Ancient textual evidence for planetary catastrophe?

[nick c]

Hmmn, the ancient textual evidence is not exactly flying in is it? I thought I would be inundated by material from the Saturnistas and Velikovskians.

Hello Grey Cloud:
The idea for this thread is of immense interest to me and I assume many other members of these forums. However, the danger is that it will lapse into off topic and unfocused ramblings, which only serve to envelop the original subject in a metaphysical fog. For that reason I think that there is a reluctance for the catastrophists to post in this thread. It is also illustrative of the difficulties encountered in the 'Origin of Myth' forum.
Also, I have to take issue with your use of the term "Saturnistas," which shows your disrespect for a serious group of scholars, instead you would do better by just taking issue with their ideas. You can attract more flies with honey than you can with........using a term that conjures up an image of a third world dictatorship or wild eyed banditos.
But then all that is contrasted by your statement:

And once more, just for the record, I do feel that there is evidence for planetary catastrophe and that plasma could well have played a central role in it. My own thinking is that there has been more than one catastrophe.

While I most definetly agree, I am curious as to what evidence points you in that direction?

As I have stated there have been volumes written on the subject of ancient textual evidence for planetary catastrophism.
Worlds In Collision by Immanuel Velikovsky
The Saturn Myth by David Talbott
God Star by Dwardu Cardonna
and so on...
Various articles in catastrophism themed journals: [url2=http://www.catastrophism.com/cdrom/pubs ... /index.htm]Pensee[/url2], [url2=http://www.kronos-press.com/]Kronos[/url2], [url2=http://www.aeonjournal.com/]Aeon[/url2], [url2=http://www.velikovskian.com/]The Velikovskian[/url2], [url2=http://www.catastrophism.com/cdrom/pubs ... /index.htm]Catastrophism and Ancient History[/url2], [url2=http://www.kronia.com/thoth.html]Thoth newsletter[/url2], [url2=http://www.sis-group.org.uk/resource.htm]Society for Interdisciplinary Synthesis[/url2], also check out the work of [url2=http://www.maverickscience.com/]Ev Cochrane[/url2]

While merely scratching the surface, here are a few lines of inquiry pertaining to this thread, much of it was garnered from Velikovsky, keeping in mind that imhop his work is more useful in making a case for general planetary catastrophism, rather than his specific scenario.
Some points:

----world wide ancient testimony to Venus' appearance as a terrifying world threatening comet...association of descriptions of Venus as a comet, example: Humboldt asked how is it that the Mexicans call Venus-the star that smoked? but did not make the connection that their name for comet was "smoking star." More commonly, Venus is described as a hairy star or having long hair (see Botticelli's 'Birth of Venus') of course the word comet comes from coma, hair in Greek. The Peruvian name for Venus is "Chaska", wavy haired.
Or as [url2=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Terentius_Varro]Varro[/url2] wrote:

There occurred a remarkable celestial portent; for Castor records that in the brilliant star Venus....there occurred so strange a prodigy, that it changed its color, size, form, course, which never happened before nor since...in the reign of Ogyges.

Furthermore this change in Venus cited by Varro is associated with a cataclysm, as [url2=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solinus]Solinus[/url2] wrote:

following a deluge which is reported to have occurred in the days of Ogyges, a heavy night spread over the globe.

So we have a report of a change in the course and appearance of Venus which took place during the time of a great innundation of Greece.
[Note that the flood of Ogyges is not to be confused with the Noachian Deluge.]

-----Babylonian (Venus Tablets of Amizaduga) clay tablets found in an astronomical library of Assurbanipal in Nineveh, 17 years of simple and matter of fact observations of Venus that don't make any sense and cannot be made to fit modern retrocalculations. No matter how one analyzes the data one of two conclusions must be reached, either the Babylonians made grossly untrustworthy observations or they are describing a different order of the solar system.

-----Also contained in the same library, there are numerous other tablets which have observations made that are inconsistent with the present order of the solar system:
Tablet 93 gives the perihelion and aphelion position of the Earth (closest and farthest position from the sun) that are actually measurements of the apparent motion of the sun, that [url2=http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/kugler/kuglrml.html]Kugler[/url2] (a 19th c Assyriologist) wrote:

"But the real position of the apsides decidely contradicts these statements."

