An ancient Indian tale of the great flood

We do not find any legend about the great flood in the Vedas, this ancient literary monument of India, apparently compiled between 1500 and 1000 BC, when the Aryans lived in the Punjab and had not yet penetrated east into the Ganges valley . But in later Sanskrit literature, different versions of the legend of the flood are repeatedly found, and each of them, although generally similar, retains its own special details. Here it will suffice to cite the oldest tradition known to us, contained in the so-called Satapatha Brahmana, an important prose work on sacred ritual, believed to have been written shortly before the advent of Buddhism, that is, no later than the 6th century. BC The Aryans at this time occupied the upper Ganges valley as well as the Indus valley, but probably experienced little influence from the cultures of Western Asia and Greece. The powerful influence of Greek ideas and Greek art, undoubtedly, began several centuries later, with the invasion of Alexander the Great in 326 BC. The content of the legend of the great flood is as follows.

“In the morning they brought water for Manu to wash, just as now they always bring him water to wash his hands. While he was washing his face, a fish fell into his hands. She said this word to him: “Grow me up, and I will save you!” - “What will you save me from?” - “The flood will destroy all earthly creatures; I will save you from the flood!" - “How can I raise you?” The fish replied: “While we are small, we cannot avoid death: one fish devours another. First you will keep me in a jug;

When I outgrow the jug, you will dig a well and keep me there. When I outgrow the well, you will let me into the sea, for then I no longer have anything to fear from death." Soon the fish became ghasha ( big fish), and this breed is the largest among fish. After this she said: “In such and such a year there will be a flood. You must then remember me and build a ship, and when the flood begins, board it, and I will save you from the flood." Having raised the fish as she asked, Manu sent it into the sea. And in the very year that the fish predicted , he remembered her advice and built a ship, and when the flood began, he boarded it. Then the fish swam to him, and he tied a rope from his ship to its fin and thus soon sailed to that distant mountain in the north. the fish said to him: “I saved you; now tie the vessel to a tree, but be careful that the water does not carry you away while you remain on the mountain; when the water subsides, you can go down little by little.” And he gradually descended from the mountain. That is why that slope of the northern mountain is called “the descent of Manu.” All creatures were destroyed by the flood; only Manu survived...

Wanting to have offspring, he began to lead a pious and strict life. He also performed a “paka” sacrifice: standing in the water, he offered a sacrifice of clarified butter, sour milk, whey and curds. From this, a year later, a woman emerged. When she became completely dense, she rose to her feet, and wherever she stepped, her traces left pure oil. Mitra and Varuna, meeting her, asked: “Who are you?” “I am the daughter of Manu,” she answered. “Say that you are our daughter,” they said. “No,” she insisted, “I am the daughter of the one who gave birth to me.” Then they wanted to have a share in her, but she, without saying “yes” or “no,” passed by. She came to Manu, and he asked her: “Who are you?” “Your daughter,” she answered. “How, you, glory of creation, are you my daughter?” - he asked. “Yes!” she said. “By those sacrifices of pure butter, sour milk, whey and curds, which you offered in water, you produced me. I am grace; use me when you make sacrifices. And if you use me, When you make sacrifices, you will become rich in offspring and livestock. Every good thing you think of asking through me will be given to you.” And so he began to use it for the glory of God in the middle of the sacrifice, and the middle of the sacrifice is everything that happens between the introductory and final sacrifice. Together with her, he continued to lead a pious and strict life, wanting to have offspring. Through her he produced the human race, the race of Manu, and every good he asked through her was given to him."

Now let's go to India - a country with one of the most ancient cultures. The traditions of India have not been interrupted for several millennia. The legends of India have been preserved intact, unlike the myths of China or Egypt, of which only fragments have reached us. And many believe that the traces of the biblical story lead to India.

For example, the famous atlantologist A.M. Kondratov believed that the Sumerians could have learned this legend from their predecessors. The fact is that the ancient Sumerians were not the indigenous inhabitants of Mesopotamia. Before the Sumerians appeared on the banks of the Tigris and Euphrates in the 3rd - 4th millennia BC. e., there lived a people who also had a high culture, but differed from the Sumerians both linguistically and in anthropological type.

Modern archaeologists called them “Ubaid” after the name of the place of the first finds of this culture - El Ubaid. The Ubaid culture dates back to the Neolithic era, to the Khalaf period (also named after the place of the first finds), VI - V millennia BC. e. But the most surprising thing is that, according to many linguists, the Ubaid language has common features with the Dravidian language. The languages ​​of the Dravidian group include some languages ​​of the peoples of India, in particular the Tamil language. This suggests the Indian roots of the Ubaids and, accordingly, the Indian origin of the legend of the Flood. After archaeological research in Mohenjo-Daro and Harappa in India, many noticed the kinship of the proto- Indian culture and Shumero-Ubaid. The relationship between the Ubaid language and the Dravidian language is assumed (the language of the Dravidian group was spoken by proto-Indians), and in this regard, attention was paid to the Dravidian - Tamil - legends about the sunken land of the ancestors of the Tamils.

