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a mountain torrent over the plains of Īrān, and the star and crescent flashed everywhere from banners on Persian soil, while to-day the Arab pitches his tent amidst the ruins of ancient cities, and only the spade of the explorer reveals their buried treasures.

CHAPTER III.

       THE POETRY AND MYTHOLOGY OF THE TABLETS.

       Table of Contents

      PRIMITIVE MYTHOLOGY—ANŪ—SEVEN EVIL SPIRITS—ACCADIAN POEM—ASSUR—HEA—NIN-CI-GAL—SIN, THE MOON GOD—HEA-BANI—NERGAL—MERODACH—NEBO—NINIP—CHEMOSH—INCANTATIONS TO FIRE AND WATER—IM—BAAL—TAMMUZ-ISHTAR—ISHTAR OF ARBELA—ISHTAR OF ERECH—LEGEND OF ISHTAR AND IZDŪBAR-ISHTAR, QUEEN OF LOVE AND BEAUTY—THE DESCENT OF ISHTAR.

      The East was the home of poetry and the land of mythology before the hundred gates of Palmyra were swung upon their massive hinges, or the crown of her beautiful queen had been set with its moonlight pearls. A land which was rich with jewels and radiant with flowers, held in her background a mythology so primitive that it appears to have been the mother of them all. Tablet and palace walls have alike been questioned concerning these early myths, and behind the dust of the centuries, in the legends that lie beneath them, we find stories of gods like Indra, the storm-king of the Hindūs, and Jove of Olympus—like Odin and Thor of the Northmen. Even the gigantic symbols that guarded the portals of ancient hall and palace are replete with wonder, for their strange wings have sheltered the very beginnings of mythology. Chaldea’s cosmogonies comprehend the ideas of the Greek and Norseman—nay, even the wildest dreams of Hindū and Persian are apparently drawn from this common source.^[63]

      The intelligent study of Persian literature compels an examination of the early myths and legends where her poetry and romance found their sources—compels the study not only of the inscriptions of Persian kings, but of the tablets which have brought down to us the idols of a primitive people. Therefore, it is the province of this chapter to give a brief yet comprehensive outline of the principal deities and legends which seem to form the basis not only of Persian mythology, but of the luxuriant growth of myth and fable which has permeated India, Greece, and Rome, as well as Northern Europe.

      A Chaldean legend of the creation is found upon a clay tablet which contains a description of the struggle between the evil powers of darkness and chaos, and the bright powers of light and order. This is doubtless the origin of the struggle between good and evil—the unceasing contest between Ormazd and Ahriman which forms the key-note of Persian thought so fully illustrated in the Avesta.

      There are two contradictory tablets of the creation. The one coming from the library at Cutha and the other from the royal library at Nineveh. This latter consists of seven tablets, as the creation is described as consisting of seven successive acts. It presents a curious similarity to the account of the creation long before recorded in Genesis, the word Tīamat which is used to represent chaos seems to be the same as the biblical word tehom, the deep. A radical difference, however, is found in the fact that in the Assyrian story, Tīamat has become a mythological personage—the dragon mother of a chaotic brood. The legend in its present form is assigned by Prof. Sayce to about the time of Assur-bani-pal.^[64] The oldest tablets are those which are written in the primitive Accadian tongue, and many of these have been found in the library of Assur-bani-pal,^[65] having evidently been copied from the earlier text and supplied with interlinear translations in the Assyrian tongue.

      The Assyrians counted no less than three hundred spirits of heaven and six hundred spirits of earth, all of which (as well as the rest of their mythology) appears to have been borrowed from the primitive population of that country. Indeed it would appear that ancient Babylonia was the birthplace of that common mythology^[66] which in various forms afterward became the heritage of so many nations.

      Elaborate and costly temples were built for these deities of an idolatrous people, and when the image of a god was brought into his newly built temple there were festivals and processions, and wild rejoicing among the worshippers.

      The principal gods mentioned in these early tablets may be briefly sketched as follows:

      ANŪ.

      The sky god and ruler of the highest heaven, whose messengers are evil spirits. The Canaanite town of Beth-anath, mentioned in Joshua,^[67] was named for Anat, the wife of Anū.

      SEVEN EVIL SPIRITS.

      These messengers of Anū are elsewhere described as the seven storm-clouds, or the winds, and their leader seems to have been the dragon Tīamat^[68] (the deep), who was defeated by Bel-Merodach in the war of the gods. The tablets have preserved an Accadian poem on this subject, the author of which is represented as living in the Babylonian city of Eridu,^[69] where his horizon was bounded by the mountains of Susiani, and the battle of the elements raging around their summit suggested to his poet-mind the warring of evil spirits.

      It was these seven storm-spirits who were represented as attacking the moon when it was eclipsed, a description of which is given in an Accadian poem^[70] translated by Prof. Talbot. Here they are regarded as the allies of the incubus, or nightmare, which is supposed to attack the moon.

      ACCADIAN POEM ON THE SEVEN EVIL SPIRITS.

      “O, Fire-god! those seven, how were they born? how grew they up?

      Those seven in the mountain of the sunset were born.

      Those seven in the mountain of the sunrise grew up.

      In the hollows of the earth have they their dwelling;

      On the high places of the earth are they proclaimed.

      Among the gods their couch they have not;

      Their name in heaven and earth exists not.

      Seven are they; in the mountain of the sunset do they rise;

      Seven are they; in the mountain of the sunrise do they set.

      Let the Fire-god seize upon the incubus;

      Those baleful seven may he remove, and their bodies may he bind.

      Order and kindness know they not,

      Prayer and supplication hear they not.

      Unto Hea they are hostile;

      Disturbing the lily in the torrents are they.

      Baleful are they, baleful are they,

      Seven are they, seven are they.”

      “They are the dark storms of heaven which unto fire unite themselves;

      They are the destructive tempests which, on a fine day, sudden darkness cause;

      With storms and meteors they rush,

      Their rage ignites the thunderbolts of Im,

      From the right hand of the thunder they dart forth.

      They are seven, these evil spirits, and death they fear not;

      They are seven, these evil spirits, who rush like a hurricane,

      And fall like fire-brands on the earth.”^[71]

      Here we have more than a suggestion of the origin of some of the early songs of the Vedas, for these seven storm-spirits are represented by the Marūts of the Hindūs—“the shakers of the earth”—who dash through the heavens in chariots drawn by dappled deer. In this primitive mythology we find also

      ASSUR.

      The “god of judges” was the especial patron of Assyria, and afterward made to express the power of the later Assyrian empire by becoming “father of the gods” and the head of the pantheon.

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