Thursday 3 June 2021

Enki's little boat

The boat journey of the god Enki (cylinder seal impression, ca. 2300–2150 BCE). Source: W. H. Ward, The Seal Cylinders of Western Asia...

There is a very strange part in the Mesopotamian poem called "Gilgameš, Enkidu and the nether world"...

It goes like this: 

"...When he set sail...when Enki set sail for the nether world, against the lord a storm...arose...The waves at the bow of the boat rose to devour the lord like wolves and the waves at the stern of the boat were attacking Enki like a lion..."

So first, why would Enki be going to the netherworld? On a boat? And is the choice of animals, to which the waves are compared, significant? Let me see I can find answers to these questions...

As I explained in my article "Shamash young and old", Enki is the god of the source of fresh water...And the god of flood...Annual flood of the Tigris and Euphrates. Which is why he is depicted with two streams of water full of fish (rivers) coming out of him...


The water levels of Tigris and Euphrates start rising sharply in Jan/Feb, at the beginning of spring, peak in Apr/May, at the end of spring, beginning of summer, and then start falling sharply until Jul/Aug, the end of summer...

Annual flow charts:

Tigris

Euphrates


Oh, by the way, Enki is standing on the bull, because the annual flood peaks in Apr/May...The time when wild Eurasian cattle start to calve...Which is marked by Taurus...An ancient animal calendar marker. Which had originally nothing to do with stars...I talked about this in my article "Ram and bull"



The time of the flood is when large tracts of Mesopotamia used to be submerged, making boats the only viable means of transport...So Enki, the god of flood, in a boat...



The climatic year in Mesopotamia is divided into two halves: summer, hot and dry half (Apr/May-Oct/Nov) and winter, cool and wet half (Oct/Nov-Apr/May)...

The end of the flood, Jul/Aug, Leo, is the hottest and driest part of the hot and dry half of the year. The lair of the fire breathing dragons...Depicted as winged lions...I talked about this in my article "Is that you Gilgamesh"...


These winged lions were most likely derived from lions with sun heat waves radiating from their back...Basically symbolically saying: dragon is the sun in Leo, the hottest, driest part of the year...I talked about this in my article "Nude winged hero dominating snakes"...

Sometimes the dragons were depicted as beasts with lion's body and 7 snake heads...Snake is the symbol of sun's heat...And there are 7 of them, because old Sumerian summer (🙂), hot dry season, had 7 months. So dragon = hot dry season...I talked about this in my article "Seven headed dragon"...

Leo, the hottest, driest part of the year, is is also where we find Nergal...The god of death, and the husband of Ereshkigal, the goddess of the underworld...Standing on a lion, holding lion scepter, being a lion...Or being a winged lion, dragon...I talked about this in my article "Winged super human hero"...

Nergal is standing at the gates of hell...The hottest and driest part of the year, when nature dies...And this is exactly where the annual flood, Enki, is going...This is the end of Enki's journey...The end of the annual flood...

But what about the wolf and lion attacking the two opposite ends of Enki's boat...

Eurasian wolves main mating season starts in Jan...At the beginning of the annual flood...

Eurasian lions main mating season starts in Aug...At the end of the annual flood...


So the wolf and lion would be at the opposite ends of the Enki's boat...Of Enki's flood...Which starts when wolves mate, peaks when aurochs calve and ends when lions mate...


Oh, did I say that in the same chapter of the "Gilgameš, Enkidu and the nether world" we also read that "The keel (middle) of Enki's little boat was trembling as if it were being butted by turtles" 🙂

Guess when the terrible Mesopotamian turtles, you know that ones that Enki "unleashed" against Ninurta  mate? In Apr/May, middle, peak of the flood...I talked about this in my article "Ninurta and the turtle"...

BTW, that star, above the end of the Enki's boat...That's Sirius, which rises with the sun, the destructive, deadly sun in Leo...Nergal...At the gates of hell...At the end of Enki's boat journey...At the end of his boat...

Sirius, rising before the sun, pretending to be "the morning star"... Otherwise known as Inanna/Ishtar "The queen of heaven"...The one that poses on the lion...In Leo...

I talked about this in my article "Ninshubur"...

So here you go...Hope you enjoyed this...I will get back to Nergal standing at the gates of hell in my next thread...Until then, as a Henry Miller once said: "drink cold, piss warm"...🙂

To read more about ancient animal and plant calendar markers, start here…then check the rest of the blog posts related to animal calendar markers I still didn't add to this page, and finally check my twitter threads I still didn't convert to blog post...I am 9 months behind now...

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