“Thus,” concludes atlantologist A.M. Kondratov, “it turns out to be an interesting chain: the legend of the flood recorded by the author of the Bible - the Babylonian tale of the flood - the Sumerian primary source of this tale - the Ubaid roots of the original source - the relationship, albeit hypothetical, of the Ubaid language with Dravidian - Dravidian legends about the sunken ancestral home.” In that case, perhaps we're talking about about an ancient flood, about the land that sank about 12 thousand years ago, as a result of melting ice after the Great Glaciation, near the territory of India.

In this regard, assumptions were made that these legends could also talk about the death of a certain mysterious land similar to Atlantis, namely Lemuria.

However, it is doubtful that this land is the mysterious Lemuria, a continent that allegedly disappeared into the Indian Ocean. The hypothesis about the death of the continent of Lemuria, previously located between Madagascar and Hindustan, was put forward in mid-19th century century German zoologist Ernst Haeckel. He proceeded from the fact of the similarity of the fauna of Madagascar and Hindustan. In particular, he drew attention to Indian and Madagascar monkeys - lemurs. According to him, lemurs came to India and Madagascar from a hypothetical Lemuria. This hypothesis was picked up by many scientists. And then the Theosophists. When the remains of lemurs were found in both America and Europe, Haeckel’s hypothesis was rejected, but his continent was not forgotten.

Already in our 20th century, the heir of Lemuria - the My continent, which allegedly died in the Pacific Ocean, became widely known. The name of the continent My is an abbreviation for Haeckel's Lemuria. This continent was created by the science fiction writer and mystic James Churchwood.

This is how legends are born! A zoologist a hundred years ago, in imitation of Plato’s Atlantis, came up with a continent with a sonorous name, and we still remember this legend. I wonder if his land would have been just as popular if he had called the mainland not Lemuria, but, for example, the Island of Monkeys?

However, in the Indian Ocean, as A.M. rightly noted. Kondratov, one can study the shelf, a continental bank that went under water after the sea level rose by more than 100 meters due to the melting of glaciers during the last glaciation. Huge lands (in fact, an entire continent) then went under water south of Indochina, and all that remained from this continent were the islands of Kalimantan and Sumatra.

This “continent” is more real and much more extensive than even Atlantis itself (if you look for it in the middle of the waters of the Atlantic Ocean). And therefore this hypothesis seems completely justified, especially since in Indian mythology there is a story about the Flood, akin to the Sumerian and Biblical legends.

This is the myth of the first man Manu, who also survived the Flood. The cause of the ancient Indian Flood differs from the causes described in biblical, ancient Greek and Sumerian-Babylonian sources. The flood did not depend on the attitude of the Vedic gods towards people. According to Shatapatha-Brahmana, a prose commentary on the sacred books of Hinduism, the Vedas, the Flood came as the natural completion of the world cycle, the yuga, and it purified the worlds. Cyclicity is indeed inherent in the process of glaciation and melting of glaciers. Isn’t this what Shatapatha Brahmana is talking about?

A fantastic fish, the incarnation of the god Brahma (according to other sources - the god Vishnu), warned Manu about the Flood; she told him: “In such and such a year there will be a flood. Therefore, follow my advice and build a ship, and when this flood begins, board the ship and I will save you.

The Shatapatha-Brahmana speaks about the future as follows: “In the year indicated by the fish, Manu, following its advice, built a ship and boarded it when the flood began. Then the fish swam to him, attached the ship's rope to its horn, and in this way quickly headed towards the northern mountain. There she told Manu: “So I saved you. Now tie the ship to a tree so that the water will not carry you away while you are on the mountain. And as soon as the water begins to subside, you can gradually descend.”

After the Flood, Manu, like Noah, makes a thanksgiving sacrifice. Then, with the help of prayer and ascetic exercises, he produces his wife Ida and after that becomes the ancestor of people.

But of course, the assumption about the proto-Indian, Vedic roots of the legend of the Flood does not exclude a different vision. Such an assumption is only the first tentative step on the path to the truth.

Is it necessary to build chains through which the legend was transmitted? We know that most of the peoples of Western Asia, Asia Minor and the Greeks have similar legends about the Flood. Shouldn't we admit that this plot, like some other plots of folklore and mythology, is simply common to these peoples? There are a large number of similar general plots, for example, snake-wrestling plots, plots associated with the initiation rite, etc. The roots of this myth go back to ancient times, they are common not only to the peoples of the Indo-European group of languages, including the Slavs, but also to many neighboring peoples .

We have come a long way from the original point of our journey. If we want to separate the storyline of the myth of the Flood, which is based on the memory of the Black Sea, Dardanelles catastrophe, from storylines, borrowed from the mythologies of other civilizations that survived other catastrophes, we must study all the myths about the Great Flood.

Let's continue to expand our horizons of knowledge about the Flood. The first article mentioned legends known to a wide range of people - the Bible, the Epic of Gilgamesh, as well as the Sumerian and more ancient roots of these legends.

Now you can move on to India and move further east, as promised.

