--- product_id: 4154603 title: "The Ark Before Noah: Decoding the Story of the Flood" price: "€ 123.46" currency: EUR in_stock: true reviews_count: 13 url: https://www.desertcart.be/products/4154603-the-ark-before-noah-decoding-the-story-of-the-flood store_origin: BE region: Belgium --- # The Ark Before Noah: Decoding the Story of the Flood **Price:** € 123.46 **Availability:** ✅ In Stock ## Quick Answers - **What is this?** The Ark Before Noah: Decoding the Story of the Flood - **How much does it cost?** € 123.46 with free shipping - **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship - **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.be](https://www.desertcart.be/products/4154603-the-ark-before-noah-decoding-the-story-of-the-flood) ## Best For - Customers looking for quality international products ## Why This Product - Free international shipping included - Worldwide delivery with tracking - 15-day hassle-free returns ## Description The recent translation of a Babylonian tablet launches a groundbreaking investigation into one of the most famous stories in the world, challenging the way we look at ancient history. Since the Victorian period, it has been understood that the story of Noah, iconic in the Book of Genesis, and a central motif in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, derives from a much older story that existed centuries before in ancient Babylon. But the relationship between the Babylonian and biblical traditions was shrouded in mystery. Then, in 2009, Irving Finkel, a curator at the British Museum and a world authority on ancient Mesopotamia, found himself playing detective when a member of the public arrived at the museum with an intriguing cuneiform tablet from a family collection. Not only did the tablet reveal a new version of the Babylonian Flood Story; the ancient poet described the size and completely unexpected shape of the ark, and gave detailed boat building specifications. Decoding this ancient message wedge by cuneiform wedge, Dr. Finkel discovered where the Babylonians believed the ark came to rest and developed a new explanation of how the old story ultimately found its way into the Bible. In The Ark Before Noah , Dr. Finkel takes us on an adventurous voyage of discovery, opening the door to an enthralling world of ancient voices and new meanings. Review: Eminently readable and refreshingly personal account. - Reading "The Ark Before Noah" makes you feel like you're in a comfortable armchair in a book-lined study. There's a brandy snifter in your hand, and you're listening to one of the most charming raconteurs you can imagine. He's spinning a yarn so compellingly and amusingly that, almost against your will, you're becoming interested in a topic about which you'd never before cared. The vast majority of humankind has no clue what cuneiform writing is. But the man in the comfy chair opposite yours, Dr. Irving Finkel, Assistant Keeper of Ancient Mesopotamian Scripts at the British Museum, would like to change that. Ostensibly, this book is about a millennia-old slab of clay with some wedge-shaped writing on it and what it reveals: a Primordial Flood story unlike any other. As Finkel informs us, there are plenty of other Babylonian cuneiform tablets in the British Museum and elsewhere with bits and pieces of Flood narratives (twelve, if memory serves). But this one was unique. Not only does it give precise instructions and dimensions for building a giant round boat (surprising enough in and of itself), it also contained the phrase "the animals entered the ark two by two"--a phrasing not found in any other Babylonian Flood narratives, but one which DOES occur in the Hebrew Bible. Now, were this book only about this tablet, it would be fascinating enough. But "The Ark Before Noah" is much more than that. "The Ark Before Noah" is a love story, an account of the lifelong romance between Dr. Finkel and cuneiform writing. Not only is it the oldest form of human writing known of, it's also, as Dr. Finkel informs us, far and away the most fun--a cryptographical challenge for the nimblest of brains. Woven through the story of the Ark Tablet is a chatty, witty, humane, and at times very funny memoir of a life spent deciphering these baffling indentations in once-wet mud. It's also a marvelous introductory history to the discipline of Assyriology itself. But it goes beyond that. One of Dr. Finkel's many gifts is to be able to see behind the inscriptions, and recognize the very human people who made them. The millennia between us and them notwithstanding, they were, he points out, people precisely like us. They struggled with the same dilemmas, had the same worries and concerns, and felt the same emotions. And, using our shared humanity across the millennia as a point of departure, he asks some much larger questions about the Bible: who wrote it? When? Why? And why would its anonymous writers or compilers, forcibly exiled in Babylon, have included stories cribbed from their pagan oppressors in their own holy book? Dr. Finkel has pulled off a rare feat: a lucidly scholarly, readable, personal, and personable book about a subject which, in the hands of the wrong writer, would be as boring as watching paint dry--but which, in his telling, becomes mesmerizing. Review: be prepared to 'go to class'... - Dr. Finkel has done with this book, what every scholar should try to achieve: Make the information as clear and concise as possible and inspire in a person the want to dig deeper not only into the primary subject but the very field of study. I found this work not only informative but very relevant to my own area of work in the text of the Masoretic Hebrew Torah. The way he melds background material into the main subject of the tablet, was akin to sitting