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A flood myth or a deluge myth is a myth in which a great
flood A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are an area of study of the discipline hydrol ...
, usually sent by a deity or deities, destroys
civilization A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system). ...
, often in an act of divine retribution. Parallels are often drawn between the flood waters of these myths and the primaeval
water Water (chemical formula ) is an Inorganic compound, inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and Color of water, nearly colorless chemical substance, which is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living ...
s which appear in certain creation myths, as the flood waters are described as a measure for the cleansing of humanity, in preparation for
rebirth Rebirth may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Film * ''Rebirth'' (2011 film), a 2011 Japanese drama film * ''Rebirth'' (2016 film), a 2016 American thriller film * ''Rebirth'', a documentary film produced by Project Rebirth * ''The Re ...
. Most flood myths also contain a culture hero, who "represents the human craving for life". The flood-myth motif occurs in many cultures, including the Mesopotamian flood stories, Native American in North America, the Genesis flood narrative, ''
manvantara A ''manvantara'', in Hindu cosmology, is a cyclic period of time identifying the duration, reign, or age of a Manu, the progenitor of mankind. In each ''manvantara'', seven Rishis, certain deities, an Indra, a Manu, and kings (sons of Manu) ar ...
-sandhya'' in
Hinduism Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...
, and
Deucalion In Greek mythology, Deucalion (; grc-gre, Δευκαλίων) was the son of Prometheus; ancient sources name his mother as Clymene, Hesione, or Pronoia.A scholium to ''Odyssey'' 10.2 (='' Catalogue'' fr. 4) reports that Hesiod called Deucal ...
and
Pyrrha In Greek mythology, Pyrrha (; Ancient Greek: Πύρρα) was the daughter of Epimetheus and Pandora and wife of Deucalion of whom she had three sons, Hellen, Amphictyon, Orestheus; and three daughters Protogeneia, Pandora II and Thyia. Accordi ...
in
Greek mythology A major branch of classical mythology, Greek mythology is the body of myths originally told by the ancient Greeks, and a genre of Ancient Greek folklore. These stories concern the origin and nature of the world, the lives and activities ...
.