Global flood. Indian versions.
1. In the morning they brought water to Manu for washing, just as they now bring him to wash his hands. While he was washing his face, a fish fell into his hands.
2. She told him this: “Grow me up, and I will save you.” - “What will you save me from?” - asked Manu. - “Every living thing will be carried away by the flood, and I will save you from it.” - “How can I raise you?” - asked Manu.
3. And the fish said: “While we (fish) are small, we are in great danger, because fish eat fish. First you keep me in a jug, but when I become too big for it, then dig a hole and keep me in it, and when I grow out of it, take me to the sea, because then I will be safe.”
4. Soon she became a large jhasha fish, and these fish grow best. Then she told Manu: “There will be a flood in such and such a year. Therefore, follow my advice and build a ship, and when this flood begins, board the ship and I will save you.”
5. Having raised the fish as she asked, Manu took it to the sea. And in the year that the fish indicated, Manu, following her advice, built a ship and boarded it when the flood began. Then the fish swam to him, attached the ship's rope to its horn, and in this way quickly headed towards the northern mountain.
6. There she said to Manu: “So I saved you. Now tie the ship to a tree so that the water will not carry you away while you are on the mountain. And as soon as the water begins to subside, you can gradually descend.”
Thus he gradually descended, and since then this slope of the northern mountain has been called the “Descent of Manu.” The flood then carried away all living beings, only Manu remained alive there.

This is how the flood is described in “Shatapatha Brahman” - “Brahman of a Hundred Paths”, a prose commentary on the sacred books of Hindus - the Vedas, written about three thousand years ago. Comparing this text with the biblical tale of the flood, as well as with the Babylonian-Sumerian primary source of the latter, it is not difficult to notice the similarities between these stories. And Noah, and Utnapishtim, and Ziusudra learn about the impending disaster from above. The fish that spoke to Manu (by the way, the plot of the “talking fish” found its way into European folklore and was reflected in Pushkin’s famous fairy tale about the goldfish) is not a simple fish, it was the embodiment of the creator of the world Brahma, and according to another version - one from the incarnations of the guardian of the world Vishnu, who repeatedly saved the human race from death. Therefore, here too we are dealing with divine providence.

Manu, like Noah, Utnapishtim, Ziusudra, builds a ship and waits out the flood on the “northern mountain” (Ararat - for the ancient Jews, Mount Nitzir - for the inhabitants of Mesopotamia). And Manu, and Noah, and Utnapishtim, and Ziusudra are the progenitors of people. There can be no talk of any influence of the Bible on the “Brahmana of a Hundred Paths,” since the latter is older than the Holy Scriptures of Christians.

“Brahmana of a Hundred Paths” sets out the story of the flood very briefly, for the main purpose of this work is to explain the origin of the human race (“Desiring to have offspring, Manu plunged into prayer and asceticism,” it is further related in “Shatapatha Brahmana”; he made sacrifices to the gods, who , together with prayers, embodied in a beautiful woman named Ida; she became the wife of Manu, and from them a new human race arose).

The great Indian poem "Mahabharata" talks about the flood in more detail. At first, the events are presented in the same way as in the Shatapatha Brahman: the fish turns to the rishi (prophet, sacred singer) Manu with a request to raise it, Manu fulfills the request of the talking fish, first placing it in a vessel, then in a large pond, then in the Ganges River, and from there releases it into the sea.

“Having fallen into the sea, the fish said to Manu: “Great lord! You protected me in every possible way: now listen from me what you should do when the time comes. Soon everything that exists on earth, movable and immovable, will turn into nothing. The time has now come for the purification of the worlds. Therefore, I will teach you what will serve you for your benefit, says the Mahabharata. - The time has come, terrible for the universe, movable and immovable. Build yourself a strong ship, with a rope tied to it. Sit down in it together with the seven Rishis and hide in it, carefully selected and safe, all the seeds that the Brahmins described in the old days. Once you board the ship, look for me with your eyes. By my horn you will easily recognize me: I will come to you. So you do everything. Now I greet you and leave. You cannot cross these deep waters without my help. Don’t doubt my elephant.” - Manu replied: “I will do everything as you said.”

The flood begins. Manu, in his ship, on board of which there are seven prophet-rishis and seeds, floating “through the wave-filled abyss,” attaches a rope to the horn of a fish. And so she “dragged the ship with great speed across the salty sea, which seemed to dance with its waves and thunder with its waters.” There was nothing but air, water and sky.

“In such a disturbed sea, Manus, seven Rishis and fish rushed about. And so for many, many years the fish tirelessly pulled the ship through the waters and finally dragged it to the highest ridge of Himavat. Then, smiling tenderly, she said to the seven Rishis: “Tie the ship to this ridge without delay.” They did it. And this highest ridge of the Himavata is still known under the name Naubandhana - the Mahabharata further narrates. - The friendly fish then announced to them: “I am Prajapati (Lord of all creatures) Brahma, above whom there is no one and nothing in the world. In the form of a fish I delivered you from this great danger. Manu will create again every living creature - gods, asuras, people, with all the worlds and all things, movable and immovable. By my grace and his strict asceticism, he will achieve a full understanding of his creative work and will not be confused.”

Having said this, Brahma disappeared in the form of a fish, and Manu, “wishing to bring every creature to life,” performed feats of hermitage and asceticism and “began to create everything that lives,” including the gods and their enemies - the asuras.

In the Matsya Purana (“Fish” Purana; a purana is a narrative work dedicated to some Indian deity), the prophet Manu is saved from the flood not by Brahma, but by Vishnu in the form of a fish. However, Manu himself is called here not a prophet-rishi, but a king, the son of the Sun, who decided to devote himself to asceticism, to which he indulged “for a whole million years” in “a certain region in Malaya,” that is, on the Malabar coast of Hindustan. Further, the plot unfolds in exactly the same way as in “Brahman of a Hundred Paths” and “Mahabharata”, only the ship for Manu “was built by the entire host of gods to save a great multitude of living creatures.”

