Kish and other cities in early Sumer

Coordinates: 32°33′N 44°39′E / 32.55°N 44.65°E / 32.55; 44.65

Kish (Sumerian: Kiš; transliteration: Kiŝ^ki; cuneiform: 𒆧𒆠;^[1] Akkadian: kiššatu^[2]) is modern Tell al-Uhaymir (Babil Governorate, Iraq), and was an ancient city of Sumer. Kish is located some 12 km east of Babylon, and 80 km south of Baghdad (Iraq).

History[link]

Kish was occupied beginning in the Jemdet Nasr period (ca. 3100 BC), gaining prominence as one of the pre-eminent powers in the region during the early dynastic period.

The Sumerian king list states that it was the first city to have kings following the deluge,^[3] beginning with Jushur. Jushur's successor is called Kullassina-bel, but this is actually a sentence in Akkadian meaning "All of them were lord". Thus, some scholars have suggested that this may have been intended to signify the absence of a central authority in Kish for a time. The names of the next nine kings of Kish preceding Etana are all Akkadian words for animals, e.g. Zuqaqip "scorpion". The Semitic nature of these and other early names associated with Kish reveals that its population had a strong Semitic component from the dawn of recorded history.^[4]

The 12th king of Kish appearing on the list, Etana, is noted as "the shepherd, who ascended to heaven and consolidated all the foreign countries". Although his reign has yet to be archaeologically attested, his name is found in later legendary tablets, and Etana is sometimes regarded as the first king and founder of Kish himself. The 21st king of Kish on the list, Enmebaragesi, said to have captured the weapons of Elam, is the first name confirmed by archaeological finds from his reign. He is also known through other literary references, where he and his son Aga of Kish are portrayed as contemporary rivals of Dumuzid, the Fisherman and Gilgamesh, early rulers of Uruk.

Some early kings of Kish are known through archaeology, but are not named on the King list. These include Utug or Uhub, said to have defeated Hamazi in the earliest days, and Mesilim, who built temples in Adab and Lagash, where he seems to have exercised some control.

The Third Dynasty of Kish is unique in that it begins with a woman, previously a tavern keeper, Kubau, as "king". She was later deified as the goddess Kheba.

Afterwards, though its military and economic power was diminished, it retained a strong political and symbolic significance. Just as with Nippur to the south, control of Kish was a prime element in legitimizing dominance over the north. Because of the city's symbolic value, strong rulers later added the traditional title "King of Kish", even if they were from Akkad, Ur, or Babylon. One of the earliest to adopt this title upon subjecting Kish to his empire was King Mesannepada of Ur. A few governors of Kish for other powers in later times are also known.

Sargon of Akkad came from the area of Kish. The city's patron deity was Zababa (or Zamama) in Akkadian times, along with his wife, the goddess Inanna.

Kish continued to be occupied through the old Babylonian, Kassite, and Neo-Assyrian periods, and into classical times, before being abandoned.

Archaeology[link]

Murex bearing the name of "Rimush, king of Kish", ca. 2270 BC, Louvre

The Kish archaeological site is actually an oval area roughly 5 miles by 2 miles, transected by the dry former bed of the Euphrates River, encompassing around 40 mounds, the largest being Uhaimir and Ingharra. The most notable mounds are:-

• Tell Uhaimir - believed to be the location of the city of Kish. It means "the red" after the red bricks of the ziggurat there.
• Tell Ingharra - believed to be the location of Hursagkalamma, east of Kish, home of a temple of Inanna.^[5]
• Tell Khazneh
• Tell el-Bender - held Parthian material.
• Mound W - where a number of Neo-Assyrian tablets were discovered.

After illegally excavated tablets began appearing at the beginning of the last century, François Thureau-Dangin identified the site as being Kish. Those tablets ended up in a variety of museums.

