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Sumer and Babylon · Berossus, Babyloniaca, via Alexander Polyhistor

Oannes and the sages from the sea

EvidenceDocumentedThe text exists and is quoted from a published translation. What it describes is a separate question.What this means
ReferenceBerossus, Babyloniaca, via Alexander Polyhistor
Writtenc. 290–278 BCE
SetBefore the Flood
An animal destitute of reason, by name Oannes, whose whole body (according to the account of Apollodorus) was that of a fish… This Being was accustomed to pass the day among men; but took no food at that season; and he gave them an insight into letters and sciences, and arts of every kind… when the sun had set, this Being Oannes retired again into the sea.

Translation: Cory, Ancient Fragments, 1832 · About the translator

Read it literally

A teacher in a suit that looks like a fish, who eats nothing on land and sleeps in the sea. An amphibious visitor, or a man in a diving suit. Cory's 1832 printing, quoted here, says 'destitute of reason'; the 1876 revised edition by E. Richmond Hodges reads 'endowed with reason'.

What scholars say

Berossus was a Babylonian priest writing in Greek. Cuneiform lists also name seven apkallu sages.

Looks like technology From the sky
People and places hereApollodorus (the Bibliotheca)

Quick answers about Berossus, Babyloniaca, via Alexander Polyhistor

Where is Berossus, Babyloniaca, via Alexander Polyhistor found?

Berossus, Babyloniaca, via Alexander Polyhistor (Sumer and Babylon). Translation quoted: I. P. Cory, Ancient Fragments (1832; 1876 ed.).

When was Berossus, Babyloniaca, via Alexander Polyhistor written?

c. 290–278 BCE.

What do scholars say about Berossus, Babyloniaca, via Alexander Polyhistor?

Berossus was a Babylonian priest writing in Greek. Cuneiform lists also name seven apkallu sages.

Rabbit holes in this passage

PersonBerossusBefore the Flood, ten kings ruled for 432,000 years, according to a Babylonian priest who wrote in Greek around 290 BCE. His flood hero was also ordered to bury written records of all things at Sippar and dig them up afterward; the book itself is lost. So how do we know any of this?BeingOannesAccording to the priest Berossus, a creature with a fish's body and a second, human head under the fish's head rose from the sea in the first year of the world. It taught writing and law by day, ate nothing among people, and slept in the sea each night; Berossus survives only secondhand. What else was quoted?

Sources

  1. I. P. Cory, Ancient Fragments (1832; 1876 ed.)Primary text
  2. Berossus, fragments via Alexander Polyhistor, in I. P. Cory, Ancient Fragments (1832)Primary text

Scholarly dates are rounded. The wording follows the named public-domain translation.

Updated