PLANS are now being laid in the West Country for an epic archaeological
expedition to the Middle East to locate the Biblical Garden
of Eden.
As
I reported on this page in November, Edmund Marriage, an independent
researcher from Dorset, wants to promote the legacy of his
late uncle, Christian O'Brien, an exploration geologist and
archaeologist who, with his poet wife Barbara Joy, wrote a
series of scholarly books proposing the diffusion of civilisation
and agriculture from Southern Lebanon by the survivors of
an advanced society, wrecked by a global catastrophe about
12,400 years ago.
They
saw this ancient community as being the single benevolent
source for law and religions.
I
can now reveal that satellite pictures of the region have
produced dramatic new evidence that appears to back up O'Brien's
remarkable theory, and that Edmund, 65, of Milborne Port,
is now liaising with the Lebanese authorities and academic
institutions in the UK about sending in a survey team this
year.
It
would run under the auspices of the Patrick Foundation which
Edmund founded in partnership with his aunt to continue the
O'Briens' work.
The
pictures show what seem to be the remains of a huge dam and
reservoir system in an intermontane basin near Mount Hermon
- and, astoundingly, the aerial images match plans drawn by
O'Brien more than 20 years ago.
"It's
really exciting," said Edmund, who met First Secretary
Hassan Abbas at the Lebanese Embassy in London last week to
discuss the project. "There doesn't seem to be any doubt
that it's a very large megalithic structure.
"The
purpose of the visit would be to survey, investigate, photograph
and film structures and the area itself, together with the
dating of pollen by taking of a number of sediment cores,
as well as other samples."
According
to O'Brien, the original source of religions was that known
to the ancient Sumerians as Kharsag ("head enclosure")
or Eden, and he concluded that the site in the Near East which
best met the descriptions was the area north of Rachaiya,
near Mount Hermon, where there is still a town called Ehdin
nearby. O'Brien's research included painstaking study of ancient
Sumerian, Aramaic and Hebraic texts, together with a detailed
geological and scientific study of the Near East, and this
indicates that a small but highly developed group restarted
agriculture and civilisation at Kharsag in about 9,500BC.
He
thought that it was this that was being referred to in the
story of the Creation and the Garden of Eden in the Book of
Genesis. Myths worldwide relate back to these people under
various names, including angels, serpents, ancient masters
and, of course, gods.
The
theory is that they were the survivors of massive meltwater
floods as ice-dams burst at the end of the last Ice Age, about
10,400BC, accompanied by gargantuan earthquakes as the Earth
was struck by cometary debris in the Hudson Bay region.
Edmund
said: "From the recently introduced images available
on Google Earth, I have been able to identify important archaeological
remains at this location, and I'm seeking permissions and
a partner in the Lebanon to assist with a preliminary survey
of the site and, if warranted and approved by the Lebanese
authorities, a four-year archaeological investigation of the
area.
"Features
visible in the photos include the site of a dam and reservoir
used to irrigate crops during what was a very dry period during
which agriculture would have been impossible without adequate
supplies of water.
"Of
major interest in the Google images is what appears to be
the reservoir overflow watercourse running from the site of
the dam to divert surplus water into a lower valley, thereby
ensuring that the basin was not flooded."
Edmund
feels the Kharsag research project is of great historical
importance to the people of Lebanon and Syria, and does not
want to proceed without a much better understanding of the
subject among the political and religious factions, who he
hopes would be more likely to be united by a greater knowledge
of their common ancestors.
Rana
Andari, of the Directorate of General Antiquities in Lebanon,
said it was a "very interesting project". He added:
"We would surely want to discuss it further and try to
understand as much as possible."