Also in regard to other tablets Kugler wrote:

The distance traveled by the moon on the Chaldean ecliptic from one new moon to the next are, according to Tablet No. 272, on the average 3 degrees 14' to great.

with regard to #32:

...a perplexing presentation of the ununiform movement of the sun. The question is insistent: Why is it that the Babylonians formulated the nonuniformity of the solar movement precisely in this way?

Kugler was very close to coming to catastrophic conclusions from his analysis of Babylonian astronomical tablets but alas, he was constrained by the same uniformitarian bias that still derails many an investigator.

----The Canopus Decree (-239) a calendar reform which attempted to change the Egyptian practice of using a calendar (Venus calendars were used around the world) based on the movements of (Isis) Venus in relation to the rising of (Sothis) Sirius. This reform was needed because the calendar did not conform, as the decree states, to "the present arrangement of the world," and "an ammendment to the faults of heaven," implying that the order of the solar system had changed, and a more modern calendar that portrayed the new order was needed. Actually the movements of Venus were carefully watched and human sacrifices made to, by peoples around the world, including Mesoamerica. So long as Venus was observed to return at regular (predicted) intervals the world was secure.

-----The various versions of the book of Joshua describe events of a catastrophic nature, perhaps the chronology of these events or whether or not it is an adaptation of an older story from another culture is open for debate.
1. There was a rain of stones from the sky, which killed more soldiers than the ensuing battle. Later translators, unable to comprehend stones falling from the sky changed this to "hailstones," yet as Velikovsky points out, the word barad in Hebrew properly translates as stones. (As an aside, the source of these rocks need not have been extraterrestial, they may have been lifted up from another part of the Earth which was undergoing [url2=http://www.thunderbolts.info/tpod/2005/ ... matter.htm]Electrical Discharge Machining[/url2]. A planetary sized body would have been in close quarters to the Earth.)
2. The Sun and the moon stood still in the sky. Now this famous alleged incident has been the subject of much debate. We conclude, in a general sense, that it indicates a disruption of some sort, in the motion of Earth and consequently a change in the apparent (observed) motion of the heavenly bodies. Which is exactly what Plato described in Timaeus and Critias. Furthermore, a collision with a large meteor or a Tungaska type of event is ruled out as this would not disrupt the motion of the Earth.
3. The horns blew and the walls of Jericho came tumbling down. The victor of a battle always has God on there side! The sound of the trumpets was the groaning of the tectonically stressed Earth resulting in an devastating earthquake.
The linkage of these three catastrophic occurences could not be tied into such a scenario by a pre-astronomical people, they simply did not have the knowledge of what would happen in a planetary catastrophe. Why would they even consider such a thing if all they ever have experienced was the clockwork regularity of an unchanging solar system? They were reporting events that they (or were passed down to them from those who did) experienced in the subjective terms of their religious/belief system:

As these phenomenon were recorded to have occured together, it is improbable that the records were invented.

Evidence for planetary catastrophism is ubiquitous, I am tired of typing, and I have not scratched the surface.

nick c

[kevin]

Grey cloud,
I have been scanning about the globe following the grid I keep waffling about, I found Ojai in Caliafornia, is that where your Krish bloke ended up?
I am watching the positions of ancient sites with a geometric head on (I don't think they actually ever ever move)
Have you looked at gilgamesh and Kharsag?
http://www.mazzaroth.com/ChapterThree/TowerOfBabel.htm
http://www.goldenageproject.org.uk/kharsagresearch.html
http://www.goldenageproject.org.uk/homo.html
kevin

[kevin]

Grey cloud,
I am mixing krishnamurti's up, this is the one who lived in Ojai.
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 6363288920
kevin

[Solar]

Grey, I'm not aware of anyone else carrying on the work of de Lubicz, honestly one would think that to be the duty of modern egyptology, and don't think I've heard of him writing anything on the Book of Going forth by Day.

On a different but related subject, NIck C, that was an interesting post. Has anyone ever heard of the "Fire Drill"?

From the book "In Defense of Nature":

"Often these lightning discharges, or as believed by our ancestors, the serpent, strike the Earth and cause great fires. In a myth of the Sintun Indians of the Pacific Coast of North America there is a "shooting star" and a "fire drill" that set the world aflame. One could see; "the burning world [and] see nothing but waves of flame; rocks were burning, the ground was burning, everything was burning. Great rolls and piles of smoke were rising; fire flew up towards the sky in flames, in great sparks and brands. The great fire was blazing, roaring all over the Earth, burning rocks, earth, trees, people, burning everything."