Mythologies

One example of a flood myth is the ''
Epic of Gilgamesh The ''Epic of Gilgamesh'' () is an epic poem from ancient Mesopotamia, and is regarded as the earliest surviving notable literature and the second oldest religious text, after the Pyramid Texts. The literary history of Gilgamesh begins with ...
''. Many scholars believe that this account was copied from the Akkadian '' Atra-Hasis'', which dates to the 18th century BCE. In the Gilgamesh flood myth, the highest god, Enlil, decides to destroy the world with a flood because humans have become too noisy. The god Ea, who had created humans out of clay and divine blood, secretly warns the hero
Utnapishtim Ut-napishtim or Uta-na’ishtim (in the ''Epic of Gilgamesh''), Atra-Hasis, Ziusudra ( Sumerian), Xisuthros (''Ξίσουθρος'', in Berossus) ( akk, ) is a character in ancient Mesopotamian mythology. He is tasked by the god Enki (Akkadian: ...
of the impending flood and gives him detailed instructions for building a boat so that life may survive. Both the ''Epic of Gilgamesh'' and ''Atra-Hasis'' are preceded by the similar
Sumerian creation myth The earliest record of a Sumerian creation myth, called The Eridu Genesis by historian Thorkild Jacobsen, is found on a single fragmentary tablet excavated in Nippur by the Expedition of the University of Pennsylvania in 1893, and first recognized ...
(c. 1600 BCE)—the oldest surviving example of such a flood-myth narrative, known from tablets found in the ruins of Nippur in the late 1890s and translated by Arno Poebel. Yi Samuel Chen analyzed various texts from the Early Dynastic III Period through to the Old Babylonian Period, and argues that the flood narrative was only added in texts written during the
Old Babylonian Period The Old Babylonian Empire, or First Babylonian Empire, is dated to BC – BC, and comes after the end of Sumerian power with the destruction of the Third Dynasty of Ur, and the subsequent Isin-Larsa period. The chronology of the first dynasty ...
. With regard to the Sumerian King List, observations by experts have always indicated that the portion of the Sumerian King List talking about before the flood differs stylistically from the King List Proper. Essentially Old Babylonian copies tend to represent a tradition of before the flood apart from the actual King List, whereas the
Ur III The Third Dynasty of Ur, also called the Neo-Sumerian Empire, refers to a 22nd to 21st century BC ( middle chronology) Sumerian ruling dynasty based in the city of Ur and a short-lived territorial-political state which some historians consider t ...
copy of the King List and the duplicate from the Brockmon collection indicate that the King List Proper once existed independent of mention of the flood and the tradition of before the flood. Essentially, Chen gives evidence to prove that the section of before the flood and references to the flood in the Sumerian King List were all later additions added in during the Old Babylonian Period, as the Sumerian King List went through updates and edits. The flood as a watershed in early history of the world was probably a new historiographical concept emerging in the Mesopotamian literary traditions during the Old Babylonian Period, as evident by the fact that the flood motif didn't show up in the
Ur III The Third Dynasty of Ur, also called the Neo-Sumerian Empire, refers to a 22nd to 21st century BC ( middle chronology) Sumerian ruling dynasty based in the city of Ur and a short-lived territorial-political state which some historians consider t ...
copy and that earliest chronographical sources related to the flood show up in the Old Babylonian Period. Chen also concludes that the name of "
Ziusudra Ziusudra ( Old Babylonian: , Neo-Assyrian: , grc-gre, Ξίσουθρος, Xísouthros) of Shuruppak (c. 2900 BC) is listed in the WB-62 Sumerian King List recension as the last king of Sumer prior to the Great Flood. He is subsequently r ...
" as a flood hero and the idea of the flood hinted at by that name in the Old Babylonian Version of " Instructions of Shuruppak" are only developments during that Old Babylonian Period, when also the didactic text was updated with information from the burgeoning Antediluvian Tradition In Hindu mythology, texts such as the
Satapatha Brahmana The Shatapatha Brahmana ( sa, शतपथब्राह्मणम् , Śatapatha Brāhmaṇam, meaning 'Brāhmaṇa of one hundred paths', abbreviated to 'SB') is a commentary on the Śukla (white) Yajurveda. It is attributed to the Vedic ...
( 6th century BCE) and the Puranas contain the story of a great flood, "''
manvantara A ''manvantara'', in Hindu cosmology, is a cyclic period of time identifying the duration, reign, or age of a Manu, the progenitor of mankind. In each ''manvantara'', seven Rishis, certain deities, an Indra, a Manu, and kings (sons of Manu) ar ...
-sandhya''", wherein the
Matsya Matsya ( sa, मत्स्य, lit. ''fish'') is the fish avatar of the Hindu god Vishnu. Often described as the first of Vishnu's ten primary avatars, Matsya is described to have rescued the first man, Manu, from a great deluge. Matsya ...