A French archaeological team under Henri de Genouillac excavated at Kish between 1912 and 1914, finding 1400 Old Babylonian tablets which were distributed to the Istanbul Archaeology Museum and the Louvre. ^[6]

Later a joint Field Museum and Oxford University team under Stephen Langdon excavated from 1923 to 1933, with the recovered materials split between Chicago and the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford.^{[7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13]}

The actual excavations at Kish were led initially by E. MacKay and later by L. C. Watelin. Work on the faunal and flora remains was conducted by Henry Field.^{[14] [15]}

More recently, a Japanese team from the Kokushikan University led by Ken Matsumoto excavated at Kish in 1988, 2000, and 2001. The final season lasted only one week.^{[16] [17] [18]}

See also[link]

• Cities of the Ancient Near East
• Short chronology timeline

Notes[link]

References[link]

• [1] McGuire Gibson, The city and Area of Kish, Coconut Grove, 1972
• [2] E. Mackay, Report on the Excavation of the "A" Cemetery at Kish, Mesopotamia, Pt. 1, A Sumerian Palace and the "A" Cemetery, Pt. 2 (Anthropology Memoirs I, 1-2),Chicago: Field Museum,1931
• Nissen, Hans The early history of the ancient Near East, 9000-2000 B.C. (Chicago/London: University of Chicago Press, 1988. ISBN 0-226-58656-1, ISBN 0-226-58658-8) Elizabeth Lutzeir, trans.
• [3] I. J. Gelb, Sargonic Texts in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, Materials for the Assyrian Dictionary 5, University of Chicago Press, 1970 ISBN 0-226-62309-2
• T. Claydon, Kish in the Kassite Period (c. 1650-1150 B.C), Iraq, vol. 54, pp. 141–155, 1992
• P. R. S. Moorey, A Re-Consideration of the Excavations on Tell Ingharra (East Kish) 1923-33, Iraq, vol. 28, no. 1, pp. 18–51, 1966
• P. R. S. Moorey,The Terracotta Plaques from Kish and Hursagkalama, c. 1850 to 1650 B.C., Iraq, vol. 37, no. 2, pp. 79–99, 1975
• Norman Yoffee, The Economics of Ritual at Late Old Babylonian Kish, Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, vol. 41, no. 3, pp. 312–343, 1998
• P. R. S. Moorey, The "Plano-Convex Building" at Kish and Early Mesopotamian Palaces, Iraq, vol. 26, no. 2, pp. 83–98, 1964
• P. R. S. Moorey, Cemetery A at Kish: Grave Groups and Chronology, Iraq, vol. 32, no. 2, pp. 86–128, 1970
• Wu Yuhong and Stephanie Dalley, The Origins of the Manana Dynasty at Kish and the Assyrian King List, Iraq, vol. 52, pp. 159–165, 1990
• Seton Lloyd, Back to Ingharra: Some Further Thoughts on the Excavations at East Kish, Iraq, vol. 31, no. 1, pp. 40–48, 1969
• Albrecht Goetze, Early Kings of Kish, Journal of Cuneiform Studies, vol. 15, no. 3, pp. 105–111, 1961

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Kish

• Online Kish Collection at the Field Museum
• YouTube video on Field Museum Kish effort
• Kish Site photographs at Oriental Institute of Chicago

Kish may refer to:

Geography[link]

• Kish Island, an Iranian island and a city in the Persian Gulf
• Kish, Iran, a city on Kish Island
• Kish District, an administrative subdivision of Iran
• Kish Rural District, an administrative subdivision of Iran
• Kish (Sumer), an ancient city in Sumer, now in Iraq
• Kish Bank, a shallow sand bank off shore of Dublin Bay. It is marked by the Kish Lighthouse.
• Kiş, Khojavend, Azerbaijan
• Kiş, Shaki, Azerbaijan, location of the Church of Kish
• Shahr-i Sabz in Uzbekistan, whose early medieval name was Kish

People[link]

• Kish (Bible), a person in the Bible
• Leslie Kish, a statistician
• Kish (rapper), a Canadian hip hop musician
• Kish, a figure in the Book of Mormon

Miscellaneous[link]

• Church of Kish, a church in the village of Kish, Azerbaijan
• Kish, a byproduct in steelmaking, used to synthesize graphite
• Kish (Tokyo Mew Mew), an antagonist in the manga and anime series Tokyo Mew Mew
• Kish Air, an Iranian airline
• Kish Cypher, a purported method for secure communication
• KISH, a radio station in Guam
• Kish Gas Field, a giant gas field close to Kish Island in the Persian Gulf
• Kish Khodro, Iranian auto manufacturer
• Oliver Fish and Kyle Lewis, fictional characters from the American Soap opera One Life to Live.