Also see Edward S. Curtis and the North American Indian, Incorporated for a photo circa 1914 of the "fire drill" in use to ignite tinder with two pieces of wood.

Here is a short Miwok legend with Prometian tones as to why/how it became that "the buckeye and the incense cedar" were used to make "fire drills".

That's an interesting relationship. Is it the incorporation of a local catastrophic event into the untraceble custom of starting a fire in that manner? Has the event become exaggerated as it was handed down to such extent that the one could see "the burning world"? Could "burning world" have been a broad approach to everything in that local area that formed the 'world view' being on fire i.e. trees, rocks, earth, sky? It does appear to be an account of a catastrophic event nonetheless.

[kevin]

I hope you don't object to this link, it's about the trypillians, a race from aprox 7,000 years ago.
There is little written regarding them, but if you look at what is written now, well it really annoys me.
most of the whole area they occupied is destroyed by fire/s, the constant crap that is put forward is that this was a ritual burning, with no evidence at all, all ASSUMPTION portrayed as fact.
It is almost as if this is all intentional, to divert any comprehension of the true reality of the past?
If this place was burn't, surely the electrical cause should be better investigated?
They were VERY clearly dowsers, those spirals etc I know very very well.
If the condition then was different to our recent past, and that condition is altering, then it may explain why odd balls like myself are appearing.
it may be that the potentials are allowing the lattice structure to be better observed .
And if there was a complete civilization extermination, WE MUST learn from it, FAST.
http://dsc.discovery.com/news/slideshow ... i-art.html
kevin

[nick c]

Hello Solar,
From only reading the ad for In Defense of Nature it seems like the author is coming close to planetary catastrophism, does he make that leap?
The myth of the theft of fire and the fire drill are common.
Keeping in mind that the comparative approach requires the seeking out of commonalities (scenarios, motifs, actions, sequences of events, characters, etc.) to myths from various parts of the globe.
In the myth you referenced I see a disruption in the apparent or observed motion of the sun and subsequent destruction by fire on Earth. This is reminiscent of the Greek "Phaethon," which was discussed earlier in this thread. Furthermore, Coyote is the quintessential [url2=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trickster]trickster[/url2] archetype which appears around the world.

Here are some more versions of these mythic themes:
http://www.ruthenia.ru/folklore/berezkin/eng/021_3.htm
http://www.sacred-texts.com/nam/ca/yat/yat04.htm
http://www.sacred-texts.com/nam/ca/wsm/wsm04.htm
http://hotcakencyclopedia.com/ho.CaveOf ... or44354201

nick c

[Grey Cloud]

Hi Nick,
You wrote:

However, the danger is that it will lapse into off topic and unfocused ramblings, which only serve to envelop the original subject in a metaphysical fog.

I understand where you are coming from but I would argue that you cannot remove the metaphysical element if you want to understand mythology or anything to do with the ancients.
The ancients built their societies upon their understanding of the workings of the cosmos and Man's place in it. A good example of this is Plato's Timaeus which although it follows on chronologically from the Republic is actually a prequel to it. In the Republic Socrates et al
discuss ideas about a perfect society and citizenry. The following night they gather again to discuss the Universe and its constitution in order to ascertain whether their ideas vis the society and citizenry are in accord with the Universe.
If one takes cognisence of the ancient's belief system then, I believe, one can better understand what it is these mythological tales are saying or are about. Too many modern authors, academics and independent researchers alike, say that they don't view the ancients as primitive etc and then go on to treat them as just that by assuming they know better than the ancients. An obvious example would be that no ancient culture I am aware of believed in anything approaching Darwinian evolution. On the contrary these ancient cultures believe that Man started off god-like and is moving down the scale.

I use the term 'Saturnistas' for convenience, it's easier than typing 'supporters of the Saturn theory' or somesuch.

What evidence do I see for planetary catastrophe? Not a lot to be honest. Timaeus, the Book of Joshua and a few other references but mostly I get it from my understanding of the metaphysics or cosmology and the cyclical nature of time. One of the reasons for starting this
thread was to, hopefully, learn of other references.