Avatar Avatar (, ; ), is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means "descent". It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, goddess or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appeara ...
of the
Vishnu Vishnu ( ; , ), also known as Narayana and Hari, is one of the principal deities of Hinduism. He is the supreme being within Vaishnavism, one of the major traditions within contemporary Hinduism. Vishnu is known as "The Preserver" withi ...
warns the first man, Manu, of the impending flood, and also advises him to build a giant boat. In
Zoroastrian Zoroastrianism is an Iranian religion and one of the world's oldest organized faiths, based on the teachings of the Iranian-speaking prophet Zoroaster. It has a dualistic cosmology of good and evil within the framework of a monotheistic ...
Mazdaism Zoroastrianism is an Iranian religion and one of the world's oldest organized faiths, based on the teachings of the Iranian-speaking prophet Zoroaster. It has a dualistic cosmology of good and evil within the framework of a monotheistic on ...
,
Ahriman Angra Mainyu (; Avestan: 𐬀𐬢𐬭𐬀⸱𐬨𐬀𐬌𐬥𐬌𐬌𐬎 ''Aŋra Mainiiu'') is the Avestan-language name of Zoroastrianism's hypostasis of the "destructive/evil spirit" and the main adversary in Zoroastrianism either of the ...
tries to destroy the world with a drought, which
Mithra Mithra ( ae, ''Miθra'', peo, 𐎷𐎰𐎼 ''Miça'') commonly known as Mehr, is the Iranian deity of covenant, light, oath, justice and the sun. In addition to being the divinity of contracts, Mithra is also a judicial figure, an all-seein ...
ends by shooting an arrow into a rock, from which a flood springs; one man survives in an ark with his cattle. Norbert Oettinger argues that the story of Yima and the Vara was originally a flood myth, and the harsh winter was added in due to the dry nature of Eastern Iran, as flood myths didn't have as much of an effect as harsh winters. He has argued that the mention of melted water flowing in Videvdad 2.24 is a remnant of the flood myth, and mentions that the Indian flood myths originally had their protagonist as Yama, but it was changed to Manu later. In
Plato Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...
's ''Timaeus'', written 360 BCE, Timaeus describes a flood myth similar to the earlier versions. In it, the Bronze race of humans angers the high god
Zeus Zeus or , , ; grc, Δῐός, ''Diós'', label= genitive Boeotian Aeolic and Laconian grc-dor, Δεύς, Deús ; grc, Δέος, ''Déos'', label= genitive el, Δίας, ''Días'' () is the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek reli ...
with their constant warring. Zeus decides to punish humanity with a flood. The Titan
Prometheus In Greek mythology, Prometheus (; , , possibly meaning " forethought")Smith"Prometheus". is a Titan god of fire. Prometheus is best known for defying the gods by stealing fire from them and giving it to humanity in the form of technology, kn ...
, who had created humans from clay, tells the secret plan to
Deucalion In Greek mythology, Deucalion (; grc-gre, Δευκαλίων) was the son of Prometheus; ancient sources name his mother as Clymene, Hesione, or Pronoia.A scholium to ''Odyssey'' 10.2 (='' Catalogue'' fr. 4) reports that Hesiod called Deucal ...
, advising him to build an ark in order to be saved. After nine nights and days, the water starts receding and the ark lands on a mountain. The theme of
divine punishment Divine judgment means the judgment of God or other supreme beings within a religion. Ancient beliefs In ancient Sumerian religion, the sun-god Utu and his twin sister Inanna were believed to be the enforcers of divine justice. Utu, as t ...
in the form of a floodfor human wickedness recurs ( Vineta, Genesis). Floods may appear local ( Kitezh) or global. Like many other folk-tale elements from around the world, the story of flood survival and human restart (motif A 1021.0.2 and associated elements) appears in Stith Thompson's ''
Motif-Index of Folk-Literature The ''Motif-Index of Folk-Literature'' is a six volume catalogue of motifs, granular elements of folklore, composed by American folklorist Stith Thompson (1932–1936, revised and expanded 1955–1958). Often referred to as Thompson's motif-index ...
''. The
Cheyenne The Cheyenne ( ) are an Indigenous people of the Great Plains. Their Cheyenne language belongs to the Algonquian language family. Today, the Cheyenne people are split into two federally recognized nations: the Southern Cheyenne, who are enr ...
, a North American Great Plains tribe, believe in a flood which altered the course of their history, perhaps occurring in the
Missouri River Valley The Missouri River Valley outlines the journey of the Missouri River from its headwaters where the Madison, Jefferson and Gallatin Rivers flow together in Montana to its confluence with the Mississippi River in the State of Missouri. At long th ...
.