One of the longest puranas - the Bhagavata Purana, dedicated to the glorification of the god Vishnu (Bhagavata - “blessed”, one of the many epithets of the god Vishnu), contains detailed and detailed story about the flood that ends the world cycle. But his hero is not called Manu, but “a certain great royal Rishi” named Satyavrata, “the Dravidian king” and a strict ascetic.

“Once, while he was bringing a libation of water to the souls of his ancestors in the Kritamala River (in the Dravidian land or Malabar), a fish fell into his hands along with the water,” says the Bhagavata Purana. Next, the plot is repeated about the request of the fish, its successive migrations as it grows. The fish tells Satyavrata that she is the incarnation of Vishnu, and when the ascetic king asks why the great god took this form, the fish replies: “On the seventh day from this day, all three worlds will plunge into the abyss of non-existence. When the universe disappears in this abyss, a large ship sent by me will come to you. Taking with you plants and various seeds, surrounded by the Rishi family and all creatures, you will board that ship and, without fear, rush through the dark abyss. When the ship begins to shake with a stormy wind, fasten it with a great serpent to my horn, for I will be close.”

Then the flood occurs, Satyavrata and the crew of his ship are saved with the help of a horned fish, Vishnu himself takes away the sacred Vedas, stolen by the enemies of the gods (a detail missing in other Indian versions of the flood). Then “King Satyavrata, possessed of all knowledge, sacred and profane, became, by the grace of Vishnu, the son of Vivasvat, the Manu of the new Yuga.” The same version of the flood is presented, only more briefly, in another purana dedicated to the omnipresent fire deity Agni.

The legend of the flood was borrowed by the creators of the Bible from Babylon, the Babylonians borrowed it from the Sumerians, and they, in turn, from the Ubaids, a people who survived the catastrophic flood, as shown by the excavations of Leonard Woolley. Here we descend into the depths of time, to events separated from us by five or even six thousand years. But the same descent “into the well of times” was made by scientists studying history and culture Ancient India. It turned out that long before classical Indian culture with its sacred Vedas, Upanishads, Brahmanas, Puranas, Mahabharata, an even more ancient civilization existed on the territory of Hindustan, contemporary with civilizations Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia, the “third cradle” of human culture with its writing, monumental architecture, urban planning, etc.

Monuments of the most ancient Indian culture - it is called “proto-Indian”, that is, “proto-Indian” - were discovered back in the 20s of our century in the Indus River valley. These excavations continue to this day.

Monuments of proto-Indian civilization were found on a vast territory of over one and a half million square kilometers. More than one and a half hundred cities and settlements created in the 3rd–2nd millennia BC. BC, archaeologists have discovered at the foot of the majestic Himalayas and in the Ganges Valley, on the Kathiyawar Peninsula and on the banks of the Narbada River in southern India, on the shores of the Arabian Sea and in the center of the Deccan Plateau, and, no doubt, new discoveries will be made.

However, despite all efforts, scientists have still not been able to find traces of the ancestor culture, which would be the basis, the soil for proto-Indian civilization. The work of Soviet and foreign researchers (the author of these lines also took part in them) made it possible - with the help of electronic computers - to determine that the monuments of proto-Indian writing, mysterious hieroglyphic inscriptions covering seals, amulets, pendants, ivory sticks, were made in the language part of the Dravidian family of languages.

Speakers of Dravidian languages ​​inhabit mainly the southern part of the Hindustan Peninsula. Monuments of proto-Indian civilization have been discovered to the north, west and east of the Dravidian language massif. However, in the area where the Proto-Indian cities were found, in northern India, they speak the Brahui language, which is part of the Dravidian family of languages. Common features With the languages ​​of the Dravidians, linguists find in the language of the Ubaids, predecessors of the Sumerians in the Tigris-Euphrates valley, and in the language of the Elamites, who created a distinctive civilization about five thousand years ago in the territory that is now the Iranian province of Khuzistan. It is possible that several thousand years ago, peoples speaking languages ​​related to Dravidian occupied the vast territory of what is now Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, and India. But this does not solve the question of the origin of the Dravidians themselves, their ancestral homeland. The Dravidians themselves believe that the cradle of their culture was on the Southern continent, which sank to the bottom of the Indian Ocean.

The Tamils, one of the Dravidian peoples of Hindustan, have an ancient literary tradition. According to legend, this tradition dates back to the first sangha (from the Sanskrit “sangha”, meaning “assembly, community”). Its founder was the great god Shiva, and it was located “in the city of Madurai, swallowed up by the sea,” in a kingdom “destroyed and swallowed up by the sea.” Medieval authors believed that the sea swallowed Tamalaham, the “homeland of the Tamils,” which once “existed on south." And, as Leningrad Dravidologist N.V. Gurov believes, the legend of the sunken ancestral home was not only not invented by commentators of the 13th–14th centuries, but has existed in Tamil literature for about two thousand years. There are, however, real reasons to attribute the origin of this legend to an even more ancient period. If we go beyond the verbal creativity of the Tamils ​​and turn to the mythology and folklore of other South Indian peoples, then we can be convinced that the Tamil legend about the Sangas and the sunken kingdom is genetically connected with a group of tales and legends that can generally be called “legends about the ancestral home.” .

