phil_t
New Member
Sorry guys, this is going to be a monster post 
You can blame Idun if you want, he wanted to know about the Hittite and Greek creation myth similarities, so here's the stuff with references to the relevant books
What did the Greeks borrow from Anatolian mythology?
Essay Research
The Origin of the Gods -> R. Caldwell, 1989 -> Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pp 82-84.
• Hesiod’s Theogeny mirrored by Kingship in Heaven cycle of Hurrian-Hittite myth.
• Kingship in Heaven begins with the reign of Alalu, who reigns for nine years before being overthrown by Anu and thrown down to ‘dark earth’. Anu then reigns for nine years before being castrated and defeated by Kumarbi, and fleeing to the sky. Kumarbi swallows Anu’s genitals and becomes pregnant with three gods (the Storm-God, Aranzaha and Tasmisu. Kumarbi spat out Aranzaha & Tasmisu but the Storm-God remained inside. Anu then spoke to the Storm-God and debated how he could escape Kumarbi’s body – he warns him not to exit through other orifices (especially the anus) but through Kumarbi’s ‘good place’ (presumably his penis). The Storm-God escapes and defeats Kumarbi to become king of the Gods.
• In the Song of Ullikummi, a sort of sequel, Kumarbi plots revenge and has intercourse with a large rock, which gives birth to a stone child, Ullikummi. The child is hidden on the shoulder of Ubelluri (the Hurrian Atlas), where he grows massive. He challenges the Storm-God and defeats him, but the other gods become worried and cut through the feat of Ullikummi with a cutter (that was used to separate earth from heaven). The Storm-God then faces Ullikummi again and defeats him.
• The parallels between the Hurrian and Hesiodic myths are clear once we eliminate the reign of Alalu: Anu is equivalent to Ouranos, Kumarbi to Kronos, and the Storm-God to Zeus; Anu and Ouranos are both castrated and various gods are born from their genitals; Kumarbi and Kronos castrate their fathers and have children inside themselves; the Storm-God and Zeus win the kingship of the gods, then must win a second victory over an enormous monster (Ullikummi/Typhoeus).
• The parallels cannot be pressed too far. For example, is the Storm-God the son of Kumarbi, from whom he is born, or of Anu, whose genitals make Kumarbi pregnant, or of both, with Anu as father and Kumarbi as mother? Also, Zeus, unlike the Storm-God, never shares his sibling’s fate of being inside Kronos but is rescued by the trickery of Rhea and Gaia. As for the similarity between the monsters Ullikummi and Typhoeus, the Hurrian myth seems closer to the much later version of Apollodorus than to Hesiod’s (but according to Apollodorus it is Zeus, not the monster, whose feet are cut through).
Greek myths and Mesopotamia -> pp 194-195
• The role of the Graces tricking Typhon into eating the ephemeral fruit that grows on Mt. Nysa, which makes him weaker instead of stronger, is reflected in the Hittite myth of the defeat of the dragon Illuyanka. The goddess Inara persuaded Illuyanka and his brood to gorge themselves on a huge feast, and they grow so large that they cannot escape to the safety of their lair when set upon by the Storm-God, who kills him. The motif of using food to defeat a great monster is perhaps a tenuous link.
The East Face of Helicon -> pp 279-280
Comparisons of the Kumarbi myth with Hesiod
• Assuming that the Storm-God is to be treated as the successor of Kumarbi and as the present king of the gods, we have a sequence Alalu, Anu, Kumarbi, Storm-God. Alalu, apparently a god of the earth, has no counterpart in the Hesiodic succession, but the other three correspond to Ouranos, Kronos and Zeus. Anu’s name, like Ouranos’, means Sky; he is a direct borrowing from the Mesopotamian pantheon. Kumarbi was a Hurrian corn-god; Kronos has become so much a mythological figure in Greece that his original nature is difficult to establish, but many scholars have concluded, from his wielding a sickle and from the celebration of his festival following the harvest, that he was a god of the harvest. The Storm-God, like Zeus, is the storm-god.
• Anu, like Ouranos, has his genitals cut off, and thereupon removes himself to heaven. From the genitals other divinities spring.
• As Anu warns Kumarbi that there is trouble in store for him as a result of what he has done, so Ouranos warns the Titans that they will have to pay later for their castration of him.
• Kumarbi, like Kronos, has a number of gods in his belly for a time, including the storm-god. The Hittite and Greek accounts give different explanations of how the gods got there, but both involve deliberate acts of swallowing by the host god.
• At one point Kumarbi actually does announce his intention of eating one of his children, and, like Kronos, he is provided with a stone instead. He takes it into his mouth asnd expels it again, after which it is set up as a cult object.
• After this the storm-god becomes powerful, and there are hostilities between him and Kumarbi/Kronos with their respective allies.
• In the Hittite text Earth gives birth in the subterranean Apsu to two children who, we infer, will pose a new threat to the Storm-God. According to Hesiod’s poem, Earth in union with Tartarus gives birth to Typhoeus, who poses a new threat to Zeus. Presumably the Storm-God successfully demolished his adversaries, as Zeus did his.
•Finally, if it is really the case that the deity KA.ZAL issues out of Kumarbi’s skull, as Athena does from Zeus, the motif of birth though a male god’s cranium appears in both narratives.
Hope thats enough for you Idun, i must say i found it one of the most interesting essays i had to write for my degree - if anyone has any questions then i'll do my best to fill you in!
