Note 205.1 — Chapter XII · Eschatologic Ideas of East and West.
Reading edition
Our question concerning the evidences in the second millennium of Mesopotamian influences on the Western Aegean demands, then, at least a brief comparison of the Sumerian-Babylonian, and Hellenic eschatology. Our knowledge of the former is derived from certain epic poems, the Epic of Gilgamesh, “The Descent of Ishtar,” and the poem dealing with the marriage of Nergal and Erishkigal, the Queen of the dead; secondly, from a few inscriptions of various periods, alluding to burial or the status of the dead; thirdly, and this is the most important source, from the recent excavations of certain “necropoleis.”205.1 The Hellenic facts have been sufficiently set forth for the present purpose in a former series of lectures.