Thus, an interesting chain is obtained: the legend of the flood, recorded by the authors of the Bible - the Babylonian legend of the flood - the Sumerian primary source of this legend - the Ubaid roots of the original source - the relationship, albeit hypothetical, of the Ubaid language with the Dravidians - Dravidian legends about the sunken ancestral home - ancient Indian sources, from the Shatapatha Brahmanas to the Puranas telling about the global flood.

Global flood. Tales from Hindustan to Australia.

The famous medieval traveler Venetian Marco Polo, who visited the island of Sri Lanka, provides information that this beautiful island “has become smaller than in the old days,” since “most of the island” was flooded. Apparently, Marco Polo received this news from local residents, who believed that a flood had once swallowed up a vast territory from their homeland.

In the ancient Chinese encyclopedia it says: “On the way from the shore of the Eastern Sea to Chelu there are no streams or ponds, although the country is cut up by mountains and valleys. Nevertheless, oyster shells and crab shields are found in the sand very far from the sea. The Mongols who inhabit this country have a legend that in ancient times a flood flooded the country, and after the flood all the places that were under water were covered with sand.”

A Chinese legend tells of a dragon named Kun-Kun, who hit his head so hard on the vault of heaven that all the pillars supporting the sky fell down. The firmament collapsed onto the earth's surface and filled it with water. In another version of the legend, Kun-Kun is not a dragon, but a commander who lost the battle. According to Chinese military ethics, a commander who loses a battle must commit suicide (otherwise his head will be cut off as a traitor). In despair, Kun-Kun began to beat his head against the bamboo pillars on which the sky rests... and one of the pillars became loose, a hole appeared in the sky through which water poured, bringing with it a flood.

The ancient Chinese had another legend with the following content: “to protect against floods, Gun built earthen dams, this did not help; Yao executed him on Mount Yushan (Mountain of Bird Feathers); Shun ordered Gun’s son Yu to pacify the flood; Yu did not build dams, but dug the canals; the water receded, Shun gave up the throne to Yu, and the Xia dynasty came from him.”

And another Chinese legend: the maid Yun Wai ate a peach that fell from a mountain and became pregnant by a dragon; she was kicked out, she raised her son; the Black Dragon's wife gave his robe to her lover the White Dragon; Black blocked the mouth of the Ershui River and caused a flood; son Yun Wai asked to forge a copper dragon head, iron fists, knives, throw cakes into the water if it turns yellow, and iron bread if it turns black; puts on a copper head, turns into a Yellow Dragon, fights a black one; people throw cakes into his mouth, and iron bread into Black; Black swallows Yellow, who cuts him from the inside; refuses to exit through the butt, nose, armpit, foot, exits through the eye; Black becomes one-eyed, runs, cutting through the dam, the water recedes; Yellow always remains a dragon.

From Sichuan: Divine Maiden Yaoji Slays 12 Heavenly Dragons; falling to the ground, they turned into stone and dammed the Yangtze; Yu in the form of a bear and his assistant the ox were unable to break through the waters; Yao-ji sends the heavenly army, it lays the bed of the Yangtze with lightning.

Miao people (Metho, Thailand): the sky spirit Joser sent two spirits to warn people about the flood; those working in the field in the morning saw that the weeds had grown again; one person wanted to kill these spirits, another questioned; they ordered to make drums; Only one man did it; during the flood, he put his son and daughter in it; With a long pole, Joser poked the ground so that the water would drain, so there are valleys and mountains; ordered the brother and sister to get married; my sister gave birth like a lump of bone marrow; Joser ordered to cut it into pieces and scatter it in different directions; from these pieces came the Chinese, Tai, Miao and other peoples (or various Miao clans); var.: 1) the man himself and his sister, and not his children, were saved in the drum; 2) at the direction of Joser, four spirits holding the earth made drains for the waters.

The Asi people have this legend: the first married couple gives birth to five sons and five daughters; brothers marry sisters; four older couples work the land, finding the field untouched every morning; they see the Silver and Golden spirits descending from the sky and restoring the turf; rush to beat them; the younger brother and sister recognize the spirits and order them to be released; they report that there will be a flood; the older couples make a chest of gold, silver, bronze, iron; the youngest – wooden; rain floods the earth with a flood, a wooden chest floats, others drown; The Golden and Silver spirits pierce the drains of the waters with arrows; descending, the ark lingers on pine, chestnut, bamboo; according to the instructions of the gods, brother and sister lower a sieve and a sieve, two millstones from the mountain; both times they fall on top of each other; brother and sister get married; a wife gives birth to a pumpkin, her brother-husband chops it up, people come out different nations, disperse across the ground.

Lolo, who inhabits China and Vietnam, tells the following legend. Tse-gu-dzih sent a messenger to the people, demanding the blood and flesh of a mortal; they refused; then he closed the floodgates, the waters rose to the sky; otters, ducks, lampreys were saved, the first ancestor of Du-mu was saved in a hollowed out log; from his four sons come the Chinese and Lolo - civilized people who can write; Du-mu made the ancestors of the rest from pieces of wood.

