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Who sank Atlantis?

 One night the whole island or country or continent (its size is a bit vague) up and sank. That is, I suppose it would be more accurate to say it down and sank. That was the end of those smarty-pants Atlanteans, because that spot was the famous Atlantis. There was a moral to that story, which was – more or less – you shouldn’t be too wicked. If you are, the gods will sink your little continent, or your big island, as the case may be.  However that boring part of the story may have gone, ever since the sinking of Atlantis, people have been locating that fabled land in one unlikely spot after another. One fellow says it was off the coast of Great Britain, another puts it off the coast of Bermuda, and I’ve even read that it was off the coast of Japan. It seems that there’s somebody out there who’ll put his finger on any damp locale on the world map where Plato couldn’t possibly have been or any land that Plato couldn’t possibly have heard anything about.

 

However, in the real past, preceding the great flowering of classical Greek civilization when Plato actually lived, there was a real Bronze Age rather than a Golden Age. Modern scholars call it by the name of that less attractive, yellowish metal because that was the metal out of which most weapons and other utensils were actually made. Iron was a lot harder to work since it didn’t melt as easily, so it wasn’t nearly as popular until the metal-workers ran out of tin to mix with the copper, so as to make all those bronze tools.

 

Toward the late end of that Bronze Age, some Greeks went to wandering about the Mediterranean Sea, becoming known to academic types as Myceneans. But before they did that, they were dominated by some other types from the island of Crete, which is south of mainland Greece. These domineering island folks are known as Minoans to scholars, because for a long time nobody knew how to read their writing, so nobody knew what they called themselves. The name Minoan comes from an unlikely, old story told by the mainland Greeks somewhat later about a king of Crete named Minos. The writing actually found on Crete is just called Linear A, the dullest name in linguistics aside from Linear B.  But we couldn’t call those guys the Linear Ayans!

 

The Minoans also had a colony on a smaller island named Thera, also known as Santorini (all Greek locales have at least two names). It formed a very unusual, natural harbor, a ring shape around a quiet volcano. One day that volcano wasn’t so quiet. It spat out a lot of lava, blew its top, and created a caldera, which is basically the same thing as a crater except that it’s created by something coming up (lava) instead of coming down (meteor). When this volcano erupted, and this caldera was created, that caused a tsunami, a gigantic type of wave which runs up on land, wreaking havoc right, left, and up the sides of hills where people are not accustomed to seeing waves run up. While the tsunami didn’t end the Bronze Age, it was pretty much curtains for Minoan hegemony. That meant somebody else came over to Crete (namely those Mycenean Greeks) and took over the job of dominating everybody in the neighborhood.

 

Most likely, the volcanic eruption and the tsunami, which occurred about 1620 BCE according to carbon 14 dating, were what Plato had heard about. So the bit about a whole civilization sinking overnight was just slightly exaggerated. Everybody sitting around on Thera at the time of the eruption would have been a goner. But it looks like the folks on Thera actually left the vicinity earlier – probably forewarned by all that lava rising up ahead of the volcano blowing its top. Still, even if they made it all the way to Crete and were sitting on the beach, watching their old homeland going up in smoke, they would have been washed away by that tsunami. So it was still curtains.

 

As for Plato, it’s most likely that he purposely made his story a bit more spiffy by moving the locale further to the west. He probably wanted to add some unlikely details, such as the bit about the folks knowing everything, as well as his preachy moral, which was the point he was trying to make all along (unless he was just confused by the Atlas Mountains being way over in the west). If he left Thera where it really was, also leaving it as small as it really was, folks in his day and age wouldn’t have been as impressed as he wanted them to be. So he decided to fudge the details, I imagine. Like many people today, he probably felt that the ends justified the means.

 

Although the dating business gets pretty tricky, that volcano might have annoyed a certain Egyptian pharaoh named Ahmose who was more illustrious than Plato in his day, but isn’t as famous nowadays. It seems that this particular pharaoh had to make a lot of repairs to a lot of temples due to an excessive amount of water lying around and shrines being wrecked, according to what it says on his monuments. He also complains a lot about the weather, specifically a most peculiar storm in which some nasty, dirty stuff fell out of the sky. This sounds like something a volcanic eruption might have brought on. Ahmose also regales posterity with what a great guy Ahmose was for making so many lovely repairs. Pharaohs were modest fellows, weren’t they?

