What was this catastrophe - predictable yet unavoidable? An important key to unlocking the puzzle of the Deluge is the realization that it was not a single, sudden event, but the climax of a chain of events.
Unusual pestilences affecting man and beast and a severe drought preceded the ordeal by water - a process that lasted, according to the Mesopotamia!! sources, seven "passings," or sar's. These phenomena could be accounted for only by major climatic changes. Such changes have been associated in Earth's past with the recurring ice ages and interglacial stages that had dominated Earth's immediate past. Reduced precipitation, falling sea and lake levels, and the drying up of subterranean water sources have been the hallmarks of an approaching ice age. Since the Deluge that abruptly ended those conditions was followed by the Sumerian civilization and our own present, postglacial age, the glaciation in question could only have been the last one.
Our conclusion is that the events of the Deluge relate to Earth's last ice age and its catastrophic ending. Drilling into the Arctic and Antarctic ice sheets, scientists have been able to measure the oxygen trapped in the various layers, and to judge from that the climate that prevailed millennia ago. Core samples from the bottoms of the seas, such as the Gulf of Mexico, measuring the proliferation or dwindling of marine life, likewise enable them to estimate temperatures in ages past. Based on such findings, scientists are now certain that the last ice age began some 75,000 years ago and underwent a mini- warming some 40,000 years ago. Circa 38,000 years ago, a harsher, colder, and drier period ensued. And then, about 13,000 years ago, the ice age abruptly ended, and our present mild climate was ushered in.
Aligning the biblical and Sumerian information, we find that the harsh times, the "accursation of Earth," began in the time of Noah's father Lamech. His hopes that the birth of Noah ("respite") would mark the end of the hardships was fulfilled in an unexpected way, through the catastrophic Deluge.
Many scholars believe that the ten biblical pre-Diluvial patriarchs (Adam to Noah) somehow parallel the ten pre-Diluvial rulers of the Sumerian king lists. These lists do not apply to divine titles DIN.GIR or EN to the last two of the ten, and treat Ziusudra/Utnapishtim and his father Ubar-Tutu as men. The latter two parallel Noah and his father Lamech; and according to the Sumerian lists, the two reigned a combined total of 64,800 years until the Deluge occurred. The last ice age, from 75,000 to 13,000 years ago, lasted 62,000 years. Since the hardships began when Ubartutu/Lamech was already reigning, the 62,000 fit perfectly into the 64,800.
Moreover, the extremely harsh conditions lasted, according to the Atra-Hasis epic, seven shar's, or 25,200 years. The scientists discovered evidence of an extremely harsh period from circa 38,000 to 13,000 years ago - a span of 25,000 years. Once again, the Mesopotamian evidence and modern scientific findings corroborate each other.
Our endeavor to unravel the puzzle of the Deluge, then, focuses on Earth's climatic changes, and in particular the abrupt collapse of the ice age some 13,000 years ago.
What could have caused a sudden climatic change of such magnitude?
Of the many theories advanced by the scientists, we are intrigued by the one suggested by Dr. John T. Hollin of the University of Maine. He contended that the Antarctic ice sheet periodically breaks loose and slips into the sea, creating an abrupt and enormous tidal wave!
This hypothesis - accepted and elaborated upon by others - suggests that as the ice sheet grew thicker and thicker, it not only trapped more of Earth's heat beneath the ice sheet but also created (by pressure and friction) a slushy, slippery layer at its bottom. Acting as a lubricant between the thick ice sheet above and the solid earth below, this slushy layer sooner or later caused the ice sheet to slide into the surrounding ocean.
Hollin calculated that if only half the present ice sheet of Antarctica (which is, on the average, more than a mile in thickness) were to slip into the southern seas, the immense tidal wave that would follow would raise the level of all the seas around the globe by some sixty feet, inundating coastal cities and lowlands.
In 1964, A. T. Wilson of Victoria University in New Zealand offered the theory that ice ages ended abruptly in such slippages, not only in the Antarctic but also in the Arctic. We feel that the various texts and facts gathered by us justify a conclusion that the Deluge was the result of such a slippage into the Antarctic waters of billions of tons of ice, bringing an abrupt end to the last ice age.
The sudden event triggered an immense tidal wave. Starting in Antarctic waters, it spread northward toward the Atlantic, Pacific, and Indian oceans. The abrupt change in temperature must have created violent storms accompanied by torrents of rain. Moving faster than the waters, the storms, clouds, and darkened skies heralded the avalanche of waters. Exactly such phenomena are described in the ancient texts.
As commanded by Enki, -Atra-Hasis sent everybody aboard the ark while he himself stayed outside to await the signal for boarding the vessel and sealing it off. Providing a "human-interest" detail, the ancient text tells us that Atra-Hasis, though ordered to stay outside the vessel, "was in and out; he could not sit, could not crouch ... his heart was broken; he was vomiting gall." But then:
. . . the Moon disappeared. . . .
The appearance of the weather changed;
The rains roared in the clouds. . . .
The winds became savage . . .
. . . the Deluge set out,
its might came upon the people like a battle;
One person did not see another,
they were not recognizable in the destruction.
The Deluge bellowed like a bull;
The winds whinnied like a wild ass.
The darkness was dense;
The Sun could not be seen.
The "Epic of Gilgamesh" is specific about the direction from which the storm came: It came from the south. Clouds, winds, rain,
and darkness indeed preceded the tidal wave which first tore down the "posts of Nergal" in the Lower World:
With the glow of dawn
a black cloud arose from the horizon;
inside it the god of storms thundered. . . .
Everything that had been bright
turned to blackness. ...
For one day the south storm blew,
gathering speed as it blew, submerging the mountains. . . .
Six days and six nights blows the wind
as the South Storm sweeps the land.
When the seventh day arrived,
the Deluge of the South Storm subsided.
The references to the "south storm," "south wind" clearly indicate the direction from which the Deluge arrived, its clouds and winds, the "heralds of the storm," moving "over hill and plain" to reach Mesopotamia. Indeed, a storm and an avalanche of water originating in the Antarctic would reach Mesopotamia via the Indian Ocean after first engulfing the hills of Arabia, then inundating the Tigris-Euphrates plain. The "Epic of Gilgamesh" also informs us that before the people and their land were submerged, the "dams of the dry land" and its dikes were "torn out": the continental coastlines were overwhelmed and swept over.
The biblical version of the Deluge story reports that the "bursting of the fountains of the Great Deep" preceded the "opening of the sluices of heaven." First, the waters of the "Great Deep" (what a descriptive name for the southernmost, frozen Antarctic seas) broke loose out of their icy confinement; only then did the rains begin to pour from the skies. This confirmation of our understanding of the Deluge is repeated, in reverse, when the Deluge subsided. First the "Fountains of the Deep [were] dammed"; then the rain "was arrested from the skies."