Historicity

Floods in the wake of the Last Glacial Period are speculated to have inspired myths that survive to this day. Plato's allegory of
Atlantis Atlantis ( grc, Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, , island of Atlas) is a fictional island mentioned in an allegory on the hubris of nations in Plato's works '' Timaeus'' and '' Critias'', wherein it represents the antagonist naval power that b ...
is set over 9,000 years before his time, leading some scholars to suggest that a Stone Age society which lived close to the
Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean Basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Western and Southern Europe and Anatolia, on the south by North Africa, and on the ...
could have been wiped out by the rising
sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardise ...
, an event which could have served as the basis for the story.
Mesopotamia Mesopotamia ''Mesopotamíā''; ar, بِلَاد ٱلرَّافِدَيْن or ; syc, ܐܪܡ ܢܗܪ̈ܝܢ, or , ) is a historical region of Western Asia situated within the Tigris–Euphrates river system, in the northern part of the ...
, like other early sites of riverine civilisation, was flood-prone; and for those experiencing valley-wide inundations, flooding could destroy the whole of their known world. According to the excavation report of the 1930s excavation at Shuruppak (modern Tell Fara, Iraq), the Jemdet Nasr and Early Dynastic layers at the site were separated by a layer of sand and silt that was interpreted as a flood layer. However, more recently it has been suggested that the nature of this deposit is more like that being created by river avulsion, a process that was very common in the Tigris–Euphrates river system. Similar layers have been recorded at other sites as well, all dating to different periods, which would be consistent with the nature of river avulsions. The geography of the Mesopotamian area changed considerably with the filling of the
Persian Gulf The Persian Gulf ( fa, خلیج فارس, translit=xalij-e fârs, lit=Gulf of Fars, ), sometimes called the ( ar, اَلْخَلِيْجُ ٱلْعَرَبِيُّ, Al-Khalīj al-ˁArabī), is a mediterranean sea in Western Asia. The bod ...
after sea waters rose following the last glacial period. Global sea levels were about lower around 18,000  BP and rose until 8,000 BP when they reached current levels, which are now an average above the floor of the Gulf, which was a huge () low-lying and fertile region in Mesopotamia, in which human habitation is thought to have been strong around the Gulf Oasis for 100,000 years. A sudden increase in settlements above the present-day water level is recorded at around 7,500  BP. One hypothesis suggests that a
meteor A meteoroid () is a small rocky or metallic body in outer space. Meteoroids are defined as objects significantly smaller than asteroids, ranging in size from grains to objects up to a meter wide. Objects smaller than this are classified as mi ...
or
comet A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena ...
crashed into the
Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by t ...
around 3000–2800 BCE, creating the undersea Burckle Crater, and generating a giant
tsunami A tsunami ( ; from ja, 津波, lit=harbour wave, ) is a series of waves in a water body caused by the displacement of a large volume of water, generally in an ocean or a large lake. Earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and other underwater exp ...
that flooded coastal lands. Historian
Adrienne Mayor Adrienne Mayor (born 1946) is a historian of ancient science and a classical folklorist. Mayor specializes in ancient history and the study of "folk science", or how pre-scientific cultures interpreted data about the natural world, and how these ...
theorizes that global flood stories may have been inspired by ancient observations of seashells and fish fossils in inland and mountain areas. The ancient Greeks, Egyptians, and Romans all documented the discovery of such remains in such locations; the Greeks hypothesized that Earth had been covered by water on several occasions, citing the seashells and fish fossils found on mountain tops as evidence of this idea. Speculation regarding the
Deucalion In Greek mythology, Deucalion (; grc-gre, Δευκαλίων) was the son of Prometheus; ancient sources name his mother as Clymene, Hesione, or Pronoia.A scholium to ''Odyssey'' 10.2 (='' Catalogue'' fr. 4) reports that Hesiod called Deucal ...
myth has postulated a large tsunami in the Mediterranean Sea, caused by the
Thera eruption The Minoan eruption was a catastrophic volcanic eruption that devastated the Aegean island of Thera (also called Santorini) circa 1600 BCE. It destroyed the Minoan settlement at Akrotiri, as well as communities and agricultural areas on near ...
(with an approximate geological date of 1630–1600 BCE), as the myth's historical basis. Although the tsunami hit the South
Aegean Sea The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi (Greek: Αιγαίο Πέλαγος: "Egéo Pélagos", Turkish: "Ege Denizi" or "Adalar Denizi") is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea between Europe and Asia. It is located between the Balkans ...
and
Crete Crete ( el, Κρήτη, translit=, Modern: , Ancient: ) is the largest and most populous of the Greek islands, the 88th largest island in the world and the fifth largest island in the Mediterranean Sea, after Sicily, Sardinia, Cyprus, ...
, it did not affect cities in the mainland of Greece, such as
Mycenae Mycenae ( ; grc, Μυκῆναι or , ''Mykē̂nai'' or ''Mykḗnē'') is an archaeological site near Mykines in Argolis, north-eastern Peloponnese, Greece. It is located about south-west of Athens; north of Argos; and south of Corinth. ...
,
Athens Athens ( ; el, Αθήνα, Athína ; grc, Ἀθῆναι, Athênai (pl.) ) is both the capital and largest city of Greece. With a population close to four million, it is also the seventh largest city in the European Union. Athens dominates ...
, and Thebes, which continued to prosper, indicating that it had a local rather than a region-wide effect. The
Black Sea deluge hypothesis The Black Sea deluge is the best known of three hypothetical flood scenarios proposed for the Late Quaternary history of the Black Sea. It is one of the two of these flood scenarios which propose a rapid, even catastrophic, rise in sea level of ...
offers a controversial account of long-term flooding; the hypothesis argues for a catastrophic irruption of water about 5600 BCE from the Mediterranean Sea into the
Black Sea The Black Sea is a marginal mediterranean sea of the Atlantic Ocean lying between Europe and Asia, east of the Balkans, south of the East European Plain, west of the Caucasus, and north of Anatolia. It is bounded by Bulgaria, Georgia, Rom ...
basin. This has become the subject of considerable discussion. The Younger Dryas impact hypothesis offers another proposed natural explanation for flood myths; this idea is similarly controversial.