 

The Hurrians, who lived where Syria is now, had a story about a deity named Kumarbi who also had an adventure involving some temple wrecking which might have had to do with that volcano. Kumarbi’s tale was a lot more detailed than that of Ahmose and quite peculiar. This deity was in several adventures, to tell the truth, each time trying to depose the king of heaven, who was a certain Storm God by the name of Tessub. Now, in an odd sort of way, Kumarbi was Tessub’s father because Tessub had been born by breaking open Kumarbi’s head and leaping out, full grown – rather like Athena later did out of Zeus’s head. But Kumarbi forever held a grudge against Tessub for this behavior and kept trying to get somebody to knock Tessub out of the sky by shaking the sky (which he believed to be a hard bowl curved over the earth, which in turn was a flat saucer) like a dirty shirt in the laundry.

 

In this particular volcanic adventure, Kumarbi traipses off to the Cold Spring after a brief conversation with himself. There, at what might be a waterfall, he has a fun, little romp with one charming Miss Cliff, begetting a son by her. What sort of son might this Divine Cliff give birth to, you ask? I shall be delighted to tell you!  She has a little baby rock, the Basalt Boy to be precise.

 

Kumarbi hires a whole gang of extra ladies to assist with the arrival of his little pebble, including some assorted Fate Goddesses, some miscellaneous Mother Goddesses, and even a crew whose general label seems to mean the “Clean-‘im-Up-and-Cart-‘im-Off” Ladies. After naming the rocky lad Ullikummi the Destroyer and pronouncing an appropriately evil destiny for him, Kumarbi hands the Basalt Boy over to the latter crew for disposal. They cart him off to the underworld, also known as Mrs. Dark Earth, wife of Mr. Soggy Deep, to be moored way down below.

 

Ullikummi, the Basalt Boy, needs to be down in the dark where Sir Sun and Sir Moon can’t see him, you understand, lest one of these worthies snap him off like a reed. How is a reed snapped off? I have no idea, since I have neither done this nor witnessed it being done. But this was the Hurrians’ favorite metaphor for doing in a god, which suggests they went about snapping reeds on a regular basis despite the fact that modern Syria isn’t all that reedy. One might think a god couldn’t be done in, much less snapped reedily, but one would be wrong when following the adventures of Hurrian gods. One may have even more surprises in store later in this odd story.

 

Ullikummi promptly starts growing down there in the darkness, where he is not only in Mrs. Dark Earth but also on the shoulder of a gigantic giant named Ubelluri. This giant holds Earth (a big saucer) and Sky (a big, upended bowl) on his big shoulder, so perhaps he’s standing in Mrs. Dark Earth himself. He may even be getting his feet wet in Sir Deep. Or maybe that soggy spot is next door. The cosmology is a little vague.

 

One might wonder how a rock – specifically a bit of basalt – could grow.  The fact is that Ullikummi did. The Hurrian poet even tells us the precise measurements. The Basalt Boy grows one iku a day and one danna a month. Or is it a gipessar a month? At any rate, he’s sprouting like a weed, something most rocks dispense with, in my experience. But, if he’s really a volcano, this would begin to make a little more sense, since those do grow and after the lava cools, it’s rocky.

 

Ullikummi grows until Mr. Sea comes up to his beltline (and this body of water is apparently on top of the Deep, also a body of water). Then Mr. Sun catches sight of him and becomes agitated. Sun quickly departs the sky and rushes off to the house of Sir Storm. There, with typical Anatolian hospitality, Tessub has his younger brother set out a stool for the guest to sit on, put out a little table for a snack, lay out the cups and plates, cook up some vittles, pour some nice Hittite walhi-beer, and offer Mr. Sun a cuppa. But Sir Sun is much too worked up to sit, eat, or take that cup of warm beer.

 

With incredibly dull but compulsive curiosity, Tessub insists on wasting a whole clay tablet to ask, “Is there something wrong with my chair that you will not sit in it, my dear Sun? Is there something wrong with my table that you will not sit at it, my dear Sun? Is there something wrong with my good Hittite walhi-beer that you will not take the cup my servant poured?” And so on and so forth until the reader is ready to fall asleep. The tablet broke, but I’d be willing to bet the answer was just as long, detailed, and incredibly dull, too. But finally, the Sun gets around to explaining what’s up.

