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These doubts were dispelled with the discovery and decipherment of cuneiform documents in the nineteenth century: Berossos, it now became clear, did draw on genuine cuneiform sources. Indeed, Book 1 closely paraphrases the Babylonian Epic of Creation or Enūma eliš, while Book 2 relies extensively on Mesopotamian king lists and the Mesopotamian flood story. In Book 3, Berossos uses Babylonian chronicles and the royal inscriptions of major Babylonian kings, especially Nebuchadnezzar and Nabonidus. Once this much was understood, the terms of the debate shifted, and scholars started asking just where on the scale between “genuinely” Babylonian culture and Greek literature Berossos positioned himself (Ruffing 2013: 301–304).
A Greek and Babylonian History
Berossos’s negotiations between Babylonian and Greek traditions need careful tracing. A passage from Book 3 of the Babyloniaca illustrates some of the difficulties. Berossos describes how Nebuchadnezzar builds a new palace in Babylon (BNJ 680 F 8a (140)):