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It is into this ocean, forming part of the Apsu, that the sun dips at evening and through which it passes during the night. The scene between Gilgamesh and Sabitum accordingly is suggested, in part, by the same cosmological conceptions that condition the description of the mountain Mashu. Sabitum herself is a figure that still awaits satisfactory explanation. She is called the goddess Siduri.

He reached the mountain Mashu, Whose exit is daily guarded, ... Whose back extends to the dam of heaven, And whose breast reaches to Aralû; Scorpion-men guard its gate, Of terror-inspiring aspect, whose appearance is deadly, Of awful splendor, shattering mountains. At sunrise and sunset they keep guard over the sun. It will be recalled that the earth is pictured by the Babylonians as a mountain.

But the text is too mutilated to warrant further conjectures. After escaping from the danger occasioned by the lions, Gilgamesh comes to the mountain Mashu, which is described as a place of terrors, the entrance to which is guarded by 'scorpion-men.

It may be objected, that such a process of reasoning as that put forward, is not convincing to a general reader who has not the means of criticizing or testing Professor Delitzsch's conclusions: he therefore cannot be sure that, in selecting two channels to represent the Pison and the Gihon, and in identifying "Mashu" with Mesha of Havilah, and one of the Babylonian districts with Kush, the Professor has at last hit off a solution of the problem which will not in its turn be disproved, as all earlier solutions have been.

However, there is also an historical background to the description. The name Mashu appears in texts as the Arabian desert to the west and southwest of the Euphrates Valley. It is called a land of dryness, where neither birds nor gazelles nor wild asses are found. Even the bold Assyrian armies hesitated before passing through this region.

Aralû is situated under the earth, and Mashu, reaching down to Aralû, must be again coextensive with the earth in this direction. The description of Mashu accordingly is a reflex of the cosmological conceptions developed in Babylonia. The scorpion-men pictured on seal cylinders belong to the mythical monsters, half-man, half-beast, with which the world was peopled at the beginning of things.

In the Greek and other versions, the mountain Musas or Masis is mentioned, that is, Mashu, as in the Gilgamesh epic. See p. 488. Not many years ago the impression appeared to be well founded that the Semites were poor in the production of myths and legends as compared, for example, to the Hindus or Greeks.

Now it so happens that the whole country west of the great Pallakopas channel, was called by the Assyrians "Mashu." Professor Delitzsch identifies this Mashu of the cuneiform inscriptions, with the "Mesha" mentioned in Scriptures, as the home of Havilah.

The description of Mashu is dependent upon this conception. The mountain seems to be coextensive with the earth. The dam of heaven is the point near which the sun rises, and if the scorpion-men guard the sun at sunrise and sunset, the mountain must extend across to the gate through which the sun passes at night to dip into the great Apsu.

The story of Eabani, Ukhat, and Sadu is independent of Gilgamesh's career, and so also is the story of his wanderings to Mashu and his encounter with Parnapishtim. Gilgamesh is brought into association with Eabani by what may be called, a natural process of assimilation.