See also[link]

• Kesh (disambiguation)
• Kitsch

This disambiguation page lists articles associated with the same title. If an internal link led you here, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.

12th Planet
12th Planet performing in February 2011 at club EPR in San Francisco, California
Background information
Origin	Los Angeles, California, USA
Genres	Dubstep, Electro. Jungle drum and bass
Occupations	DJ Record producer
Years active	2006 - Present
Labels	SMOG
Website	Website Official Facebook

John Dadzie, better known by his musical aliases "12th Planet" and "Infiltrata" is a Los Angeles based dubstep and drum and bass producer and DJ.

Biography[link]

12th Planet, born John Dadzie,^[1] grew up in Los Angeles with his half-brother, Ronald Higgins, and has 1 niece, Kayla Nyree Higgins. and Kayla has a sister named Haley Noble. He was first introduced to the electronic music scene in high school. After forming Imperial Recordings with DJ Lith, he launched his production skills on his own terms, originally producing drum and bass under the alias Infiltrata. In 2006, he decided that he was going to make dubstep. It was then that his new alias 12th Planet was created, in reference to Zecharia Sitchin's book, 12th Planet. All production under the name 12th Planet is original.^[2] As one of the first individuals to bring the dubstep culture to America (in one of the USA’s electronic meccas, Los Angeles) 12th Planet has frequently been cited as the American Dubstep King.^[3]

12th Planet works frequently with Orange County producer Flinch and LA Local Skrillex (on tracks "Father Said", "Needed Change" And "Burs" Along with Kill The Noise). He has also done collaborations with various dubstep producers including Datsik, Doctor P, Plastician, and Skream. Many well-known dubstep DJs (such as Rusko, Skream, Skrillex and more) use 12th Planets productions and remixes in their live DJ sets.

As a DJ, 12th Planet has toured globally in London, Australia, New Zealand, and across the US. He has also played at many American dance festivals such as Electric Daisy Carnival,^[4] Together As One,^[5] SXSW, Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, Ultra Music Festival, Nocturnal, and Beyond Wonderland. He is represented by AM Only, one of the largest agencies in the electronic music industry.^[6]

In 2009, 12th Planet was listed as one of URB.com's "Next 100", and had a special feature in their 25 Now! supplemental issue.^[7] 2010 marked the release of his music video for "Reasons", presented by Scion A/V, which was premiered and cycled on MTV 2.^[8] Diplo’s label Mad Decent included 12th Planet’s remix of Little Jinder's "Youth Blood" on their dubstep compilation "Blow Your Head", released in November.^[9] 12th Planet has also been described by Skrillex as Skrillex's Mentor at a show at Ultra Music

Discography[link]

Singles/EPs[link]

• 2008 RedVolume - 28 Hours Later EP
• 2008 SMOG 001 – Smokescreen EP
• 2008 SMOG 002 – Ptera Patrick EP
• 2008 BASSHEAD 001 – Control EP
• 2008 SMOG 004 – 68 / Be Blatant EP
• 2008 Subconscious Recordings – Spliff Politics EP
• 2008 Argon – Element 16 (Sulfur) EP
• 2008 Noppa Recordings – Tonka EP
• 2009 10 Bag Records – C-Sick / Are Ya Feelin EP (with Emu)
• 2009 SMOG 005 - Texx Mars EP (with Datsik)
• 2010 Dubsteppers for Haiti Volume 3
• 2010 SMOG Scion CD Sampler V.30
• 2010 BulletTrain Records – Reasons EP
• 2011 SMOG 007 - Westside Dub (with Plastician)
• 2011 Dub Police - Purple & Gold (with Antiserum)
• 2011 SMOG 009 - Lootin 92 (with SPL)
• 2011 SMOG 010 - Who Are We?
• 2011 SMOG 011 - What We Are?
• 2011 KILL 012 - Kill Me Now!
• 2012 Roadrunner Records - Way Too Far (Korn feat. 12th Planet)
• 2012 The End is Near - EP

