Hymn of Babylon is pieced together after 2,100 YEARS: Scientists use AI to reconstruct ancient song
Sung to the god Marduk, patron deity of the great city, the poem describes Babylon's flowing rivers, jewelled gates, and 'bathed priests' in stunning detail.
Although the song was lost to time after Alexander the Great captured the city, fragments of clay tablets survived in the ruins of Sippar, a city 40 miles to the North.
In a process that would have taken 'decades' to complete by hand, researchers used AI to piece together 30 different tablet pieces and recover the lost hymn.
Originally 250 lines long, scientists have been able to translate a third of the original cuneiform text.
These lines reveal a uniquely rich and detailed description of aspects of Babylonian life that had never been recorded before.
Lead researcher Professor Enrique Jiménez, of Ludwig Maximilian University (LMU), told MailOnline that the hymn's literary quality is 'exceptional'.
'It's meticulously structured, with each section flowing seamlessly into the next,' he said.
The hymn begins with grand praise to the god Marduk, calling him the 'architect of the universe'.
The poem's author then turns to the city of Babylon, describing it as a rich paradise of abundance.
The hymn writes: 'Like the sea, (Babylon) proffers her yield, like a garden of fruit, she flourishes in her charms, like a wave, her swell brings her bounties rolling in.'
There are also descriptions of the river Euphrates, which still runs through modern-day Iraq, and its floodplains upon which 'herds and flocks lie on verdant pastures'.
However, as Professor Jiménez points out, the hymn also gives a unique insight into Babylonian morality.
Professor Jiménez: 'The hymn reflects ideals the Babylonians valued, such as respect for foreigners and protection of the vulnerable.'
The hymn praises priests who do not 'humiliate' foreigners, free prisoners, and offer 'succor and favor' to orphans.
Likewise, the poem gives some striking details about the lives of women in Babylon who are rarely mentioned elsewhere.
'For example, it reveals that one group of priestesses acted as midwives—a role unattested in other sources,' says Professor Jiménez.
The poem describes these priestesses as 'cloistered women who, with their skill, nourish the womb with life'.
What makes this discovery particularly exciting is how important the poem appears to have been to the Babylonians.
Babylonians recorded information in a writing system called cuneiform, which involved pressing a sharpened reed into soft clay to make triangular marks.
Even after Babylon was conquered in 331 BC, many of these clay tablets have survived until the present day.
Excavations at the city of Sippar have yielded hundreds of clay tablets which, according to legends, were placed there by Noah to hide them from the floodwaters.
These fragments show that the hymn was being used in Babylonian schools as an educational tool for around 1,000 years.
Professor Jiménez believes that the poem was originally written sometime around 1500-1300, making it one of the earliest long poems from Babylon.
The oldest surviving version of the text comes from a fragment belonging to a school dating to the seventh century BC.
However, the tablets from Sippar show that the poem was still being copied out by children in schools right up to the last days of Babylon in 100 BC - 1,400 years after it was composed.
That is the equivalent of children today learning about a poem written around 700 AD, such as the Old English poem Beowulf.
The researchers say that this importance would have put the Hymn to Babylon alongside the Epic of Gilgamesh, the oldest known long-form poem in human history.
Professor Jiménez says that, although the hymn was written later than the Epic of Gilgamesh, both would have 'circulated side by side for centuries'.
Unlike the Epic of Gilgamesh, the researchers believe that the Hymn to Babylon was written by a single author rather than by collecting traditional texts over time.
Although this author's name is currently unknown, Professor Jiménez remains hopeful that this may change in the future.
He says: 'We have been digitising the British Museum's cuneiform collection over the last few years and discovered previously unknown author names, so we may yet identify the hymn's creator in the future.'
Excerpts from The Hymn to Babylon
Like the sea, (Babylon) proffers her yield,
Like a garden of fruit, she flourishes in her charms,
Like a wave, her swell brings her bounties rolling in.
Marduk's star, delightful, precious sun, is her auspicious sign,
Wherever the sun (is), is her gate, the distant heavens.
Imgur-Enlil is her primeval wall - the mountain of the just,
Alulu is her king - the father of all generations.
The Euphrates is her river – established by wise lord Nudimmud -
It quenches the lea, saturates the canebrake,
Disgorges its waters into lagoon and sea,
Its fields burgeon with herbs and flowers,
Its meadows, in brilliant bloom, sprout barley,
From which, gathered, sheaves are stacked,
Herds and flocks lie on verdant pastures,
Wealth and splendor - what befit mankind -
Are bestowed, multiplied, and regally granted
...
Bathed priests of Ištarān, pure priests of Šamaš, Buḫlû-priests of Šušinak, Nippureans of Enlil -
The foreigners among them they do not humiliate.
The humble they protect, their weak they support, Under their care, the poor and destitute can thrive.