 

There’s this big rock out in the Sea and it’s growing like a weed, which is unusual in rocks. But not to worry, Sir Storm assures his guest. All will be dealt with in time. Oh, well, in that case, where’s that walhi-beer? Sun has his snack and lukewarm toddy and then heads back to the sky, where no doubt some birds are happy to be able to see where they are going again. They must have been getting tired of bonking their heads on that big bowl, Mr. Sky.

 

Tessub holds hands with Bubba, whose name is Tasmisu. Ah, isn’t that sweet? The two dash off to the coast to have a look at this fellow who’s doing all this untoward growing, joined on the way by their divine sister, Sauska, who masquerades as Babylonian Ishtar most of the time. At the sight of Sir Basalt, Tessub turns to Ishtar (or is it Sauska?) and bursts into courageous tears. “Oh, boo hoo! Who can tolerate all this being supplanted by Father Kumarbi? Not me! Boo hoo!”

 

Sauska decides to have a shot at dealing with the situation. In a previous adventure, she decked herself in nothing but a seashell, played some musical galgalturi instruments, and so enticed a dragon out of the sea. She then got the big snake drunk on that wonderfully warm walhi-beer so that Mr. Storm could dispatch him. She fetches those galgalturi instruments now, decks herself in that seashell, and heads off to catch Ullikummi’s eye. Unfortunately, this time around, a big wave up and tells Sauska that she’s just wasting her time, because Ullikummi doesn’t have any eyes to catch. Nor does he have any ears with which to hear the music played by those galgalturi instruments. Well, boo hoo hoo! Ishtar or Sauska -- or whoever she is -- sits down and has a good cry herself.

 

Tessub decides he might as well try lobbing a few lightning bolts, so it’s once more unto the breach with Ullikummi! Actually, it’s the first time for this breach. Meanwhile, the Basalt Boy has grown so tall he’s now blocking the entrance to the shrine where Mrs. Tessub is. This is Hebat. Hebat is most unhappy about this state of affairs and tries to get her servant Takiti to go tattle to Tessub about the rude rock who’s in her way.

 

Takiti is an real oddity because, while she’s female in my glossary, she’s a he in the story. I’m not sure what causes this, but it doesn’t really matter.  Whether she’s a he or he’s a she, Takiti can’t get out to blab to Tessub anyway. Ullikummi has destroyed the road. Boo hoo boo hoo all around.

 

All of a sudden, Tasmisu (Bubba) shows up, having put on some handy-dandy winged boots, which are the winds, and flown over whatever obstacles are keeping Takiti and Hebat penned in. He brings the dismal message that Tessub has lost Round One of the battle. As a result, he is being banished to the Little Place for some obscure period. This apparently means he’s dead.   Hebat feels so bad about this, she tries to throw herself off the roof of the shrine, but Takiti stops her. Then Tasmisu does throw himself off the roof, but he has those winged boots, so he’s fine.

 

Now it’s off to the underworld for Tessub and – surprisingly – Bubba Tasmisu, who goes everywhere his big brother does. They complain about the scenery, which is evidently hilly. They also wail about the seating arrangements. Then they get the bright idea to go and visit Ea, a very old deity from Babylonia who is Sir Smarts. He lives in the Deep, in the neighborhood of Mrs. Dark Earth, down there around Ullikummi’s ankles. After Storm and Bubba do an appropriate amount of bowing and scraping and boo-hooing, Ea is impressed enough to do some thinking. He decides that what they need is a secret weapon, namely, the big copper saw they once used to separate Mr. Sky and Mrs. Earth (but perhaps a slightly different Earth from the Dark one) at the beginning of time.

 

This is actually a peculiar detail to put in this story, since this Ullikummi tale is part of a long series that starts at the beginning of time and, in the beginning, Poppa Kumarbi went and usurped all the functions of Mrs. Earth. As a result, there actually was no parting of Mother Earth and Father Sky. Ahem! One can’t get technical with the Bronze Age, so we’ll just pretend we didn’t notice that minor detail. 