Mix compilations[link]

• 2010 MISHKA Keep Watch Volume XXI ^[10]
• 2011 Korn Way Too Far

Remixes[link]

• 2009 Grand Puba – “Get It (12th Planet Remix)" [Scion A/V]
• 2009 Dave Nada – “Apocalypse Theme (12th Planet & Flinch Remix)" [Tits & Acid]
• 2009 Little Jinder - "Youth Blood (12th Planet & Flinch Remix)" [Trouble & Bass]
• 2009 Ladybox – “Cookies Fly (12th Planet & Flinch Remix)" [Party Like Us]
• 2010 Villains - "Victims (ft Whiskey Pete) (12th Planet & Flinch)" [Dim Mak]
• 2010 Le Castle Vania – "Nobody Gets Out Alive (12th Planet & Flinch Remix)" [Always Never]
• 2010 Rusko - "Hold On (ft. Amber Coffman) (12th Planet Remix)" [Mad Decent]
• 2010 DJ Sneak - "Southern Boy (12th Planet & Flinch Remix)" [Scion A/V]
• 2010 Rye Rye - "Sunshine (ft. M.I.A.) (12th Planet Remix)" [Interscope]
• 2010 MSTRKRFT - Heartbreaker (12th planet & Flinch Remix)
• 2011 Skrillex - All I Ask of You (feat. Penny) [12th Planet Remix]

As Featured Artist[link]

• 2011 Skrillex - "Right On Time" from the Skrillex EP Bangarang. The song also features the Dubstep artist Kill The Noise

^[11]

References[link]

External links[link]

• 12th Planet
• 12th Planet Interview

Zecharia Sitchin
Born	July 11, 1920 Baku, Azerbaijan SSR
Died	October 9, 2010( 2010-10-09) (aged 90) New York, New York
Citizenship	United States
Alma mater	London School of Economics, University of London
Known for	Ancient astronauts
Website
http://www.sitchin.com/

Zecharia Sitchin (July 11, 1920 – October 9, 2010^[1]) was an Azerbaijani-born American author of books proposing an explanation for human origins involving ancient astronauts. Sitchin attributes the creation of the ancient Sumerian culture to the Anunnaki, which he states was a race of extra-terrestrials from a planet beyond Neptune called Nibiru. He believed this hypothetical planet of Nibiru to be in an elongated, elliptical orbit in the Earth's own Solar System, asserting that Sumerian mythology reflects this view. Sitchin's books have sold millions of copies worldwide and have been translated into more than 25 languages.

Sitchin's ideas were rejected by scientists and academics, who dismiss his work as pseudoscience and pseudohistory. Sitchin's work has been criticized for flawed methodology and mistranslations of ancient texts as well as for incorrect astronomical and scientific claims.^[2]

Early life[link]

Sitchin was born in the then Azerbaijan SSR of the Soviet Union, but was raised in Palestine. He received a degree in economics from the University of London, and was an editor and journalist in Israel, before moving to New York in 1952. While working as an executive for a shipping company, he taught himself Sumerian cuneiform and visited several archaeological sites.^[3][4]

Ideas and works[link]

This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (March 2010)

Similarly to earlier authors such as Immanuel Velikovsky and Erich von Däniken, Sitchin advocated hypotheses in which extraterrestrial events supposedly played a significant role in ancient human history.

