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A short story...thing.
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The Cradle of Civilization
Back in the good old days, before there was civilization, there was a city full of men with high hopes and a dream in their individual hearts. The Babylonians were awfully keen on the idea of civilization, and it was largely through their big hearts, their determination, and their good new-fashioned values that they hoped to make it all possible. They hoped that their toiling away at that blah, dreary old life of theirs would someday add up to something far in the future that made wearing wool skirts worthwhile.
Gu-Nickle was just such a Babylonian of lofty ideals. A strong man was he, and perhaps the city’s most famous artist. In just about twenty years, he’d earned the reputation as the best sculptor in all Babylon (and perhaps all Babylonia to boot). But, like many other ancient people with very little at all to look forward to other than eating bread and (sort of) roasted chunks of meat, or going to sleep on the roof again because it was too hot inside, Gu-Nickle felt as though there was something more to existence other than sculpting things for the royal court of Hammurabi.
“Anu,” said Gu-Nickle one day to his brother-in-law, “There’s something missing here. I know that Hammurabi, the Great King Under the Sun, or whatever, is saying that this is really the best way to live at present, this being the dawn of mankind, and the lot, but I just don’t feel satisfied.”
“What do you mean, old chap? Are your wool skirts getting itchy too? I know that with the hot weather, it gets to be a bother, especially with sweat,” answered Anu, who was carrying a very, very heavy bunch of inscribed tablets.
Gu-Nickle laid down his chisel from the rather tall, bald, wide-eyed statue he was working on of a guy in a wool skirt. “Well, no, that’s not quite it, Anu. You see…I’m beginning to wonder what he means by ‘We all live in the cradle of civilization’. I mean, what does everyone expect? Do they think that one day we won’t have to wear wool skirts anymore? Do they think that, for once, Hammurabi’s taste in art might get a bit more daring and, dare I say it, interesting? I mean, if we’re just going to hang around doing the same sort of mindless thing day after day, we might interpret those words as just nonsense. He might as well be saying something entirely moronic and nonsensical, just because no one ever said it before, like, like, say ‘We all live in a yellow submarine’, whatever that means. You see my point?”
“Not really, actually.”
“Bugger. Look around you! Do you see anything at all that remotely suggests anything other than bad taste?”
“What? I rather like the tall bald chap you are making there…” said Anu, innocently.
“Shut up. By Gilgamesh, Ishtar, and Inanna! You just are too thickheaded. It’s the Babylonian spirit to persevere, and push forward, and all that, so that we may mold a better future. That one day, when we’re dead, someone will have good taste and make clothes that don’t make us look like sheep, or make art that doesn’t portray a lot of chaps running around looking like bug-eyed monsters…” Gu-Nickle nodded towards the statue of the bald chap with the big eyes and the wool skirt.
“Bug-eyed? Well, I suppose…”
“Do you know what I have on my list of things to do, eh, eh? Everyone wants me to make them votive offerings for the temple…Some priest wants me to do a new wall panel that shows, what else, Hammurabi killing someone baaaad. Guess what? The King wants a carving in his bedroom of an antelope getting bitten on the rump by a lion. And it has to be a muscular lion, at that. And what do you think the big going item is these days, eh? A dumb looking winged bull with a man’s head, and a big beard. Yes, sure, this is great. Civilization in art. Just look at it. Oh Ninhursag! You’d think that Hammurabi, with his ‘Building a bridge to the 16th Century BC’ line, you’d think he’d try to make us a bit more civilized…”
Ansu was getting upset. “Hey, look, Gu-Nickle, I know that you are a bit depressed. But look, we’ve all got to put up with that sort of lip from whiners like you, and we don’t bother you because of it…Do you think you are the only guy who says ‘Geeze, it’s really terrible’ when they look at a votive offering? Do you think that you are the only guy who doesn’t like wearing a skirt in public? Think again. We’ve all got to go through little trials in life here, buddy. You aren’t the center of the celestial dome.
“And if you care to knock Babylonian culture, snot-head, why don’t you take a look at…the cylinder seal!” To bolster his point, Anu whipped one out of his woolly pocket.
