When in 1927 the announcement was made of Sir Leonard Woolley’s great discoveries at Ur of the Chaldees, it was understood that a great blow had been dealt at scepticism. For so long many had contended that the Bible story of the Flood was mythical. He tells the story in Ur of the Chaldees, and it is easy to sense his excitement as he relates the details of his discoveries. His workmen had reached a great bed of clay.
“Eight feet of sediment imply a very great depth of water, and the flood which deposited it must have been of a magnitude unparalleled in local history. . . Taking into consideration all the facts, there could be no doubt that the flood of which we had thus found the only possible evidence was the Flood of Sumerian history and legend, the Flood on which is based the story of Noah.” He went on to add, “The discovery that there was a real deluge to which the Sumerian and the Hebrew stories of the Flood alike go back does not, of course, prove any single detail of either of these stories.”
Thus Woolley did not state precisely that, in his opinion, the Flood of the Bible was proven, although it is recognised that it is implied. After all, confirmation of the Bible was not his purpose. Probably, for that matter, his record is all the more valuable. From that time onward public acknowledgement of his work has been paid gratefully by the emphasis given in addresses on many public platforms. The blow against scepticism was a confirmation of the very old statement of the Bible.
Then in 1959 a shock came—and from a quarter that was least expected. A Bible-loving archaeologist dismissed Woolley’s contention as “not even probable.” The new “enemy” was Millar Burrows, a man of considerable experience, knowledge and undoubted scholarship, a professor of Biblical Theology of Yale University. Outstanding among the hundreds of books and pamphlets relating to the discoveries at Qumran is his book, The Dead Sea Scrolls. Here one cannot fail to be impressed by his honesty and care in avoiding foolish conclusions. He did not rush in like many others to say that the community at Qumran was the sect of the Essenes. There was insufficient evidence to satisfy him.
It was therefore all the more astonishing to read in another of his books ‘What mean these stones?‘ such a devastating condemnation of the claims by Woolley :
“Perhaps the most conspicuous instance of confusing interpretation and evidence is the supposed confirmation of the biblical account of the flood discovered by Woolley at Ur and by Mackay and Langdon at Kish. Between occupational levels at both these sites were found thick layers of silt containing no remains of human life. At Ur the layer was more than eight feet deep and consisted of ‘clean clay’. Below this appeared again evidence of human occupation. The excavators were convinced that they had found the deposit left by the Flood described in Genesis. The fact is that this interpretation is not only uncertain, it is not even probable . . .
“there is no evidence to connect the deposits of mud found at Ur and Kish with the particular flood of Genesis 6-9. At Kish there were several flood-deposits. Two in particular come under consideration here. They are separated by no less than 19 ft. of debris. The upper one was dated by Langdon, on the basis of the finds above and below it, at about 3300 B.C. The lower one is ascribed by Langdon to about 2000 B.C., and it is this one which he equates with the Ur inundation. None of the inundations at Kish, however, is contemporary with any at Ur . . . In Woolley’s own excavations at Tell Obeid, only four miles from Ur, there was no silt at the levels corresponding to those at which it was found at Ur. . . . The supposed connections between these floods and the flood of Genesis, therefore, is illusory, and with it goes the neat archaeological dating of Noah’s flood. ‘
If these observations were correct, then it wasn’t difficult to imagine the consternation that would be caused, and the embarrassment that would come to many, and the joy that once again would re-seat itself in the heart of the sceptic.
There seemed to be no alternative but to take the matter up with Sir Leonard Woolley himself. This was done with quotations from Burrows’ book. A reply came speedily. It was unsparing and caustic.
Strangely enough, this challenge to his convictions about Ur had not reached him. He had never heard of Millar Burrows. The following extracts give confirmation to all he had said and written 30 years before :
“In the first place, he lumps together the ‘evidence’ from Ur and from Kish, whereas these have nothing in common, as it is, of course, generally recognised. He says that ‘at Kish there were several flood deposits, two in particular came under consideration here’. Now water-laid deposits are not uncommon : one at Kish which I examined seemed to be confined to a single courtyard ! Langdon’s dates for the two in question were his first estimate, since then completely modified—the lower one, the older, can be dated now to approximately 2,500 B.C., since it overlaid the Early Dynastic cemetery—incidentally, it was a small affair which might have resulted from exposure to a winter’s rain. In any case, it could not have any connection with the Sumerian legend or with the Ur deposit.
“Mr. Burrows’ argument about al ‘Ubaid is ignorant. Floods deposit silt only against (and below) an obstruction. We at Ur dug only on the North flank at what was already then a fairly high city mound, and so found the flood deposit—had we dug to the east or west at the mound we should have found nothing, for there the effect of the flood would have been scouring, not depositing al ‘Ubaid was a village site in a little mound only a few feet high, which would have been submerged —there would have been extremely little silt deposited even on its north side and we were not digging on the north side. The site had actually been eroded as shown by the fact that remains of pottery etc. were only a few inches down under the surface sand. I found other village sites of the al ‘Ubaid period, and all had been eroded and lay on the modern surface, and none of them had been re-settled at a later period ; i.e. low-lying settlements were absolutely destroyed by the Flood and only a few old-established (and therefore high-lying) towns escaped, as the Sumerians said was the case.”
Woolley’s reply appears to be conclusive. It was not thought necessary to refer the matter to Burrows, who appears to have based his conclusions on a wrong foundation. This, however, does not detract from the quality of his other works, one of which has been mentioned.
Sir Leonard concluded, “I do not know of any archaeologist who has disputed my views.” It is in his favour that men of renown like the late Sir Charles Marston accepted and quoted the conclusions of Woolley regarding his work at Ur.
Alas, Woolley is no longer with us. He died in February, 1960, eight months after writing the letter quoted above, and the world of archaeology is poorer that he has gone the way of all human beings. Our gratitude remains for his testimony to the truth of the Bible record.
Note: al’Ubaid and Tell Obeid are different ways of spelling the name of the same place. This is a common occurrence in the East.
Review of “The Early Earth” by John Whitcomb (1972)