Comets

The earliest known hypothesis about a comet that had a widespread effect on human populations can be attributed to
Edmond Halley Edmond (or Edmund) Halley (; – ) was an English astronomer, mathematician and physicist. He was the second Astronomer Royal in Britain, succeeding John Flamsteed in 1720. From an observatory he constructed on Saint Helena in 1676–77, H ...
, who in 1694 suggested that a worldwide flood had been the result of a near-miss by a comet. The issue was taken up in more detail by
William Whiston William Whiston (9 December 166722 August 1752) was an English theologian, historian, natural philosopher, and mathematician, a leading figure in the popularisation of the ideas of Isaac Newton. He is now probably best known for helping to inst ...
, a protégé of and popularizer of the theories of
Isaac Newton Sir Isaac Newton (25 December 1642 – 20 March 1726/27) was an English mathematician, physicist, astronomer, alchemist, theologian, and author (described in his time as a " natural philosopher"), widely recognised as one of the grea ...
, who argued in his book ''
A New Theory of the Earth ''A New Theory of the Earth'' was a book written by William Whiston, in which he presented a description of the divine creation of the Earth and a posited global flood. He also postulated that the earth originated from the atmosphere of a comet ...
'' (1696) that a comet encounter was the probable cause of the Biblical Flood of Noah in 2342 BCE. Whiston also attributed the origins of the atmosphere and other significant changes in the Earth to the effects of comets. In
Pierre-Simon Laplace Pierre-Simon, marquis de Laplace (; ; 23 March 1749 – 5 March 1827) was a French scholar and polymath whose work was important to the development of engineering, mathematics, statistics, physics, astronomy, and philosophy. He summarized ...
's book ''Exposition Du Systême Du Monde'' (''The System of the World''), first published in 1796, he stated: A similar hypothesis was popularized by Minnesota congressman and
pseudoarchaeology Pseudoarchaeology—also known as alternative archaeology, fringe archaeology, fantastic archaeology, cult archaeology, and spooky archaeology—is the interpretation of the past from outside the archaeological science community, which rejects ...
writer Ignatius L. Donnelly in his book '' Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel'' (1883), which followed his better-known book '' Atlantis: The Antediluvian World'' (1882). In ''Ragnarok'', Donnelly argued that an enormous comet struck the Earth around 6,000 BCE to 9,000 BCE, destroying an advanced civilization on the "lost continent" of
Atlantis Atlantis ( grc, Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, , island of Atlas) is a fictional island mentioned in an allegory on the hubris of nations in Plato's works '' Timaeus'' and '' Critias'', wherein it represents the antagonist naval power that b ...
. Donnelly, following others before him, attributed the Biblical Flood to this event, which he hypothesized had also resulted in catastrophic fires and
climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to ...
. Shortly after the publication of ''Ragnarok'', one commenter noted, "Whiston ascertained that the deluge of Noah came from a comet's tail; but Donnelly has outdone Whiston, for he has shown that our planet has suffered not only from a cometary flood, but from cometary fire, and a cometary rain of stones."


