The Eagle and the Snake, or anzu and basmu? Another Mythological Dimension in the Epic of Etana.

• Author: Valk, Jonathan
• Position: Critical essay

INTRODUCTION

Lamentably fragmentary as it is, the Epic of Etana (ala isiru ultaklilusu, according to its late incipit) is an important work of Akkadian literature. It tells the story of Etana, whom the gods choose to exercise kingship and who goes in search of the plant of birth so that he can sire an heir. ' Much of the surviving text of Etana does not, however, deal with Etana at all. Instead, almost the entirety of Tablet 2 of the Neo-Assyrian recension of the epic tells the story of an eagle and a snake. This narrative has extensive mythological qualities, (2) not least of which is the anthropomorphization of the eagle and the snake. These characters are depicted speaking to each other, to their children, to the sun god Samas, and to the human Etana. Indeed, the mythical quality of the eagle is further reflected in the fact that it is able to carry Etana up to heaven on its back--this is no ordinary eagle. There are also curious intertextual references to other Mesopotamian myths, notably in the description of the youngest of the eagle's hatch-lings as atar hasisa. (3) Amid this rich mythological material, I contend that the Neo-Assyrian recension of Etana preserves a pair of explicit references to the eagle and the snake by the names of their mythological counterparts, anzu and basmu. Although the reference to anzu has been widely noted, the reference to basmu has been hiding in plain sight.

SOURCES FOR THE EAGLE AND THE SNAKE

The Epic of Etana is known from two Old Babylonian manuscripts, a number of Middle Assyrian manuscripts, and a larger group of Neo-Assyrian manuscripts from Nineveh. (4) Like most literary texts from Nineveh, the Neo-Assyrian Etana manuscripts are written in Standard Babylonian. The existing manuscripts indicate that the text of Etana was copied in tablets of varying length, so that the content of any one tablet of the series could vary depending on its size and layout. (5) Even if the distribution of the text of Etana could vary per tablet, there was no such variation in the text itself. Wherever the contents of Neo-Assyrian Etana manuscripts overlap, there are no meaningful differences in the text they record. (6) To the contrary, the manuscripts by and large mirror each other on a sign for sign basis. All differences are very minor, concerning vowel choice, (7) syllabic versus logographic writings, (8) sign choice, (9) verbal form, (10) the choice of the determinative sign preceding Etana's name, (11) and on two occasions the inclusion or exclusion of a pronominal suffix. (12) There is not a single documented instance in which a word that features in one Neo-Assyrian manuscript does not feature at the corresponding point in another. To the best of our knowledge, the Neo-Assyrian text of Etana was fixed and existed in only one recension.

In the manuscripts from all periods, much of the surviving text tells the story of the eagle and the snake. The fundamental plot of this episode is constant through time. The eagle and the snake occupy the same poplar tree (sarbatu) in the sanctuary of the god Adad, the eagle living at the top of the tree and the snake at its base. Instead of expending their energy in constant vigilance against each other, the eagle and the snake decide to cooperate. They swear friendship before Samas. Whenever the eagle catches an animal, it shares the meat with the snake; whenever the snake catches an animal, it shares the meat with the eagle. (13) Both animals further distribute this bounty to their respective broods. The cooperation between the eagle and the snake comes to a dramatic end when the eagle's chicks mature. At that point, the eagle plots to eat the snake's children. Although it is counseled against this by one of its fledglings, (l4) the eagle swoops down while the snake is out hunting and eats its young. When the snake returns and discovers what has happened, it is overcome with grief. (15) The snake remonstrates with the god Samas, before whom the oath of friendship had been sworn. The eagle has violated its oath, declares the snake, and it must be punished for its foul deed. Samas agrees, and the plot moves on from there to the eagle's punishment and its subsequent rescue by Etana.

Where the surviving text of the various Etana manuscripts overlaps, there is substantial congruity across time. This congruity is such that many passages of the Old Babylonian and Middle Assyrian manuscripts are reiterated nigh verbatim in their Neo-Assyrian counterparts. Given the stability of the Etana text tradition, any differences between the manuscripts are deserving of heightened attention. One of these differences is the inclusion in the Neo-Assyrian recension of references to anzu and--if the present argument is correct--to basmu, despite their absence from the Old Babylonian manuscripts that preserve parallel passages.