To the orphan they offer succor and favor,
The prisoner they set free, the captive they release (even) at the cost of a silver talent,
With the absent person they share the inheritance,
Piously observing, they return kindness.
...
(Their) women who have become masters in their duties:
High priestesses who keep (their) vow to their bridegrooms,
Cloistered women who, with their skill, nourish the womb with life
Holy women who cleanse with pure water.
hey keep the prohibitions and adhere to what is sacred,
Kneeling in prayer, armed with a supplication,
Reverent and vigilant, mindful of good works, They visit the sanctuaries, seeking life.
Skilled in benevolence, they act with propriety.
They (the women) are the cows of all Babylon, the herds of Ištar,
They (the men) are the ones freed by Marduk.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Guardian
9 hours ago
- The Guardian
Neolithic long cairn in Yorkshire given extra protection after walkers remove stones
A rare and remarkable 5,000-year-old monument that is an example of one of the earliest visible structures in England is to receive extra protection because walkers, sometimes innocently, have been removing and moving stones. The Dudderhouse Hill long cairn in the Yorkshire Dales has been granted 'scheduled monument' status by the government, making it a site of national importance with greater legal protection. The long cairn is remarkable in many ways and helps us understand the lives, deaths and beliefs of the first farming communities, said Paul Jeffery, the national listings manager at Historic England, which has advised the government. 'This time was the beginning of everything.' To the untrained eye Dudderhouse Hill may look like a large pile of stones in the middle of nowhere and that helps explain the often unintentional damage, said Jeffery. The long cairn, near the village of Austwick in North Yorkshire, dates from about 3,400-2,400BC and is one of the oldest visible reminders of our prehistoric past. It is thought to be one of the first structures communally constructed by humans. Jeffery said: 'The fact it has survived at all demonstrates how well constructed it was and how monumental in the landscape back in its time.' The long cairn, which was built by a Neolithic farming community who were the successors to hunter-gatherers and lived in caves and stone huts, may have had a number of purposes. One of those was funerary, as a 'home for the dead', although not for whole bodies. Evidence suggests the deceased were left to the birds and elements before body parts were ritualistically interred in the monument. Long cairns may also have been positioned, like Stonehenge, to help communities know when seasons started and ended. Another function of the long cairn was to say 'this is our land', said Jeffery. 'Building a structure like that would have taken a lot of people a significant amount of time. They would have had to be fed by others, there would have been specialist stonemasons and engineers – a lot of effort would have been invested into those structures. They are a statement of 'this is us', 'we are here'.' Research suggests the long cairn was used as an animal pen in the 16th century and in more recent years has been damaged by people removing and moving stones, sometimes innocently to create way markers for walkers. 'The problem is this causes sustained and considerable damage over time,' said Jeffery. 'People might only be taking one stone and don't realise the harm they're doing. If it was left unchecked, eventually the evidence for its existence would be lost completely.' Scheduled monument status means the long cairn will receive the highest level of protection available and means the national park authority can carry out a project to educate people about the site's importance. Duncan Wilson, the chief executive of Historic England, said: 'Scheduling this remarkable neolithic long cairn ensures that this rare and fragile piece of our prehistoric heritage receives the protection it deserves.'
The Guardian
a day ago
- The Guardian
‘Long-lived and lucky' ship wrecked off Orkney was at siege of Quebec, experts find
When a schoolboy running on a beach on the island of Sanday in Orkney last year came across the timbers of a shipwreck that had been exposed after a storm, local people knew the ship might have an intriguing history. Residents of the tiny island at the edge of the Scottish archipelago are familiar with ships that have come to grief in stormy seas, hundreds of shipwrecks having been recorded there over the centuries. But this large section of oak hull, its boards carefully knitted together by wooden pegs, appeared particularly well built and was obviously not recent. The question was, how old was the ship – and what else could they learn about it? Eighteen months after that discovery in February 2024, archaeologists and local volunteers have managed to identify the ship and to piece together the surprising history of a vessel that witnessed some of the most dramatic events of the 18th century before finally being wrecked off Sanday in 1788. Thanks to detailed timber dating and historical analysis, experts are confident the hull belonged to HMS Hind, a 24-gun Royal Navy frigate that was built in Chichester in 1749 and went on to have a remarkable career. Despite its sticky end, the Hind was 'an amazingly long-lived and lucky ship', according to Ben Saunders, a senior marine archaeologist at Wessex Archaeology, who led the project alongside Historic Environment Scotland (HES) to recover and identify the vessel's remains. The ship, naval records show, served off the coast of Jamaica in the 1750s and took part in the sieges of Louisbourg (1758) and Quebec (1759), when the British defeated French forces in Canada during the seven years war. It was among the British fleet in the American revolutionary war of the 1770s and then served for a decade as a training ship in the Irish Sea, before it was decommissioned and sold off to become a 500-tonne whaling ship in the Arctic Circle. It was in this guise, under