listening to a lecture that you do not want to leave. I have posted to many friends the link to his book here on desertcart... I intend to do so more as I find those who would be also interested in this subject. Technically: I personally think with some expansion he could use this very book as a basis for a textbook on Assyrian and Akkadian comparative studies! Or better a Primer for Assyrian Cuneiform. (I have many old texts in my library but none approach the ease of getting into the subject as this book.) I could write many glowing words but never match the joy of reading this book. Only one draw back is encountered for someone like me, who likes to sink his literary teeth into a real textual study - the text appears in phonetic transcription with translation... but to include the transcription of the text in cuneiform would have been a very good addition. All in all, I say - FIVE STARS - hands down! Thank You! to Dr. Finkel - BUY THIS BOOK. ## Technical Specifications | Specification | Value | |---------------|-------| | Best Sellers Rank | #773,908 in Books ( See Top 100 in Books ) #34 in Archaeology (Books) #66 in Expeditions & Discoveries World History (Books) #211 in Ancient Civilizations | | Customer Reviews | 4.5 out of 5 stars 622 Reviews | ## Images ![The Ark Before Noah: Decoding the Story of the Flood - Image 1](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/81JdKPRm7KL.jpg) ## Available Options This product comes in different **Media Language, Media Format** options. ## Customer Reviews ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Eminently readable and refreshingly personal account. *by J***R on April 30, 2014* Reading "The Ark Before Noah" makes you feel like you're in a comfortable armchair in a book-lined study. There's a brandy snifter in your hand, and you're listening to one of the most charming raconteurs you can imagine. He's spinning a yarn so compellingly and amusingly that, almost against your will, you're becoming interested in a topic about which you'd never before cared. The vast majority of humankind has no clue what cuneiform writing is. But the man in the comfy chair opposite yours, Dr. Irving Finkel, Assistant Keeper of Ancient Mesopotamian Scripts at the British Museum, would like to change that. Ostensibly, this book is about a millennia-old slab of clay with some wedge-shaped writing on it and what it reveals: a Primordial Flood story unlike any other. As Finkel informs us, there are plenty of other Babylonian cuneiform tablets in the British Museum and elsewhere with bits and pieces of Flood narratives (twelve, if memory serves). But this one was unique. Not only does it give precise instructions and dimensions for building a giant round boat (surprising enough in and of itself), it also contained the phrase "the animals entered the ark two by two"--a phrasing not found in any other Babylonian Flood narratives, but one which DOES occur in the Hebrew Bible. Now, were this book only about this tablet, it would be fascinating enough. But "The Ark Before Noah" is much more than that. "The Ark Before Noah" is a love story, an account of the lifelong romance between Dr. Finkel and cuneiform writing. Not only is it the oldest form of human writing known of, it's also, as Dr. Finkel informs us, far and away the most fun--a cryptographical challenge for the nimblest of brains. Woven through the story of the Ark Tablet is a chatty, witty, humane, and at times very funny memoir of a life spent deciphering these baffling indentations in once-wet mud. It's also a marvelous introductory history to the discipline of Assyriology itself. But it goes beyond that. One of Dr. Finkel's many gifts is to be able to see behind the inscriptions, and recognize the very human people who made them. The millennia between us and them notwithstanding, they were, he points out, people precisely like us. They struggled with the same dilemmas, had the same worries and concerns, and felt the same emotions. And, using our shared humanity across the millennia as a point of departure, he asks some much larger questions about the Bible: who wrote it? When? Why? And why would its anonymous writers or compilers, forcibly exiled in Babylon, have included stories cribbed from their pagan oppressors in their own holy book? Dr. Finkel has pulled off a rare feat: a lucidly scholarly, readable, personal, and personable book about a subject which, in the hands of the wrong writer, would be as boring as watching paint dry--but which, in his telling, becomes mesmerizing. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ be prepared to 'go to class'... *by M***Z on January 23, 2015* Dr. Finkel has done with this book, what every scholar should try to achieve: Make the information as clear and concise as possible and inspire in a person the want to dig deeper not only into the primary subject but the very field of study. I found this work not only informative but very relevant to my own area of work in the text of the Masoretic Hebrew Torah. The way he melds background material into the main subject of the tablet, was akin to sitting listening to a lecture that you do not want to leave. I have posted to many friends the link to his book here on Amazon... I intend to do so more as I find those who would be also interested in this subject. Technically: I personally think with some expansion he could use this very book as a basis for a textbook on Assyrian and Akkadian comparative studies! Or better a Primer for Assyrian Cuneiform. (I have many old texts in my library but none approach the ease of getting into the subject as this book.) I could write many glowing words but never match the joy of reading this book. Only one draw back is encountered for someone like me, who likes to sink