I am not overly interested in the theories of modern authors whether Saturn theorists or not. There are hundreds of theories out there. All I want is the evidence and I will form my own opinions.

As to Venus and her wavey hair, my own jury is still out on this. Botticelli's Venus is Renaissance not ancient. She has a nice pair of breasts, are these accounted for by the Saturn theory? What about Mercury's winged sandals or Saturn's scythe? How are these accounted for in any flavour of the Saturn theory?
I would appreciate a pointer to the Varro and Solinus works your Venus quotes came from.

Babylonian (Venus Tablets of Amizaduga) clay tablets found in an astronomical library of Assurbanipal in Nineveh, 17 years of simple and matter of fact observations of Venus that don't make any sense and cannot be made to fit modern retrocalculations. No matter how one
analyzes the data one of two conclusions must be reached, either the Babylonians made grossly untrustworthy observations or they are describing a different order of the solar system.

I recently read an explanation of this which explained away the apparent discrepancy. I can't remember what it was and to be honest I don't have the requisite astronomical knowledge to make a judgement one way or t'other. My own understanding of things can accomodate the planets in any configuration so it's not an issue with me.

I would argue against Isis being the planet Venus. Firstly, the numerical values assigned to the names will be different, and secondly, conceptually they represent two different things. If anyone can come up with an ancient reference to Isis as a planet I am willing to reconsider.

The Canopis Decree appears to be merely an account of the change from a year of 360 days plus 5 epagomenae to one of 365 1/4 days.
(see: http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/tex ... decree.htm ) The Birch translation of 1876 reads:
"that what was a little defective in the order as regards the seasons and the year, as also the opinions which are contained in the rules of the learned on the heavenly orbits, are now corrected and improved by the Benevolent Gods".
As for human sacrifices, apart from the (medieval) Aztecs, what ancient people were you thinking of?

I agree that the events described in the Book of Joshua describe some sort of of unusual event(s) but as to what exactly caused it can only be speculation. Your comment about the sound of the trumpets at Jericho being the sound produced by earthquake is also pure speculation. These people were familiar with trumpets and earthquakes and would have known the difference between them surely?
You wrote:

The linkage of these three catastrophic occurences could not be tied into such a scenario by a pre-astronomical people, they simply did not have the knowledge of what would happen in a planetary catastrophe.

Can you name one 'pre-astronomical people'? (I include astrology).
I also disagree with Velikovsky's reasoning that "As these phenomenon were recorded to have occured together, it is improbable that the records were invented". That they all occur in one book written by one author or group of authors seems to me to make it more probable that it
was invented. I'm not saying it was, just that V's reasoning is flawed.

You wrote:

Evidence for planetary catastrophism is ubiquitous.

No offence but this type of comment is one of the main reasons for me starting this thread. I've seen this type of statement so many times but all I ever see by way of evidence to back it up is the same few examples such as Timaeus, Joshua, Phaeton and a (maybe) few more.

[Grey Cloud]

Kevin,
Glad you got the Krishnamurtis sorted out. U.G. and Jiddu aren't related by the way.

Thanks for the link about the Trypillians, they are a civilisation I hadn't heard of before. I haven't had time to read up on them yet but I certainly intend to. Their existence and disappearance seems to fit in with some of my own ideas but I will have to do the reading up before I can draw any conclusions.

You wrote:

most of the whole area they occupied is destroyed by fire/s, the constant crap that is put forward is that this was a ritual burning, with no evidence at all, all ASSUMPTION portrayed as fact.

Spot on. Every time scholars find something they don't understand they claim it was used 'for ritualistic purposes'.

You wrote:

If the condition then was different to our recent past, and that condition is altering, then it may explain why odd balls like myself are appearing.

I am convinced that conditions were different and moreover, that we were different too (you are where you live). I also believe that conditions are in the process of changing now. [P.S. Sorry to hear about your balls. Two left ones? ]

it may be that the potentials are allowing the lattice structure to be better observed.

Yep. These Saturn theorists constantly bang on about the Axis Mundi and how it was a plasma column. To me the Axis Mundi is still there, it has never been anywhere else. That is was at one time visible to the naked-eye isn't an issue with me. I believe it may well become visible
again in the not too distant future. Ditto your lattice structure and, no doubt, other phenomena.