The eagle and the snake of Etana are clearly conceived of as an eagle and a snake rather than as anzu and basmu. In the Old Babylonian manuscript from Susa, the eagle is identified by its Akkadian equivalent era written out syllabically. The snake is identified by the logogram MUS, which represents sem, the Akkadian word for snake. In the Old Babylonian Morgan Tablet, sem is written out syllabically, so that there is no doubt about the intended value of the logogram MUS. (16) By contrast, Middle Assyrian and Neo-Assyrian manuscripts refrain from syllabic spellings and with a single exception represent the eagle and the snake by the logograms T[I.sub.8.sup.MUSEN] (era) (17) and MUS (sem). T[I.sub.8.sup.MUSEN] is a perfectly conventional logographic value for eagle, so that there is again no doubt about the intended referent.

ENTER ANZU

Lines 23-24' of the Old Babylonian Susa Tablet of Etana preserve part of the snake's indictment of the eagle. (18) In these lines, the snake denounces the eagle to Samas as:

epis lemu[tti u a]nzilli mukil lem[utt]i ana ibrlsu the perpetrator of evil and abomination, who harbored evil against its comrade. The analogous passage in the Neo-Assyrian recension of Etana is amended at one point. (19) There, the snake denounces the eagle instead as:

epis lemutti anzu mukil [lemutti ana ibrisu] the evildoer, the anzu who harbored evil against its comrade. (20) This change alters the character of the snake's complaint: the snake is not merely stating that the eagle is an evildoer, but identifying the eagle explicitly with the anzu-bird, the eagle's mythological counterpart. (21)

The anzu is very well attested in Mesopotamian mythology, (22) including in its own epic where the bird is entrusted by the god Enlil with the task of guarding the tablet of destinies but instead betrays Enlil's trust and steals the tablet. (23) All of the gods come together to defeat wicked anzu, who is eventually slain by Ninurta, an act that enables the restoration of the divine order. The use of anzu in a comparative sense is likewise well attested, often demonstrating the wickedness of whatever is being likened to the anzu. (24) Accordingly, by referring to the eagle as anzu, the snake is transposing this entire mythological frame of reference onto it. This rhetorical ploy equates the eagle's bad character and monstrous deeds with those of anzu. Like anzu, the eagle is a wicked creature deserving of punishment at the hands of the gods, which is precisely what the snake demands of Samas.

By itself, the snake's use of the epithet anzu to refer to the eagle can be understood as a scribal misrepresentation of the word anzilli that features in the analogous line of the Old Babylonian Susa Tablet. (25) There is, however, good cause to regard this change as a deliberate scribal emendation--even beyond the fact that the change serves a clear rhetorical purpose and does not create textual difficulties of any kind. The term anzilla features at two other points in the Neo-Assyrian manuscripts, so that no argument can be made that it is the lectio difficilior in the passage where it is amended to anzu. In the first instance, transgressing the oath of friendship is described as anz[illa] sa ilani ("an abomination of the gods"). (26) In the second instance, Samas says to the eagle that anzilla sa ilani asakku takul ("you committed an abomination of the gods, a forbidden deed"). (27) This second instance is partially preserved in the parallel passage from the Old Babylonian Morgan Tablet, which renders anzillam sa i[li...] ("an abomination of the g[ods,.."]). (28)

Here, the Neo-Assyrian recension and its Old Babylonian forebear mirror each other precisely, with the scribe of the former having no problem rendering the Old Babylonian anzillam with fidelity. Given that the Neo-Assyrian recension of Elana can reproduce anzillu without difficulty, including at the precise moment that its Old Babylonian predecessor does, the deviation from such fidelity at only one point merits attention. This is all the more true because the change from anzilli to anzu makes good textual sense. Anzu is no accident.

MUCH ADO ABOUT -Ml

The deliberate character of the change from anzilli to anzu can serve to clarify a textual curiosity in one passage of the Neo-Assyrian recension of Etcma. There, the text relates that when the eagle decided to eat the snake's young, it declared:

mari MUS-mi lukulu anaku : MUS-mi lib-b[a...] I shall eat the MUS-mi's children: the MUS-mi in... (29) The traditional approach has been to read MUS here in the same way that it is read elsewhere in all Old Babylonian, Middle Assyrian, and Neo-Assyrian Elana manuscripts: as sent (snake). The -mi ending is understood as the enclitic particle marking direct speech. (30) This reading makes sense in light of the preceding line, which indeed indicates that the words here represent the eagle's...