Abstract
The story of the Deluge is found in all the sagas of the ancient civilizations of the Middle East, and is an echo of pre- and proto-historical real events. These took place when the fertile valley of the two rivers was settled by an organized agricultural society which harnessed these rivers. When these rivers went out of control it was interpreted as a disturbance in the ordered life of the gods, and as man’s failure to meet their needs. To the Hebrews, who inherited this story this catastrophe was interpreted as a punishment for the social corruption ways of human society. The explanation suggested in the present work is that the story of The Deluge is a distant memory of events due to global cooling, which thus caused humid spells in the Middle East. On the basis of paleo-hydrological data, such events occurred at about 7000 B.P., and extend to the period of 6300 B.P., and from 4900 to about 4300 B.P.
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Issar, A.S. (2014). The Deluge Flooding the Cradle of Civilization. In: Strike the Rock and There Shall Come Water. SpringerBriefs in Geography. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-01937-6_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-01937-6_6
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