And if there was a complete civilization extermination, WE MUST learn from it, FAST.

Too late methinks. It doesn't matter, it's all part of the plan (and we are the planners). Today is a good day to die.

[Grey Cloud]

Solar,
Pity about Lubicz's work and I agree that egyptologists should be doing something about it.

Nice quote about the fire-drill. I thought it was interesting that the Sintun used the prosaic analogy of the fire-drill rather than going for the battling gods.
I agree that it does seem to be referring to some sort of planetary catastrophe with connections to events in the sky.
The fact that everything is burning rather than being drowned in a flood should tie it back to one of the 'Suns' in the American mythologies. I can't remember off the top of my head which order the fire, flood etc are in relation to the ending of the Suns.
What I also find of interest is that these people emphasise that this is not your everyday fire. These people were familiar with forest fires and lightning strikes etc but they are saying this was something else entirely. See my comments to Nick, above, re trumpets and earthquakes.

I enjoyed the Miwok legend about the theft of the fire and can understand your comment about Promethean overtones. However, I'm not quite sure that they are that similar. To be honest, I'm not quite sure what the Miwok tale is refrring to but my understanding of the
Prometheus story is that Prometheus represents Man and that the fire is not the fire used to cook with etc, but is rather, Fire in the sense of spirit (Fire as in the four elements). And we didn't steal it.

Thanks for the link to In Defence of Nature, it looks very interesting and I will check it out further.

[Grey Cloud]

Nick,
Thanks for the links to the various Native American fire myths. To me they appear as variations on a theme as they all originated from the survivors of the same culture who were left isolated for an unknown post-catastrophe period.
I am of the opinion that at least North America got hit hard by whatever it was that hit (I'm not sure about South and Central America). Consequently, I see the native American civilisation as being the descendents of the survivors. When this original culture was destroyed its knowledge of the Ancient Wisdom was all but destroyed too. This destruction combined with the centuries or millenia of isolation and lack of contact with other non-American cultures meant that they have been unable to piece back together their original
knowledge of that Wisdom. [I've not written that very well but I hope you can understand what I'm trying to say]. Contrat their experience with that of the various cultures in the Mediterranean and Middle East region (another region I believe got hit hard). Persian Magi, Egyptian Mystery schools, Indian gymnosophists, Greek philosophers etc all came into contact with each other over the years. This allowed each culture to add to or fine-tune its own belief system.
As I metioned in my reply to Solar, I'm not convinced that these N. American tales are related to the story of Prometheus.
Interestingly, in one of these tales it states that these people had fire but it was not hot enough. (from the second link. It doesn't say which tribe the story is from). I'm not sure what that is about. The only thing I can think of, off the top of my head, is that it is something to do with atmospheric conditions; lack of oxygen perhaps?

As an aside, I don't put too much credence into the so-called comparative method. Comparative mythology has been around for a long time, it wasn't invented by Dave Talbot or whoever. Similarly, mythologists have long been aware that there are several common themes
etc in all the world's mythologies. To me, comparative mythology involves comparing and attempting to interpret these commonalities rather than just lumping them together and cherry-picking various bits to suit a theory. I don't know if you have seen this thread:
http://www.thunderbolts.info/wp/forum/phpB ... a&start=15 but I go into a bit more detail there.

[mague]

This destruction combined with the centuries or millenia of isolation and lack of contact with other non-American cultures meant that they have been unable to piece back together their original
knowledge of that Wisdom.

Some tribes do remember. If you do some googles you will find that at least the Hopi remember that they came from a sunken landmass in the pazific ocean (potentially Lemuria). They remember that they left the land and entered the continent in Peru and then, later on, moved north.

[Grey Cloud]

This destruction combined with the centuries or millenia of isolation and lack of contact with other non-American cultures meant that they have been unable to piece back together their original
knowledge of that Wisdom.

Some tribes do remember. If you do some googles you will find that at least the Hopi remember that they came from a sunken landmass in the pazific ocean (potentially Lemuria). They remember that they left the land and entered the continent in Peru and then, later on, moved north.

Hi Mague,
Like I said, I didn't write that part very well.
I don't doubt that these people have some of the Ancient Wisdom and knowledge, just that they don't have it all and some of what they do have is corrupted.
One can see this knowledge get corrupted and or lost. For example the Olmecs were more 'advanced' than the Maya, who in turn, were more advanced than the Aztecs. Human sacrifice has no place in the philosophy of the Ancient Wisdom. Likewise the Egyptians got less advanced as time passed.