Art

Image:Matsya Avatar, ca 1870.jpg, Matsya-
avatara Avatar (, ; ), is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means "descent". It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, goddess or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appearanc ...
of Lord
Vishnu Vishnu ( ; , ), also known as Narayana and Hari, is one of the principal deities of Hinduism. He is the supreme being within Vaishnavism, one of the major traditions within contemporary Hinduism. Vishnu is known as "The Preserver" withi ...
pulls
Manu Manu may refer to: Geography * Manú Province, a province of Peru, in the Madre de Dios Region **Manú National Park, Peru ** Manú River, in southeastern Peru * Manu River (Tripura), which originates in India and flows into Bangladesh *Manu Tem ...
's boat after having defeated the demon Image:Manabozhointheflood.png,
Nanabozho In Anishinaabe ''aadizookaan'' (traditional storytelling), particularly among the Ojibwe, Nanabozho (in syllabics: , ), also known as Nanabush, is a spirit, and figures prominently in their storytelling, including the story of the world's creat ...
in
Ojibwe The Ojibwe, Ojibwa, Chippewa, or Saulteaux are an Anishinaabe people in what is currently southern Canada, the northern Midwestern United States, and Northern Plains. According to the U.S. census, in the United States Ojibwe people are one of ...
flood story from an illustration by R. C. Armour, in his book ''North American Indian Fairy Tales, Folklore and Legends'' (1905) Image:Anoniem - De zondvloed.jpg, ''The Great Flood'', by anonymous painter, ''The vom Rath bequest'', Rijksmuseum File:Francis Danby deluge.jpg, ''The Deluge'', by Francis Danby, 1840. Oil on canvas. Tate Gallery


See also

*
List of flood myths Flood myths are common across a wide range of cultures, extending back into Bronze Age and Neolithic prehistory. These accounts depict a flood, sometimes global in scale, usually sent by a deity or deities to destroy civilization as an act of divin ...


References

Footnotes Citations


Sources

*


Further reading

* Bailey, Lloyd R. ''Noah, the Person and the Story'', University of South Carolina Press, 1989. * Best, Robert M. ''Noah's Ark and the Ziusudra Epic, Sumerian Origins of the Flood Myth'', 1999, * Dundes, Alan (ed.) ''The Flood Myth'', University of California Press, Berkeley, 1988. * Faulkes, Anthony (trans.) ''Edda'' (Snorri Sturluson).
Everyman's Library Everyman's Library is a series of reprints of classic literature, primarily from the Western canon. It is currently published in hardback by Random House. It was originally an imprint of J. M. Dent (itself later a division of Weidenfeld & N ...
, 1987. * Greenway, John (ed.), ''The Primitive Reader'', Folkways, 1965. * Grey, G. ''Polynesian Mythology''. Whitcombe and Tombs, Christchurch, 1956. * Lambert, W. G. and Millard, A. R., ''Atra-hasis: The Babylonian Story of the Flood'', Eisenbrauns, 1999. * Masse, W. B. "The Archaeology and Anthropology of Quaternary Period Cosmic Impact", in Bobrowsky, P., and Rickman, H. (eds.) ''Comet/Asteroid Impacts and Human Society: An Interdisciplinary Approach'' Berlin, Springer Press, 2007. pp. 25–70. * Reed, A. W. ''Treasury of Maori Folklore'' A.H. & A.W. Reed, Wellington, 1963. * Reedy, Anaru (trans.), ''Nga Korero a Pita Kapiti: The Teachings of Pita Kapiti''. Canterbury University Press, Christchurch, 1997. {{Authority control Catastrophism Comparative mythology Megafloods Mesopotamian myths Jemdet Nasr period