According to Sitchin's interpretation of Mesopotamian iconography and symbology, outlined in his 1976 book The 12th Planet and its sequels, there is an undiscovered planet beyond Neptune that follows a long, elliptical orbit, reaching the inner solar system roughly every 3,600 years. This planet is called Nibiru (although Jupiter was the planet associated with the god Marduk in Babylonian cosmology).^[5] According to Sitchin, Nibiru (whose name was replaced with MARDUK in original legends by the Babylonian ruler of the same name in an attempt to co-opt the creation for himself, leading to some confusion among readers) collided catastrophically with Tiamat (a goddess in the Babylonian creation myth the Enûma Eliš), which he considers to be another planet once located between Mars and Jupiter. This collision supposedly formed the planet Earth, the asteroid belt, and the comets. Sitchin states that when struck by one of planet Nibiru's moons, Tiamat split in two, and then on a second pass Nibiru itself struck the broken fragments and one half of Tiamat became the asteroid belt. The second half, struck again by one of Nibiru's moons, was pushed into a new orbit and became today's planet Earth.

According to Sitchin, Nibiru (called "the twelfth planet" because, Sitchin claimed, the Sumerians' gods-given conception of the Solar System counted all eight planets, plus Pluto, the Sun and the Moon) was the home of a technologically advanced human-like extraterrestrial race called the Anunnaki in Sumerian myth, who Sitchin states are called the Nephilim in Genesis. He wrote that they evolved after Nibiru entered the solar system and first arrived on Earth probably 450,000 years ago, looking for minerals, especially gold, which they found and mined in Africa. Sitchin states that these "gods" were the rank-and-file workers of the colonial expedition to Earth from planet Nibiru.

Sitchin wrote that Enki suggested that to relieve the Anunnaki, who had mutinied over their dissatisfaction with their working conditions, that primitive workers (Homo sapiens) be created by genetic engineering as slaves to replace them in the gold mines by crossing extraterrestrial genes with those of Homo erectus.^[6][7] According to Sitchin, ancient inscriptions report that the human civilization in Sumer, Mesopotamia, was set up under the guidance of these "gods", and human kingship was inaugurated to provide intermediaries between mankind and the Anunnaki (creating the "divine right of kings" doctrine). Sitchin believes that fallout from nuclear weapons, used during a war between factions of the extraterrestrials, is the "evil wind" described in the Lament for Ur that destroyed Ur around 2000 BC. Sitchin states the exact year is 2024 BC.^[8] Sitchin says that his research coincides with many biblical texts, and that biblical texts come originally from Sumerian writings.

Popularity[link]

Since the release of his first book The 12th Planet in 1976, now in its 45th printing, Zecharia Sitchin has written seven other books as part of his Earth Chronicles series, as well as six other companion books, all of which are still in print as of 2010^[update]. Sitchin's books have sold millions of copies worldwide and been published in more than 25 languages, as well as in braille.^[9] New York Times reporter Corey Kilgannon noted that despite academic dismissal of his work, Sitchin has "a devoted following of readers".^[3]

Critic Michael Heiser called Sitchin "arguably the most important proponent of the ancient astronaut hypothesis over the last several decades".^[10] Sitchin was a frequent guest on the Coast to Coast AM radio show, which in 2010 presented Sitchin with a life-time achievement award.^[11] Gods of the New Millennium author Alan F. Alford admits he initially became "infatuated" with Sitchin's hypotheses but later became a critic of Sitchin's interpretations of myth.^[12]

According to some writers, Sitchin's ideas along with those of Erich von Däniken may have influenced the beliefs of the religious sect of Raëlism,^[13][14] and writer Mark Pilkington sees the mythology of Japan's Pana Wave religious group as rooted in Sitchins The 12th Planet and its sequels.^[15]

The 1994 movie Stargate, directed by Roland Emmerich, and the 2009 video game The Conduit drew some conceptual inspiration from Sitchin's ideas,^[16][17] while screenwriter Roberto Orci says the villains of the film Cowboys and Aliens were inspired by Sitchin's conceptualization of the Anunnaki as gold-mining aliens.^[18]

Criticisms[link]

Criticism of Sitchin's work falls primarily into three categories: translations and interpretations of ancient texts; astronomical and scientific observations; and literalism of myth.