[nick c]

Hi Grey Cloud,

I understand where you are coming from but I would argue that you cannot remove the metaphysical element if you want to understand mythology or anything to do with the ancients.

I don't deny that one can extract metaphysical lessons from mythology, however, it seems to me that these are the result of later anthropomorphizations. It is my belief that the original source of myth is cosmological, and it tells the story of ancient man's desire for the orderly movements of the planets, and the obsession with and fear of world destruction should this order be disturbed.
As a case in point, of how the celestial elements of a myth can be ignored and the humanization, and "bringing down to earth" of what are obvious celestial events, I would like to return to the myth of Phaethon, which has been already been discussed in this thread. As I stated previously, the importance of this myth according to Plato:
1. the myth is based on truth
2. at intervals there is a change in the course of the heavenly bodies and a thunderbolt
3. resulting in widespread destruction by fire (in this case, but also by flood in others) of things on Earth
4. much of the world has forgotten the catastrophes due to the loss of men with the skill of writing
This, I think, contains a most important message being relayed to us by our ancestors through the medium of myth. But see this [url2=http://www.jstor.org/pss/2935984]link[/url2] which discusses the theatrical (Euripides) version. The cosmological reference, though briefly mentioned, is in the process of being ignored; and the myth is being humanized.

...Euripides interwove complex domestic motifs, including a marriage plan, into the familiar tragedy of the charioteer...stressed the complicity of Phaethon's sisters, the Heliades, in yoking the horses for him, and their subsequent remorse and grief....which puts special dramatic and symbolic emphasis on Merops' plan to marry off Phaethon to some highborn bride.

Here we have Phaethon given human form, yet Plato has told us that we are dealing with a celestial body(s). Is it not easy to see, that as a myth is told and retold, by people who have no direct experience with planetary catastrophes (or are not capable of considering the possibility) that the meaning would be lost and the original celestial protagonists given human character with all its' accompanying flaws and virtues?

nick c

[seasmith]

Grey Cloud wrote:

Native American fire myths. To me they appear as variations on a theme as they all originated from the survivors of the same culture who were left isolated for an unknown post-catastrophe period.

GC,
As i think nick and maguey have previously indicated, i would also respectfully caution against lumping all 'American' indigenies into the same ethno/cultural gene pool.
Without digging up a bunch of academic references, let me propound my extensively researched trivial opinion that there were at least two waves of immigrants to the New World, separated by tens of millennia. The earlier probably being coincident with the "aborigonies' arrival in Australia.
BTW, to you down-under ancient history buffs- any anecdotes pertaining to global catastrophes there ??

s

[nick c]

I would appreciate a pointer to the Varro and Solinus works your Venus quotes came from.

The Varro quote was cited in Worlds In Collision p 158 (Doubleday Ed) where the source is listed as The City of God by Augustine. Where Augustine wrote "From the book of Marcus Varro, entitled Of the Race of the Roman People, I cite word for word the following instance..." and then the rest of the quote continues as I posted earlier in the thread. The original book by Varro is no longer extant, as most of his work has been lost to the ravages of time. I believe there is only one complete book of his known, by references from other ancient authors and fragments, we know he wrote many books and treastises. As a side note on Varro, he was apparently aware of the dangers of bacteria, talk about ancient wisdom!

From a modern perspective, one noteworthy aspect of Varro's work is his anticipation of microbiology and epidemiology. Varro warned his contemporaries to avoid swamps and marshland, since such areas "breed certain minute creatures which cannot be seen by the eyes, but which float in the air and enter the body through the mouth and nose and cause serious diseases."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marcus_Terentius_Varro

The source for the Solinus quote concerning the flood of Ogyges is given as Polyhistor, translated by A. Golding (London, 1587), Chap. xvi, and the translation by Agnant (Paris, 1847), Chap. xi
Note that there are many references to the flood of (King) Ogyges and the reign of Ogyges as this and the flood of Deucalion were two great disasters in Greek tales. See Worlds In Collision p148-152 (Doubleday) where the floods of Deucalion and Ogyges are discussed in detail with numerous references.

nick c