The Chaldean Account of Genesis

‘The Chaldean Account of Genesis’ is a book by George Smith, first published in 1876. Drawing on cuneiform tablets from the Library of Ashurbanipal, Smith presents the Babylonian creation and flood traditions — most famously the deluge episode that parallels the story of Noah — alongside other Mesopotamian narratives about the Fall, the Tower of Babel, Nimrod, and the patriarchal age. His work offered the first accessible English translations of these texts and showed, with unusual clarity for its time, how ancient Near Eastern sources illuminate early biblical themes. The book landed amid intense public interest after Smith’s sensational 1872 announcement of a Babylonian flood narrative — read before the Society of Biblical Archaeology in a session attended by Prime Minister William Gladstone — which helped spark decades of comparative study between Mesopotamian literature and the book of Genesis. By bridging museum discoveries and a general readership, Smith’s synthesis became a touchstone for biblical scholarship, Assyriology, and the broader conversation about how ancient myths travel and transform. Its influence endures in modern discussions of the Epic of Gilgamesh, Genesis, and the cultural cross-currents of the ancient Near East.