Translations and interpretations[link]

When Sitchin wrote his books, only specialists could read the Sumerian language. However, sources such as the 2006 book Sumerian Lexicon^[19] have made the language more accessible to non-experts. Ancient language scholar Michael S. Heiser^[20] states he has found many inaccuracies in Sitchin's translations and challenges interested parties to use this book to check their validity.^[15][21] Prof. Ronald H. Fritze,^[22] author of the book Invented Knowledge: False History, Fake Science and Pseudo-religions,^[22] mentions the example of Sitchin's claim that the Sumerian sign Din-Gir means "pure ones of the blazing rockets", adding that "Sitchin's assignment of meanings to ancient words is tendentious and frequently strained."^[23] Fritze also commented on Sitchin's methodology, writing that "When critics have checked Sitchin's references, they have found that he frequently quotes out of context or truncates his quotes in a way that distorts evidence in order to prove his contentions. Evidence is presented selectively and contradictory evidence is ignored."^[23]

Sitchin bases his arguments on his personal interpretations of pre-Nubian and Sumerian texts, and the seal VA 243. Sitchin wrote that these ancient civilizations knew of a twelfth planet, when in fact they only knew five.^[24] Hundreds of Sumerian astronomical seals and calendars have been decoded and recorded, and the total count of planets on each seal has been five. Seal VA 243 has 12 dots that Sitchin identifies as planets. When translated, seal VA 243 reads "You're his Servant" which is now thought to be a message from a nobleman to a servant. According to semitologist Michael S. Heiser, the so-called sun on Seal VA 243 is not the Sumerian symbol for the sun but is a star, and the dots are also stars.^[24][25] The symbol on seal VA 243 has no resemblance to the hundreds of documented Sumerian sun symbols.

In a 1979 review of The Twelfth Planet, Roger W. Wescott,^[26] Prof. of Anthropology and Linguistics at Drew University, Madison, New Jersey, noted Sitchin's amateurishness with respect to the primacy of the Sumerian language:

Sitchin's linguistics seems at least as amateurish as his anthropology, biology, and astronomy. On p. 370, for example, he maintains that "all the ancient languages . . . including early Chinese . . . stemmed from one primeval source -- Sumerian". Sumerian, of course, is the virtual archetype of what linguistic taxonomists call a language-isolate, meaning a language that does not fall into any of the well-known language-families or exhibit clear cognation with any known language. Even if Sitchin is referring to written rather than to spoken language, it is unlikely that his contention can be persuasively defended, since Sumerian ideograms were preceded by the Azilian and Tartarian signaries of Europe as well as by a variety of script-like notational systems between the Nile and Indus rivers.^[27]

Astronomical and scientific observations[link]

Sitchin's "planetary collision" view does superficially resemble a theory by modern astronomers—the giant impact theory of the Moon's formation about 4.5 billion years ago by a body impacting with the newly-formed Earth. However, Sitchin's proposed series of rogue planetary collisions differ in both details and timing. As with Immanuel Velikovsky's earlier Worlds in Collision thesis, Sitchin states that he has found evidence of ancient human knowledge of rogue celestial motions in a variety of mythological accounts. In Velikovsky's case, these interplanetary collisions were supposed to have taken place within the span of human existence, whereas for Sitchin these occurred during the early stages of planetary formation, but entered the mythological account passed down via the alien race which purportedly evolved on Nibiru after these encounters.

While Sitchin's scenario for the creation of the Solar System is hard to reconcile with the Earth's current small orbital eccentricity of only 0.0167, Sitchin's supporters maintain that it would explain much of Earth's peculiar early geography due to cleaving from the celestial collision, i.e., solid continents on one side and a giant ocean on the other.^{[citation needed]}

According to former Immanuel Velikovsky assistant turned prolific critic,^[28] C. Leroy Ellenberger,^[28] "[Sitchin states that] from an equal start, the Nefilim evolved on Nibiru 45 million years ahead of comparable development on Earth with its decidedly more favorable environment. Such an outcome is unlikely, to say the least, since Nibiru would spend over 99% of its time beyond Pluto. Sitchin's explanation that heat from radioactive decay and a thick atmosphere keep Nibiru warm is absurd and does not address the problem of darkness in deep space. Also unexplained is how the Nefilim, who evolved long after Nibiru arrived, knew what happened when Nibiru first entered the solar system."^[29]

