Talk:Flood myth

Dates

One part of the article reads, "Many scholars believe that this account was copied from the Akkadian Atra-Hasis, which dates to the 18th century BCE."

The article then later reads, "Both the Epic of Gilgamesh and Atra-Hasis are preceded by the similar Eridu Genesis (c. 1600 BCE)—the oldest surviving example of such a flood-myth narrative, …"

Can someone explain to me how 1600 BCE "precedes" the "18th century BCE"? I thought 1800 BCE came before 1600 BCE. Ndd92 (talk) 12:35, 1 June 2024 (UTC)

Dates listed at beginning of Article

Um, hi. The dates listed in the first paragraph of the Mythologies section don't make sense. It says that the Eridu Genisis predates the Atra-Hasis and the Epic of Gilgamesh, but also says that the Atra-Hasis dates back to 1800 BC while the Eridu Genisis dates back to 1600 BC. 1800 BC is earlier than 1600 BC so how does the Eridu Genisis predate the Atra-Hasis or the Epic? Hope someone notices and fixes the article. 208.90.106.67 (talk) 15:31, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

You're right. It's a fine mess. Iskandar323 (talk) 17:15, 5 February 2025 (UTC)

North American native peoples

@DougWeller, hello! I'm massively ignorant on this, but of course it's on topic etc. For WP:LEAD purposes, if more of these are added, we might go in a "many North American native peoples have Flood myths..." direction, but I don't think we're there yet. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 11:45, 30 March 2025 (UTC)

Recent edits

@Crunchista Hello. See WP:LEAD. Do you see the problem with starting the first sentence after the WP:LEAD with "Another example of a flood myth is..."? That is one problem I see with your latest edits, but I'm going to bed now. Ping to @Doug Weller and @Iskandar323 if they wish to comment. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 21:28, 6 April 2025 (UTC)

Thanks for criticism. I just read WP:LEAD, but still don't get it. You mean that the ‘Another’ (exampel) is not inviting enough to continue reading cause too complicated? I'll change it back to the original wording ‘One example’. What other problems do you see Crunchista (talk) 21:53, 6 April 2025 (UTC)

I fully protected the article for three days in order to give time for discussion to reach a consensus. Please be cautious about quoting source material because quoting too much may be a copyright violation which is regarded as a serious problem. Also, the point being made above about WP:LEAD is that the first couple of paragraphs of an article (before the first heading) must be a summary of material that already exists in the body of the article. Finally, there should be no commentary in an article. The body (text following the first heading) has to be a self-contained article; it should not refer to what was in the lead. Editors here have to provide a summary of what reliable sources say without any personal observations. Questions can be asked here, and more general advice can be found at WP:Teahouse. Johnuniq (talk) 10:02, 7 April 2025 (UTC)

Hm, actually I wanted to provide the word ‘organisation’ (of the Sumerian gods) with a source. It's freely accessible, so I don't think the publisher would complain about the quoted passage. Rather, it seems to me that the quote is an incentive to read the whole interview. If necessary, however, I would summarise the relevant statements in concise sentences of my own and include them in the reference. For the other criticism, I need a suitable example from the article. Otherwise I don't know what you mean. --Crunchista (talk) 10:48, 7 April 2025 (UTC)

My knee-jerk reaction on that particular point is that "organisation" is an odd word to use for a group of gods. Can't remember seeing the Olympians or the Aesir or the Ennead described like that. Not that it's necessarily wrong, but it sounds weird. Gråbergs Gråa Sång (talk) 10:56, 7 April 2025 (UTC)