“Anu, the cylinder seal was invented thousands of years ago…”
“Look, I’m sorry if I’m being tough, but you’re ignoring one big fact…There isn’t anything else on earth except this, and until someone comes along and thinks up something better, this is what is going to be…” Anu looked away, wiping a little tear out of his eye. “I’m sorry, Gu-Nickle. But what would you possibly do to improve things?”
“I don’t know. I’ve tried some things, you know. They never sell. They just aren’t ready for them, you know. They quite prefer bug-eyes and wool panties and muscular goats and bulls and lions and things. Sometimes, I’ve thought of doing, for example, a painting of some lady with folded hands, without eyebrows, clothed in black, with a charming smile on her lips, gazing away demurely at the viewer from the nice little landscape all around her…”
Anu gave a little snort. “That’ll never work. Too pointless. Moronic.”
“Or, for example…I’ve often thought of painting a ceiling…”
“Gag me with a bone-handled soup ladle! A ceiling!”
“Yes, with a bunch of angelic-being-thingies floating around doing something in the clouds. In the center is a naked white-skinned chap…”
“What? Where are you coming from?”
“Bear with me. This naked chap is reclining on a cloud, gazing at some old, white-haired God who is likewise sitting on a cloud…”
“Oh, right. This is sheer brilliance, shining forth like a beacon, extending from your own glorious, center of the universe-type pate…”
“Anyway, the guy points at the God, who points back at him, and their fingers are about to touch, and…”
“Please. I can’t take this any longer. No more. I don’t want to eat these important tablets from the King out of sheer survival instinct…”
Gu-Nickle looked, for the first time in the whole week, somewhat amazed. “The King? Hammurabi? The wildly brilliant, most tasteful King of Babylon?”
“None other. He wants you to design some sort of pillar with his brand spanking-new law-code emblazoned upon it in big, black cuneiform,” said Anu in a boorish manner.
“Law code? What in shocked reactionary curse is that?”
“A law code is a code of laws. Don’t ask me. I didn’t write the thing. But here, take these tablets, and carve out the cuneiform under some nice picture of the King on some big pillar of something or other. It might just be that civilization thingy you were waiting for.”
“By gum! You may be right!” shouted Gu-Nickle excitedly. The prospect of advancing beyond his simplistic, archaic, antediluvian existence filled him with sudden and tremendous joy. He giggled insanely as he tore into the stone tablets, ignoring the mixed metaphors, looking for some sign of the meaning of life itself, or at least civilization. “Yes! This is it! Completely revolutionary! We’ve got laws now! This is wonderful! Look, read this,” he said, wiping a huge crocodile tear from his eye. “’Any architect who constructs a dwelling that collapses in on itself and kills the owner of the dwelling will have his hand cut off’…this is beautiful! Glorious! ‘Any man that breaks a hole into another man’s house to steal from that man shall be put to death in front of that hole and buried’. Words cannot describe the rapture I’m experiencing at present…”
After a few minutes, that feeling subsided.
“OK, OK, I get the picture. Someone does something wrong, he is put to death, or gets his limbs sawed off, or something. Where’s the imagination here? The creative instinct, eh? I thought at first that it was something good and worth my time, but noooooo way. Forget that. This is only the cradle of civilization here, after all. Can’t keep our hopes up. Haven’t quite reached civilization, have we? Ick. And look at it. It’s disgusting. ‘If a surgeon has opened an eye-infection with a bronze instrument and thereby destroyed the man’s eye, they shall cut off his hand’…Ack. Who wants to have to carve that in? I don’t. Nasty.”
Back in the good old days, before there was civilization, there was a city full of men with high hopes and a dream in their individual hearts. The Babylonians were awfully keen on the idea of civilization, and it was largely through their big hearts, their determination, and their good new-fashioned values that they hoped to make it all possible. They hoped that their toiling away at that blah, dreary old life of theirs would someday add up to something far in the future that made wearing wool skirts worthwhile.
But, I guess, it really, really didn’t.