The scenario outlined by Sitchin, with Nibiru returning to the inner solar system regularly every 3,600 years,

. . . implies an orbit with a semi-major axis of 235 astronomical units, extending from the asteroid belt to twelve times farther beyond the sun than Pluto. Elementary perturbation theory indicates that, under the most favorable circumstances of avoiding close encounters with other planets, no body with such an eccentric orbit would keep the same period for two consecutive passages. Within twelve orbits the object would be either ejected or converted to a short period object. Thus, the failed search for a trans-Plutonian planet by T.C. Van Flandern, of the U.S. Naval Observatory, which Sitchin uses to bolster his thesis, is no support at all.^[29]

Sitchin in “the case of Adam’s alien genes”^[30] states that 223 unique genes found by the Human Genome Sequencing Consortium are without the required predecessors on the genomic evolutionary tree. Later researchers have argued that the conclusion from the Human Genome Sequencing Consortium cannot be drawn due to a lack of a comprehensive gene database for comparison. An analysis by Salzberg identified 40 potential genes laterally transferred into the genome from prokaryotic organisms. Salzberg also argues that gene loss combined with sample size effects and evolutionary rate variation provide an alternative, more biologically plausible explanation.^[31]

Literalism of myth[link]

Peter James, co-author of the controversial book Centuries of Darkness,^[32] has criticized Sitchin both for ignoring the world outside of Mesopotamia and more specifically for misunderstanding Babylonian literature:

He uses the Epic of Creation Enuma Elish as the foundation for his cosmogony, identifying the young god Marduk, who overthrows the older regime of gods and creates the Earth, as the unknown "Twelfth Planet". In order to do as he interprets the Babylonian theogony as a factual account of the birth of the other "eleven" planets. The Babylonian names for the planets are established beyond a shadow of a doubt—Ishtar was the deity of Venus, Nergal of Mars, and Marduk of Jupiter—and confirmed by hundreds of astronomical/astrological tables and treatises on clay tablets and papyri from the Hellenistic period. Sitchin merrily ignores all this and assigns unwarranted planetary identities to the gods mentioned in the theogony. For example, Apsu, attested as god of the primeval waters, becomes, of all things, the Sun! Ea, as it suits Sitchin, is sometimes planet Neptune and sometimes a spaceman. And the identity of Ishtar as the planet Venus, a central feature of Mesopotamian religion, is nowhere mentioned in the book—instead Sitchin arbitrarily assigns to Venus another deity from Enuma Elish, and reserves Ishtar for a role as a female astronaut.^[33]

William Irwin Thompson comments on what he calls Sitchin's 'literalism':

What Sitchin sees is what he needs for his hypothesis. So figure 15 on page 40 is radiation therapy, and figure 71 on page 136 is a god inside a rocket-shaped chamber. If these are gods, why are they stuck with our cheap B movie technology of rockets, microphones, space-suits, and radiation therapy? If they are gods, then why can't they have some really divine technology such as intradimensional worm-hole travel, antigravity, starlight propulsion, or black hole bounce rematerializations? Sitchin has constructed what appears to be a convincing argument, but when he gets close to single images on ancient tablets, he falls back into the literalism of "Here is an image of the gods in rockets." Suddenly, ancient Sumer is made to look like the movie set for Destination Moon. Erich Von Däniken's potboiler Chariots of the Gods has the same problem. The plain of Nazca in Peru is turned into a World War II landing strip. The gods can cross galactic distances, but by the time they get to Peru, their spaceships are imagined as World War II prop jobs that need an enormous landing strip. This literalization of the imagination doesn't make any sense, but every time it doesn't, you hear Sitchin say "There can be no doubt, but..."^[34]

Bibliography[link]

Earth Chronicles volumes[link]

