A 3,000-Year-Old Clay Tablet May Reveal The Location Of Noah’s Ark
The world’s oldest map, a 3,000-year-old Babylonian clay tablet known as the Imago Mundi, may reveal the location of an ark that closely mirrors the Biblical story of Noah’s ark.
The map was created sometime in the 7th century B.C.E. It centers around the Euphrates River and includes several cities, mountains, and other bodies of water in the region.
On the tablet, there is a cuneiform script that describes the creation of the world by the god Marduk. It also mentions the king Utnapishtim, who built a giant ark to survive a massive flood.
In the Biblical story, a man named Noah is the one who undertakes the task of constructing a large ark. God told him to gather two of every animal onto it before a 150-day flood swept across the globe to rid the world of evil.
Now, researchers think the additional text on the tablet, which has puzzled experts for centuries, may be referring to the location of Noah’s ark.
The clay tablet fell into the possession of the British Museum in 1882. It was discovered in southern Iraq, close to the ancient city of Babylon. The Imago Mundi features a double ring called the “Bitter River.”
Everything on the outside of that river was unknown to the Babylonians. Triangles etched into the map beyond the river seemed to represent distant mountains or uncharted territory.
“You have encapsulated in this circular diagram the whole of the known world in which people lived, flourished, and died. However, there’s more to this map than that,” said Dr. Irving Finkel, a curator and cuneiform expert at the British Museum.
Finkel and colleagues translated more of the cuneiform on the map and realized that it seemed to be alluding to the location of Noah’s ark.
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One of the inscriptions on the Imago Mundi instructed people journeying to the fourth triangle to travel seven leagues until they encounter “something as thick as a parsiktu-vessel.”
The term “parsiktu” is rare and refers to a boat of a certain size. It appears in the Babylonian flood story that is similar to the Biblical tale of Noah’s ark.
In Mesopotamian myth, king Utnapishtim built the ark in 1800 B.C.E. It ended up on a mountain called Urartu. According to Biblical scholars, Urartu is the same as Ararat, the mountain where Noah’s ark landed in the Bible.
The fourth triangle on the Imago Mundi map seemingly stands for the location of the ark. Ancient travelers on the path to Urartu may have passed by the remains of the vessel.
Biblical measurements of the ship were given as 300 cubits, 50 cubits, by 30 cubits, which comes out to about 515 feet long by 86 feet wide and 52 feet high. It matches up with the measurements of the site in modern-day Turkey.
The Imago Mundi tablet is currently on display at the British Museum.
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