the new name of The Earl of Chatham, that the ship was wrecked by a North Sea storm on 29 April 1788. Even then, its luck did not desert it – all 56 people onboard survived, a snippet in the Aberdeen Journal records. Identifying the vessel posed a challenge for present-day archaeologists, however. The hull, measuring 10 metres by 5 metres (about 33ft by 16ft), had been well preserved under the sand, allowing multiple wood samples to be sent for dendrochronological analysis. Experts found that the wood had originated in southern and south-western England, and that the earliest sample had a clear felling date of spring 1748. Saunders and his colleagues then worked closely with the community of Sanday, for whom shipwreck timber has been an important source of wood for centuries. The island is largely treeless, and 'some of the people we've been working with have half their roofs held up with masts and deck beams', he says. 'It's incredible.' A date in the mid-18th century was not only interesting but helpful, says Saunders, 'because this is when you're starting to get the bureaucracy of the British state kicking in, and a lot more records surviving'. A group of 20 volunteer researchers pored through maritime archives, government shipping registers and news sheets to pinpoint the right vessel among at least 270 known to have foundered on Sanday. Sign up to Headlines UK Get the day's headlines and highlights emailed direct to you every morning after newsletter promotion '[The islanders] also brought a lot of their own experience,' says Saunders. 'You've got a lot of people in Orkney who are connected to the sea anyway. That meant we could collate this massive amount of data and start saying: 'Right, that ship is too small, that ship was built in the Netherlands, no, not that ship.'' Eventually, the records led the researchers to the Hind and its second life as a whaler when Britain's early Industrial Revolution was relying more heavily on the products of whaling. The timbers salvaged from the shoreline are now being preserved underwater at the Sanday heritage centre while a long-term home is under discussion. Alison Turnbull, the director of external relationships and partnerships at HES, says the 'rare and fascinating story' of the ship's identification 'shows that communities hold the keys to their own heritage. It is our job to empower them to make these discoveries.' Saunders says what he really enjoyed about studying this wreck was 'that we've had to do this detective work', combining the highly technical scientific analysis with scrutiny of a wealth of archive material. 'We're really lucky to have so much archive material, because of the period and because of where it wrecked in Orkney. It's been very satisfying.'
Sky News
a day ago
- Sky News
Sanday Wreck: Archaeologists believe they have identified centuries-old shipwreck in Orkney
Archaeologists believe they have identified a centuries-old vessel shipwrecked in Orkney. Expert say the wreck discovered on the island of Sanday last year is most likely the Earl of Chatham, a former Royal Navy vessel called HMS Hind that was later renamed once it became a whaling ship. Historic Environment Scotland (HES), which funded the research, said the sixth-rate 24-gun frigate saw many years of active service, including the sieges of Louisbourg and Quebec in the 1750s and the American Revolutionary War in the late 1770s. Once decommissioned, it was sold and renamed the Earl of Chatham, becoming a 500-tonne whaling ship. HES said this was common for Royal Navy boats as their build quality allowed them to withstand the icy conditions of British whaling routes. As the Earl of Chatham, it completed four seasons in the Arctic before ultimately meeting its end in the Bay of Lopness in March 1788. The 56 sailors on board all survived. Wessex Archaeology, along with Dendrochronicle and volunteer community researchers, began working on the wreck's origins following its discovery in February 2024. Analysis of the wood concluded the ship was built with timber from south and southwest England. Archaeologists from Wessex Archaeology, local community researchers, and the Sanday Heritage Centre then spent months working with archives and community records to find the most likely candidate for the ship. This research was also supported by Sanday Heritage Group and Orkney Archaeology Society. Ben Saunders, senior marine archaeologist at Wessex Archaeology, said: "It is thanks to our dedicated team of community researchers and the evidence they have gathered that means we have been able to identify the Sanday Wreck with a reasonable degree of confidence. "Throughout this project, we have learned so much about the wreck, but also about the community in Sanday in the 1780s. "Sanday was infamous for shipwrecks at the time, called 'the cradle of shipwrecks in Scotland', but the community was equally well-known for its hospitability as it looked after sailors who fell afoul of the area's stormy seas. "We are grateful to the support from our partners, and we're delighted to be able to share our work on this intriguing wreck." The Sanday Wreck was revealed last year due to changes in the climate. Increased storminess and unusual wind patterns led to removal of the covering sands which had hidden and protected the wreck for centuries. Changes to coastlines, which are predicted to accelerate in coming decades, could make similar finds more common. The timbers are currently housed in a freshwater tank at Sanday Heritage Centre as part of preservation efforts. There, visitors can find out more about the wreck's story and Sanday's history. Alison Turnbull, director of external relations and partnerships at HES, said: "The discovery of the Sanday Wreck is a rare and fascinating story. "Wessex Archaeology worked closely with the community of Sanday to discover the ship's identity, which shows that communities hold the keys to their own heritage. "It is our job to empower communities to make these discoveries and be able to tell the story of their historic environment."