his literary teeth into a real textual study - the text appears in phonetic transcription with translation... but to include the transcription of the text in cuneiform would have been a very good addition. All in all, I say - FIVE STARS - hands down! Thank You! to Dr. Finkel - BUY THIS BOOK. ### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ A Purely Literary Analysis *by R***Z on February 21, 2020* This book accomplishes what it sets out to achieve. The story is fascinating; the writing is scholarly, learned, and weighty, but it is done with a light touch and is fully accessible. The problem (I should say, my problem) is that the subtitle is very misleading. "Decoding the Story of the Flood" is an overstatement. The author is an expert on ancient Mesopotamia at the British Museum. He works with cuneiform tablets. This work is very 'literary'; he characterizes it (appropriately) as "philology". Once upon a time English Ph.D. students had philology requirements as part of their programs. This meant such courses as Beowulf, Old English and the History of the Language. This meant bibliography (physical as well as descriptive) and it meant paleography and graphology. This was the hyper-scholarly side of 'literary' study, not like literary 'criticism' or literary history. At one point the author reminisces about the giants in his field and notes that they came equipped with Latin, Greek, Hebrew, Arabic, Coptic, Ethiopic, Syriac and Aramaic "before they even looked at Babylonian" (p. 39). Note that this sort of work is language-driven. When the story of the flood is examined the materials used are literary texts, not, e.g., oceanographic, anthropological, archaeological or historical materials/evidence. The only (brief) historical excursus in this book is a fascinating, speculative passage on the possible impact of the Babylonian Captivity on the creation of the Hebrew Bible. The impetus behind the study is the author's extensive study of a single cuneiform tablet concerned with the construction of the ark. Interestingly, this ark is circular. It is a coracle, a very common form of nautical vehicle in this part of the world, i.e., contemporary Iraq. From this single tablet the author expands his examination to include other ancient texts (particularly the Gilgamesh text) and studies the pieces of the puzzle which they contribute. We never, however, really leave that bubble. We do not learn whether or not there actually was a great flood, when it occurred, where it occurred, whether or not the landing on Mt. Ararat is historically plausible. Within the texts examined there are other possible mountain sites and they are identified on a map and studied closely within the literary texts themselves, but we never go beyond the texts. The 'outside world' if it might be so described is represented by an actual building of an ark of the sort described in the central tablet. It is far smaller than the original, by necessity. It was also built in India, where the bitumen used for sealing was of far poorer quality than that available in Iraq. This is all very interesting, but it is far less interesting (to me) than the larger story. One version of the larger story, e.g., is William Ryan and Walter Pitman's book, NOAH'S FLOOD: THE NEW SCIENTIFIC DISCOVERIES ABOUT THE EVENT THAT CHANGED HISTORY (1998). Ryan and Pitman (Columbia U. oceanographers and marine geologists) study the Black Sea and argue that the Black Sea was once the Black Lake. Approximately 7,600 years ago the glaciers melted, the oceans rose and the Mediterranean plunged through the Bosporus Strait. This occurred over a period of months and the sound would have been horrific—sufficient to launch a panoply of tales and legends. The point is proven by the existence of now-lost settlements beneath the Black Sea and the existence of fresh water mollusks below the Sea and salt water mollusks above. Negotiating the Strait is traditionally very, very difficult—a problem solved by suspending weights below ships so that the cross-current problem is ameliorated. This book, which appeared 16 years prior to THE ARK BEFORE NOAH, does not appear in the latter's bibliography. This was profoundly disappointing to me. I expected THE ARK BEFORE NOAH to complement Ryan and Pitman's argument or at least address it, but the larger questions concerning the Flood are totally avoided (unless they are represented literarily within existing texts). What was interesting was the author's introduction to cuneiform writing (with many helpful illustrations) and the literary analysis which he was able to provide. I wanted and expected much more. This may be 'my problem' but potential readers should be aware of the circumscribed subject matter of the book. The historicity of the bible is of enormous importance. It is (to me) the central question here. The physical evidence represented by cuneiform tablets is interesting to the extent that it bears on larger questions. Those are not addressed here. --- ## Why Shop on Desertcart? - 🛒 **Trusted by 1.3+ Million Shoppers** — Serving international shoppers since 2016 - 🌍 **Shop Globally** — Access 737+ million products across 21 categories - 💰 **No Hidden Fees** — All customs, duties, and taxes included in the price - 🔄 **15-Day Free Returns** — Hassle-free returns (30 days for PRO members) - 🔒 **Secure Payments** — Trusted payment options with buyer protection - ⭐ **TrustPilot Rated 4.5/5** — Based on 8,000+ happy customer reviews **Shop now:** [https://www.desertcart.be/products/4154603-the-ark-before-noah-decoding-the-story-of-the-flood](https://www.desertcart.be/products/4154603-the-ark-before-noah-decoding-the-story-of-the-flood) --- *Product available on Desertcart Belgium* *Store origin: BE* *Last updated: 2026-10-26*