 

Ea runs off and fetches that copper knife, or whatever. But he has to go through the Land of the Dead and it seems to make his hair turn white. Yeah, the Dead will do that to a god. Or She will, as the case may have been. But that’s another story. While he’s down there in the dark, rummaging around in the Sacred and Ancient Storage Shed for that copper sickle, putting peroxide on his hair, Ea must have run into Ullikummi’s ankles. Wielding his copper hacksaw, he cuts them off. He eventually turns up next to Tessub and Tasmisu, Ea does, all white-haired and goose-pimply from staring at those Dead (or Mrs. Dead, as the case may have been), and hands over that copper hatchet. Or whatever it was. Maybe it was a file. I can’t tell – but it had teeth.

 

Meanwhile, back at the ranch – or rather the Sea – Ullikummi has been feuding and fighting with the gods, all seventy of them, led by Astabi. Astabi is Sir War, so you’d think he’d be good at this fighting and feuding business. But as usual, you’d be wrong. These Anatolian stories never behave! Ullikummi reaches up and shakes the sky like a dirty shirt in the laundry. All the gods, including Astabi, fall out like little toys in the pockets and land in the Sea. Mr. Sea, of course, is on Kumarbi’s side, so everybody falling in him is a goner.

 

Now Tessub reappears, ready to lob some more thunderbolts, now that Ullikummi is no longer moored to the shoulder of that gigantic giant. Ullikummi is over a mile tall now and his scary skull is three times that wide. The two have a nice conversation, Sir Storm and the Basalt Boy. Unfortunately, the tablet fell apart at this point and we only get a couple of fragments. Somebody mentions a liver and lungs. Somebody’s scary head is named, but we don’t know what they name it. Then, in a strange fragment, Kumarbi seems to be rejoicing. That would be a mighty odd thing to do if Ullikummi lost that final battle, don’t you think?

 

I think that Ullikummi was the volcano at Thera. I also think that in the final battle, while Tessub may have finally done in Ullikummi, Ullikummi also finished off Tessub. In the end, there was no volcano left for people to see, just bits and pieces of the circular part of the island and not even all of that. That’s probably the liver and lungs that are mentioned in Ullikummi’s speech, unless these are part of cult instructions and somebody who survives is supposed to slaughter a cow and offer the Basalt Boy a liver and lungs from the beastie.

 

But there was also no more Sir Storm, after that final battle, because the regular seasons were disrupted and there was, instead, a terrible ash cloud in the sky. There was also a lot of horrible weather that was unlike anything people had seen before. Probably that disgusting head which is given a name, which Time rudely erased so that we couldn’t read it, is a reference to this nasty cloud. 

 

No wonder Kumarbi rejoiced! He was a nether deity. Then skulls piled up, which was unfortunate. The sun and moon also bowed down in one story, which is not what these orbs normally do. But when volcanic ash fills the sky, the sun and moon can’t be seen well. Hunger overcame the lands in one of the songs in this cycle, too. This really would have happened, most likely as a result of the disruption of the weather and the falling of large amounts of ash.

 

These motifs are all there in this cycle of songs. They also seem to be in a lot of other stories, based on Ullikummi’s but appearing much later, all the way down to the present day. Even today, in every monster movie you see, the monster has to die twice. Why is that? The real reason is that, back in the Bronze Age, the monster did not die the first time. The good guy did. Sir Storm always loses Round One and dies in the ancient tales. Then he comes back and wins in Round Two, whether the story is Hurrian, Hittite, Greek, or Canaanite. 

 

But nowadays, we can't bring our heroes back from death nearly as convincingly, so we have to kill somebody else -- the monster -- both times.  We're also still talking about a day when the sun and moon will fall from the sky and then somebody else will come out and either darken the sky or brighten it up again.  We aren't looking for Ullikummi's scary skull anymore.  And we aren't looking for Atlantis to rise from wherever it sank.  But that's where it all began.  So, who sank Atlantis?  Since Atlantis was Ullikummi, we can blame it on Ea's copper hacksaw.  Either that, or it was Tessub's lightning bolt.

 

For a glimpse of what the war between the volcano and the thunderstorm would have looked like, you can look at photographs taken of a more recent volcano, one in South America, named Chaiten.  Go to http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-563975/Amazing-pictures-The-lightning-storm-e...