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The Cradle of Civilization
Back in the good old days, before there was civilization, there was a city full of men with high hopes and a dream in their individual hearts. The Babylonians were awfully keen on the idea of civilization, and it was largely through their big hearts, their determination, and their good new-fashioned values that they hoped to make it all possible. They hoped that their toiling away at that blah, dreary old life of theirs would someday add up to something far in the future that made wearing wool skirts worthwhile.
Gu-Nickle was just such a Babylonian of lofty ideals. A strong man was he, and perhaps the city’s most famous artist. In just about twenty years, he’d earned the reputation as the best sculptor in all Babylon (and perhaps all Babylonia to boot). But, like many other ancient people with very little at all to look forward to other than eating bread and (sort of) roasted chunks of meat, or going to sleep on the roof again because it was too hot inside, Gu-Nickle felt as though there was something more to existence other than sculpting things for the royal court of Hammurabi.
“Anu,” said Gu-Nickle one day to his brother-in-law, “There’s something missing here. I know that Hammurabi, the Great King Under the Sun, or whatever, is saying that this is really the best way to live at present, this being the dawn of mankind, and the lot, but I just don’t feel satisfied.”
“What do you mean, old chap? Are your wool skirts getting itchy too? I know that with the hot weather, it gets to be a bother, especially with sweat,” answered Anu, who was carrying a very, very heavy bunch of inscribed tablets.
Gu-Nickle laid down his chisel from the rather tall, bald, wide-eyed statue he was working on of a guy in a wool skirt. “Well, no, that’s not quite it, Anu. You see…I’m beginning to wonder what he means by ‘We all live in the cradle of civilization’. I mean, what does everyone expect? Do they think that one day we won’t have to wear wool skirts anymore? Do they think that, for once, Hammurabi’s taste in art might get a bit more daring and, dare I say it, interesting? I mean, if we’re just going to hang around doing the same sort of mindless thing day after day, we might interpret those words as just nonsense. He might as well be saying something entirely moronic and nonsensical, just because no one ever said it before, like, like, say ‘We all live in a yellow submarine’, whatever that means. You see my point?”
“Not really, actually.”
“Bugger. Look around you! Do you see anything at all that remotely suggests anything other than bad taste?”
“What? I rather like the tall bald chap you are making there…” said Anu, innocently.
“Shut up. By Gilgamesh, Ishtar, and Inanna! You just are too thickheaded. It’s the Babylonian spirit to persevere, and push forward, and all that, so that we may mold a better future. That one day, when we’re dead, someone will have good taste and make clothes that don’t make us look like sheep, or make art that doesn’t portray a lot of chaps running around looking like bug-eyed monsters…” Gu-Nickle nodded towards the statue of the bald chap with the big eyes and the wool skirt.
“Bug-eyed? Well, I suppose…”
“Do you know what I have on my list of things to do, eh, eh? Everyone wants me to make them votive offerings for the temple…Some priest wants me to do a new wall panel that shows, what else, Hammurabi killing someone baaaad. Guess what? The King wants a carving in his bedroom of an antelope getting bitten on the rump by a lion. And it has to be a muscular lion, at that. And what do you think the big going item is these days, eh? A dumb looking winged bull with a man’s head, and a big beard. Yes, sure, this is great. Civilization in art. Just look at it. Oh Ninhursag! You’d think that Hammurabi, with his ‘Building a bridge to the 16th Century BC’ line, you’d think he’d try to make us a bit more civilized…”
Ansu was getting upset. “Hey, look, Gu-Nickle, I know that you are a bit depressed. But look, we’ve all got to put up with that sort of lip from whiners like you, and we don’t bother you because of it…Do you think you are the only guy who says ‘Geeze, it’s really terrible’ when they look at a votive offering? Do you think that you are the only guy who doesn’t like wearing a skirt in public? Think again. We’ve all got to go through little trials in life here, buddy. You aren’t the center of the celestial dome.
“And if you care to knock Babylonian culture, snot-head, why don’t you take a look at…the cylinder seal!” To bolster his point, Anu whipped one out of his woolly pocket.