A Burmese legend tells how in mythical times a crab, offended by a kite that punched a hole in its skull, caused the seas and rivers to swell to the sky and cause a global flood.

The imperial family, according to the beliefs of the Japanese who profess the Shinto religion, belongs to the generation of people who lived before the flood. The divine ancestors of the emperors come from the sun goddess Amaterasu, who sent her great-grandson to rule the island of Kyushu, which emerged from the depths of the sea. His great-great-grandson, Jimmu, became the first mortal man on the Japanese throne, the first emperor. He made a trip from the island of Kyushu to the island of Honshu, which also emerged from the waters of the sea, and conquered it.

Vietnamese fairy tales. Three brothers catch frogs and hear them say that soon the animals will gather to judge the man. The brothers release the frogs, the eldest goes to a meeting with the old frog, hides in a hollow tree. Animals accuse each other of the fact that each of them is guilty before man, and only frogs are destroyed by man innocently. The frog promises that there will be a flood - the animals scatter. The frog tells the brothers to make a raft. The water of the flood drowns the fire. The brothers want to fry a crab and swim to the house of the Sun. The elder brother fell in love with the daughter of the Sun, baked the crab until it turned black - now he is visible in the sun with a black crab in his hands. The raft landed on bare rocks. The elder brother dropped a tree trunk containing two termites and two earthworms from the sky. Termites and worms turn wood into soil, the brothers plant rice.

Indonesian legends say that evil spirits caused a flood through their machinations. An unusually high tide flooded the land. Only a woman, whose hair got tangled in the branches of a tree, managed to escape. She was the only person who was not washed away by the waves into the ocean. The woman began to throw stones at the drowned men who were rocking on the waves near the shore, and the dead came to life.

There is a legend about the flood even among such people as the Chukchi. They have an unknown sea animal latching onto the hunter’s back. People save the hunter, and he orders the animal to be skinned and put into the sea. From this, a flood begins, and at the site of the settlement a strait is formed between the two islands.

The Buandik tribes of the south-eastern part of South Australia have a story that in ancient times the land extended far to the south from what is now the town of Port MacDonnell. As far as the eye could see - and was covered with magnificent meadows and forests. A huge and scary man owned this area. One day he saw a woman climb up one of his favorite acacia trees to collect sweet tree sap. Scary man got angry and ordered the sea to drown her. The sea obeyed the order, poured onto the land and, together with the woman, flooded it. This is how McDonnell Bay was formed.

Another Australian legend explains the "flood mechanism". One day, it says, a huge frog swallowed all the water. All the rivers and seas dried up, the fish jumped on the hot sand like on coals. The animals decided to make the frog laugh so that the water would return to the earth, but all their attempts were in vain: the water thief only puffed out her cheeks and puffed up her eyes. And only the eel managed to do what no one else could: the frog became funny from his antics. Tears flowed from the frog's eyes, water from his mouth. And the flood began. The fishing pelican saved the world from the flood.

The famous collector of Australian folklore K. Longlaw-Parker, in a collection of myths and fairy tales of Australia, gives a story about how the wife of the “heavenly ancestor” Baiame caused floods with the help of a blood ball, which was broken with hot stones. A stream of blood burst out of the ball, it was cleansed by hot stones and turned into a river flood. The frogs performed this operation, screaming loudly at the same time. That is why they are considered the harbingers of the flood.

Global flood. Legends of Oceania.
Melanesian legend - a husband found out that his wife had a lover; sent to her a large serpent, which took the form of that man; the woman slept with the serpent; people dragged him into the house, set him on fire, but he left hand(i.e. a snake in an anthropomorphic form?) remained outside; the children saw how the snake blocked the river with its foot, but the people did not believe it; the children went to the mountain; people sacrificed a pig to the Snake, but he was not satisfied, he shot at the ground, water poured out, everyone drowned, only two young men on a coconut tree were saved; they ate coconuts, the shell fell into the water, it was carried to the mountain where the girls were saved; the young men jumped into the water and swam for the shell; married girls and had many descendants.

The inhabitants of New Guinea, the largest island in Oceania, have a legend about the flood, which says that water overflowed the shores of the sea and poured onto the Earth with such force that both people and animals perished. A myth recorded in the Gilbert Islands of Micronesia states that the disaster was preceded by sudden darkness. Then came the flood (the local pantheon has a special flood deity). On the islands of Palau, located in the far west of Oceania, near the Philippines, a legend is written about how newcomers appeared among the islanders who were not shown the traditional hospitality that distinguishes the inhabitants of the South Seas. “The only exception was one woman, to whom the grateful aliens told her in confidence that they were gods and decided to punish the rest of the people for their crimes by sending a flood on them during the next full moon. It's easy to guess what happened next. After the flood, only this woman remained alive. True, the legend does not mention how inhabitants appeared on the island again, but it is not difficult to guess.”

On one of the islands of the Fiji archipelago, lying at the junction of Melanesia and Polynesia, there is an amazing ritual of walking on fire, similar to that, which is organized by Bulgarian nestinars, Indian fakirs and “fire walkers” of Africa. Legendary story The island claims that this ritual is a legacy of the times “before the flood.”