Phil
You can blame Idun if you want, he wanted to know about the Hittite and Greek creation myth similarities, so here's the stuff with references to the relevant books What did the Greeks borrow from Anatolian mythology?
Essay Research
The Origin of the Gods -> R. Caldwell, 1989 -> Oxford: Oxford University Press. Pp 82-84.
• Hesiod’s Theogeny mirrored by Kingship in Heaven cycle of Hurrian-Hittite myth.
• Kingship in Heaven begins with the reign of Alalu, who reigns for nine years before being overthrown by Anu and thrown down to ‘dark earth’. Anu then reigns for nine years before being castrated and defeated by Kumarbi, and fleeing to the sky. Kumarbi swallows Anu’s genitals and becomes pregnant with three gods (the Storm-God, Aranzaha and Tasmisu. Kumarbi spat out Aranzaha & Tasmisu but the Storm-God remained inside. Anu then spoke to the Storm-God and debated how he could escape Kumarbi’s body – he warns him not to exit through other orifices (especially the anus) but through Kumarbi’s ‘good place’ (presumably his penis). The Storm-God escapes and defeats Kumarbi to become king of the Gods.
• In the Song of Ullikummi, a sort of sequel, Kumarbi plots revenge and has intercourse with a large rock, which gives birth to a stone child, Ullikummi. The child is hidden on the shoulder of Ubelluri (the Hurrian Atlas), where he grows massive. He challenges the Storm-God and defeats him, but the other gods become worried and cut through the feat of Ullikummi with a cutter (that was used to separate earth from heaven). The Storm-God then faces Ullikummi again and defeats him.
• The parallels between the Hurrian and Hesiodic myths are clear once we eliminate the reign of Alalu: Anu is equivalent to Ouranos, Kumarbi to Kronos, and the Storm-God to Zeus; Anu and Ouranos are both castrated and various gods are born from their genitals; Kumarbi and Kronos castrate their fathers and have children inside themselves; the Storm-God and Zeus win the kingship of the gods, then must win a second victory over an enormous monster (Ullikummi/Typhoeus).
• The parallels cannot be pressed too far. For example, is the Storm-God the son of Kumarbi, from whom he is born, or of Anu, whose genitals make Kumarbi pregnant, or of both, with Anu as father and Kumarbi as mother? Also, Zeus, unlike the Storm-God, never shares his sibling’s fate of being inside Kronos but is rescued by the trickery of Rhea and Gaia. As for the similarity between the monsters Ullikummi and Typhoeus, the Hurrian myth seems closer to the much later version of Apollodorus than to Hesiod’s (but according to Apollodorus it is Zeus, not the monster, whose feet are cut through).
Greek myths and Mesopotamia -> pp 194-195
• The role of the Graces tricking Typhon into eating the ephemeral fruit that grows on Mt. Nysa, which makes him weaker instead of stronger, is reflected in the Hittite myth of the defeat of the dragon Illuyanka. The goddess Inara persuaded Illuyanka and his brood to gorge themselves on a huge feast, and they grow so large that they cannot escape to the safety of their lair when set upon by the Storm-God, who kills him. The motif of using food to defeat a great monster is perhaps a tenuous link.
The East Face of Helicon -> pp 279-280
Comparisons of the Kumarbi myth with Hesiod
• Assuming that the Storm-God is to be treated as the successor of Kumarbi and as the present king of the gods, we have a sequence Alalu, Anu, Kumarbi, Storm-God. Alalu, apparently a god of the earth, has no counterpart in the Hesiodic succession, but the other three correspond to Ouranos, Kronos and Zeus. Anu’s name, like Ouranos’, means Sky; he is a direct borrowing from the Mesopotamian pantheon. Kumarbi was a Hurrian corn-god; Kronos has become so much a mythological figure in Greece that his original nature is difficult to establish, but many scholars have concluded, from his wielding a sickle and from the celebration of his festival following the harvest, that he was a god of the harvest. The Storm-God, like Zeus, is the storm-god.
• Anu, like Ouranos, has his genitals cut off, and thereupon removes himself to heaven. From the genitals other divinities spring.
• As Anu warns Kumarbi that there is trouble in store for him as a result of what he has done, so Ouranos warns the Titans that they will have to pay later for their castration of him.
• Kumarbi, like Kronos, has a number of gods in his belly for a time, including the storm-god. The Hittite and Greek accounts give different explanations of how the gods got there, but both involve deliberate acts of swallowing by the host god.
• At one point Kumarbi actually does announce his intention of eating one of his children, and, like Kronos, he is provided with a stone instead. He takes it into his mouth asnd expels it again, after which it is set up as a cult object.
• After this the storm-god becomes powerful, and there are hostilities between him and Kumarbi/Kronos with their respective allies.
• In the Hittite text Earth gives birth in the subterranean Apsu to two children who, we infer, will pose a new threat to the Storm-God. According to Hesiod’s poem, Earth in union with Tartarus gives birth to Typhoeus, who poses a new threat to Zeus. Presumably the Storm-God successfully demolished his adversaries, as Zeus did his.
•Finally, if it is really the case that the deity KA.ZAL issues out of Kumarbi’s skull, as Athena does from Zeus, the motif of birth though a male god’s cranium appears in both narratives.
Hope thats enough for you Idun, i must say i found it one of the most interesting essays i had to write for my degree - if anyone has any questions then i'll do my best to fill you in!
Phil