards the gods, [Greek word]. The Chalaean
account considers the Deluge to have been sent as a
punishment upon men for their sins against the gods, since
it represents towards the end (cf. p. 52 of this History) Ea
as reproaching Bel for having confounded the innocent and
the guilty in one punishment.

** The name of this individual has been read in various
ways: Shamashnapishtim, "sun of life," Sitnapishtim, "the
saved," and Pirnapishtim. In one passage at least we find,
in place of Shamashnapishtim, the name or epithet of
Aclrakhasis, or by inversion Khasisadra, w