Two Fijians killed a sacred bird that belonged to the highest deity - the lord of snakes Ndengei. As punishment for this sacrilege, Ndengei sent a flood to the human race. Then the culprits built a huge tower, where they gathered men and women from all the clans that inhabited Fiji. However, the water continued to advance and people were threatened with death. Having built a raft, they went to look for a place of refuge. All the islands of the Fiji archipelago were flooded with water, only the highest peak of Mbenga Island stuck out of the water. Here people were saved from the flood, preserving all ancient customs and traditions.

The legend of Timor says that the sea covered all the land except Tata-Maí-Lau. Two men, Bato-Bere and Súir-Bere, dug a way out for the waters, and the waters receded.

On the islands of Polynesia - from Hawaii in the north to New Zealand in the south, from Tahiti in the west to Easter Island in the east - researchers of the past and of this century recorded a variety of versions of the story about the flood and the sunken “mainland”. "Handed down through countless generations," a Hawaiian legend says that there once existed a vast land called Ka-Houpo-o-Kane - "Solar Plexus of Kane", the great Polynesian god, known on other islands as Tane. All the islands of Polynesia up to the Fiji archipelago included this continent.

Kai-a-Hina-Alii - “The Flood that Overthrew the Leaders”, a terrible natural disaster - destroyed the “Solar Plexus of Kane”. All that remained of the vast land were the tops of its mountains - the present-day islands of Polynesia and the Fiji archipelago. A wise wizard named Nuu managed to save only a few people from this flood.

“And so, at the time of the full moon, a strong storm broke out with rain. The sea began to rise higher and higher, flooded the islands, tore apart the mountains and demolished all human habitation. People did not know where to save themselves, and every single one of them died, except for one righteous woman who saved herself on a raft,” says one of the Polynesian legends.

The inhabitants of the island of Tahiti, the pearl of Central Polynesia, trace their ancestry to a married couple who escaped the flood that once consumed their land. At the top of the mountain, “only a woman with a chicken, a dog and a cat and a man with a pig were saved. And when ten days later the water receded, leaving fish and algae on the rocks, a hurricane suddenly hit, uprooting trees, and stones fell from the sky. People had to hide in a cave.” When the disasters ended, the descendants of this couple settled the island of Tahiti.

On Hao Atoll at the beginning of this century, the French folklorist Charles Caillot recorded a legend about the flood, also associated with the ancestors of the current inhabitants of the island. “At first there were three gods: Watea Nuku, Tane and Tangaroa. Vatea created the earth and the sky and everything that is in them. Watea created the flat earth, Tane raised it, and Tangaroa held it. The name of this land was Hawaiiki, says the “Tale of the Ancestors of the People of Hao Atoll,” recorded by Kayo. - When the earth was created, Tangaroa created a man named Tiki and his wife named Hina. Hina was born from Tiki's side. They lived together and had children."

The legend goes on to say that “people began to do evil on this land - and Vatea was angry at their deeds. Vatea ordered a man named Rata to build a boat that would serve as a shelter for him. This boat was named Papapapa-i-Whenua - and it was supposed to shelter Rata and his wife, who was called Te Pupura-i-Te-Tai, as well as their three children and their wives. Rain poured down from the upper space, from the sky, and our land was flooded with water. Vatea's wrath broke the doors of heaven, the wind was released from its chains, the rain poured down in torrents - and the earth was destroyed and flooded with the sea. Rata, his wife and three children and their wives took refuge in the boat and after six hundred eras, when the water subsided, they came out of it. They were saved, just as the animals and birds were saved, the animals that crawl on the earth and fly in the space above it. Time passed - and the earth was filled with people..."

The flood is also mentioned in the mythology of New Zealand, located in the southern corner of the great Polynesian triangle formed by Hawaii - Easter Islands - New Zealand. The priests of the Maori, the indigenous inhabitants of New Zealand, developed a complex natural-philosophical and at the same time poetic system, which included cosmogony, cosmology, genealogies of deities and leaders, etc. (the collection of Maori mythological texts occupies a voluminous volume). One of the myths tells about the creation of the world, when the spouses Rangi and Papa, Heaven and Earth, who once formed one cosmic whole, were separated by their children. But although the eldest son, the god of light, life and vegetation, Tane, adorned his parents and dressed them in beautiful clothes, Rangi and Papa yearned for each other. A sign of this were continuous floods and fogs. And then the gods turned the face of the Earth, Papa, so that she could no longer see her beloved husband Rangi.

In addition to these floods associated with the era of creation, another flood is mentioned in Maori folklore associated with the exploits of the noble Tafaka, an exemplary member of the community. An excellent expert on Maori mythology and folklore, J. Gray, in his “Polynesian Mythology,” gives a story about a flood caused by the dead and unavenged ancestors of Tafaki, who released streams of water from the heavens. The flood covered the entire earth, and the human race perished. According to another version, Tafaki called on his parents for revenge, but they did not pay attention to this. Then Tafaki entered heaven and, contrary to the warnings of his mother, began to trample one of the shrines, remaining unpunished. The mother's grief was so strong, and she cried so desperately that her tears turned into a flood that fell on the earth and killed people. According to the third version, the fortress in which Tafaki was hiding was besieged by enemies. Then the hero called for help from his sacred ancestors, who sent a flood with lightning and thunder. The flood flooded the earth and destroyed all the hero's enemies, and the Tafaki fortress was spared. Finally, another version explains the flood by saying that Tafaki stomped on the heavenly shell so hard that it burst, and streams of water poured down, flooding the earth.