“Anu, the cylinder seal was invented thousands of years ago…”
“Look, I’m sorry if I’m being tough, but you’re ignoring one big fact…There isn’t anything else on earth except this, and until someone comes along and thinks up something better, this is what is going to be…” Anu looked away, wiping a little tear out of his eye. “I’m sorry, Gu-Nickle. But what would you possibly do to improve things?”
“I don’t know. I’ve tried some things, you know. They never sell. They just aren’t ready for them, you know. They quite prefer bug-eyes and wool panties and muscular goats and bulls and lions and things. Sometimes, I’ve thought of doing, for example, a painting of some lady with folded hands, without eyebrows, clothed in black, with a charming smile on her lips, gazing away demurely at the viewer from the nice little landscape all around her…”
Anu gave a little snort. “That’ll never work. Too pointless. Moronic.”
“Or, for example…I’ve often thought of painting a ceiling…”
“Gag me with a bone-handled soup ladle! A ceiling!”
“Yes, with a bunch of angelic-being-thingies floating around doing something in the clouds. In the center is a naked white-skinned chap…”
“What? Where are you coming from?”
“Bear with me. This naked chap is reclining on a cloud, gazing at some old, white-haired God who is likewise sitting on a cloud…”
“Oh, right. This is sheer brilliance, shining forth like a beacon, extending from your own glorious, center of the universe-type pate…”
“Anyway, the guy points at the God, who points back at him, and their fingers are about to touch, and…”
“Please. I can’t take this any longer. No more. I don’t want to eat these important tablets from the King out of sheer survival instinct…”
Gu-Nickle looked, for the first time in the whole week, somewhat amazed. “The King? Hammurabi? The wildly brilliant, most tasteful King of Babylon?”
“None other. He wants you to design some sort of pillar with his brand spanking-new law-code emblazoned upon it in big, black cuneiform,” said Anu in a boorish manner.
“Law code? What in shocked reactionary curse is that?”
“A law code is a code of laws. Don’t ask me. I didn’t write the thing. But here, take these tablets, and carve out the cuneiform under some nice picture of the King on some big pillar of something or other. It might just be that civilization thingy you were waiting for.”
“By gum! You may be right!” shouted Gu-Nickle excitedly. The prospect of advancing beyond his simplistic, archaic, antediluvian existence filled him with sudden and tremendous joy. He giggled insanely as he tore into the stone tablets, ignoring the mixed metaphors, looking for some sign of the meaning of life itself, or at least civilization. “Yes! This is it! Completely revolutionary! We’ve got laws now! This is wonderful! Look, read this,” he said, wiping a huge crocodile tear from his eye. “’Any architect who constructs a dwelling that collapses in on itself and kills the owner of the dwelling will have his hand cut off’…this is beautiful! Glorious! ‘Any man that breaks a hole into another man’s house to steal from that man shall be put to death in front of that hole and buried’. Words cannot describe the rapture I’m experiencing at present…”
After a few minutes, that feeling subsided.
“OK, OK, I get the picture. Someone does something wrong, he is put to death, or gets his limbs sawed off, or something. Where’s the imagination here? The creative instinct, eh? I thought at first that it was something good and worth my time, but noooooo way. Forget that. This is only the cradle of civilization here, after all. Can’t keep our hopes up. Haven’t quite reached civilization, have we? Ick. And look at it. It’s disgusting. ‘If a surgeon has opened an eye-infection with a bronze instrument and thereby destroyed the man’s eye, they shall cut off his hand’…Ack. Who wants to have to carve that in? I don’t. Nasty.”
Back in the good old days, before there was civilization, there was a city full of men with high hopes and a dream in their individual hearts. The Babylonians were awfully keen on the idea of civilization, and it was largely through their big hearts, their determination, and their good new-fashioned values that they hoped to make it all possible. They hoped that their toiling away at that blah, dreary old life of theirs would someday add up to something far in the future that made wearing wool skirts worthwhile.
But, I guess, it really, really didn’t.
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Excellent! yes really funny. Well done. 
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