On Easter Island, the easternmost outpost of Polynesia and all of Oceania, legends are recorded that differ significantly from the traditional “story of the flood,” but are nevertheless associated with some kind of catastrophic phenomena and invasion of waters. First of all, this is the myth of the creation of Easter Island. Its translation, made by the author of these lines from a notebook discovered by Thor Heyerdahl (book “Aku-aku”), reads as follows:

“The young man Tea Waka said:
- Our land used to be a big country, a very big country.
Kuukuu asked him:
- Why did the country become small?
“Uwoke lowered his staff on her,” answered Tea Waka. - He lowered his staff onto Ohiro's terrain. The waves rose and the country became small. She began to be called Te-Pito-o-te-Whenua - the Navel of the Earth. Uwoke's staff broke on Mount Puku-puhi-puhi.
Tea Waka and Kuukuu were talking in the area of ​​Ko-te-Tomonga-o-Tea Waka - “Tea Waka Landing Place”. Then the ariki (chief) Hotu Matua came ashore and settled on the island.
Kuukuu told him:
- This land used to be big.
Tea's friend Waka said:
- The earth has sunk.
Then Tea Waka said:
- This place is called Ko-te-Tomonga-o-Tea Waka.
Ariki Hotu Matua asked:
- Why did the earth sink?
“Uwoke did it, he lowered the ground,” answered Tea Waka. - The country began to be called Te-Pito-o-te-Whenua, the Navel of the Earth. When Uwoke's staff was large, the earth fell into the abyss. Puku-puhi-puhi - that's where Uwoke's staff broke.
Ariki Hotu Matua told Tea Wax:
- Friend, it wasn’t Uwoke’s staff that did this. This was done by the lightning of the god Makemake.
Ariki Hotu Matua began to live on the island."

The French researcher Francis Mazières, who worked on Easter Island in 1963, wrote down from the words of Elder A Ure Auviri Porota a similar legend, according to which “Easter Island was much larger, but due to the misdeeds committed by its inhabitants, Walke rocked it and broke it with a lever... »

The name of Woke, or Uwoke, who destroyed the “mainland,” is found not only in the folklore of Easter Island, but also in the cosmogonic myths of the Marquesas Islands.

Tea Waka was the name of one of the first settlers of the “Navel of the Earth” who lived on Easter Island even before the appearance of the first ruler, Hotu Matua, and Kuukuu was the name of one of the scouts sent by Hotu Matua from his homeland in search of a new land.

According to one version of the legends about the settlement of Easter Island, Hotu Matua was forced to leave his homeland because it began to sink into the sea... In a word, the folklore of the mysterious Easter Island speaks not of a “global flood,” but of the destruction of lands in the ocean.

Just in case, I'll clarify. Not all the stories about the flood are shown here. There are much more of them among the peoples inhabiting these vast lands. There are legends even in Tibet.

Now we can move on to the peoples inhabiting both American continents, and further to the east. More about this next time.

Manu, son of Vivasvat, step-brother Yama, settled on earth in a secluded monastery near the southern mountains. One morning, when he was washing his hands, as they do to this day, he came across a small fish in the water brought for washing. She told him: Save my life, and I will save you. -What will you save me from? - asked the surprised Manu. Fish said:

The flood will come and destroy all living beings. I will save you from him. - How can I save your life? And she said: We fish, while we are so small, are threatened with death from everywhere. One fish eats another. First, keep me in a jug, when I grow out of it, dig a pond and keep me there, and when I grow even larger, take me to the sea and release me into the open, for then death will no longer threaten me from anywhere. Manu did just that. Soon she grew up and became a huge jhasha fish with a horn on her head: and this is the largest of all fish. And Manu released her into the sea. Then she said: In such and such a year there will be a flood. Make a ship and wait for me. And when the flood comes, board the ship and I will save you.

And in the year that the fish indicated to him, Manu built a ship. When the flood came, he boarded the ship and the fish swam to him. Obeying her command, Manu took with him the seeds of various plants. Then he tied a rope to the horn of the fish, and it quickly pulled his ship along the raging waves. The land was no longer visible, the countries of the world disappeared from the eyes, only water was around them. Manu and the fish were the only living creatures in this watery chaos. Fierce winds rocked the ship from side to side. But the fish swam and swam forward through the watery desert and finally brought Manu's ship to the highest mountain Himalaya. Then she told Manu: I saved you. Tie the ship to a tree. But be careful, the water may wash you away. Descend gradually, following the decline of the water. Manu followed the advice of the fish. Since then, this place in the northern mountains has been called the Descent of Manu.

And the flood washed away all living creatures. Only Manu remained to continue the human race on earth.

After reading this story, you will, of course, remember the story of Deucalion and Pyrrha. Who warned them about the flood? Why does fish play this role in Indian myth? Is it a coincidence that it later turns out to be the largest of the fish (and, moreover, it has a name)? Why she. appeared to Manu not in her true form?

Comparing the two flood stories leads to a more complex question: why did different peoples in ancient times have the same idea that humanity once died and arose again after the catastrophe?