1. The 12th Planet, New York: Stein and Day, 1976
2. The Stairway to Heaven, 1980, Avon Books (Bear & Company, 1992, ISBN 0-939680-89-0; Harper, 2007, ISBN 0-06-137920-4)
3. The Wars of Gods and Men, 1985, Avon Books (Bear & Company, 1992, ISBN 0-939680-90-4)
4. The Lost Realms, Avon Books, 1990, ISBN 0-380-75890-3
5. When Time Began, 1993, (Harper, 2007, ISBN 0-06-137928-X, ISBN 978-0-06-137928-4)
6. The Cosmic Code, Avon Books, 1998, ISBN 0-380-80157-4
7. The End of Days: Armageddon and Prophecies of the Return, William Morrow, 2007, ISBN 978-0-06-123823-9

Companion volumes[link]

• Genesis Revisited: Is Modern Science Catching Up With Ancient Knowledge?, (Avon Books, 1990, ISBN 0-380-76159-9)
• Divine Encounters: A Guide to Visions, Angels and Other Emissaries, Avon Books, 1995, ISBN 0-380-78076-3)
• The Lost Book of Enki: Memoirs and Prophecies of an Extraterrestrial god, Bear & Company, 2001, ISBN 1-59143-037-2
• The Earth Chronicles Expeditions, Bear & Company, 2004, ISBN 978-1-59143-076-6
• Journeys to the Mythical Past, Bear and Company, 2007 ISBN 978-1-59143-080-3
• The Earth Chronicles Handbook, Bear & Company, 2009, ISBN 978-1-59143-101-5
• There Were Giants Upon the Earth: Gods, Demigods, and Human Ancestry: The Evidence of Alien DNA, (Bear & Company), 2010, ISBN 978-1-59143-121-3

DVDs[link]

• Are We Alone in the Universe? (based on Genesis Revisited), documentary, 1978 (2003 DVD release)^[35]
• An Evening with Zecharia Sitchin, lecture and slide presentation, 1997
• A Talk From The Heart!, lecture and slide presentation, 2006
• Signs of the Return, lecture and slide presentation, 2009
• 2012 - The End of Days?, lecture and slide presentation, 2010
• Zecharia at 90 - Farewell Address, lecture, 2010

See also[link]

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikiversity has learning materials about Zecharia Sitchin

• Official Website
• Kilgannon, Corey. "Origin of Species, From an Alien View", The New York Times, January 10, 2010. p. MB4.
• Zecharia Sitchin Audio Tribute on Coast to Coast AM

Criticisms[link]

• Ian Lawton's Mesopotamia Papers
• An Astronomer's View of the Akkadian Seal by Tom van Flandern
• SitchinIsWrong.com: A Polemical Website against the Theories of Zechariah Sitchin

David Byrne
David Byrne speaking at the 2006 Future of Music Policy Summit hosted by the McGill University Schulich School of Music in Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Background information
Born	(1952-05-14) May 14, 1952 (age 60) Dumbarton, Scotland, UK
Genres	New Wave, experimental pop, worldbeat, alternative rock
Occupations	Musician, songwriter, artist, singer, actor, director, film producer, record producer
Instruments	Vocals, guitar, bass, keyboards, synthesizer, flute, clavinet, slide guitar, harmonica, autoharp, harmonium, violin, accordion buildings[1]
Years active	1974–present
Labels	Luaka Bop, Nonesuch Records, Thrill Jockey
Associated acts	Talking Heads, Brian Eno, X-Press 2, Fatboy Slim, The BPA
Website	www.davidbyrne.com
Notable instruments
Fender Duo-Sonic Fender Stratocaster

David Byrne (born May 14, 1952) is a musician and artist, best known as a founding member and principal songwriter of the American new wave band Talking Heads, which was active between 1975 and 1991. Since then, Byrne has released his own solo recordings and worked with various media including film, photography, opera, and non-fiction. He has received Grammy, Oscar, and Golden Globe awards and been inducted to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Early life[link]

Byrne was born in Dumbarton, Scotland, to Tom and Emma Byrne. He was the elder of two children. Two years later, his parents moved to Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, and then to Arbutus, Maryland, when he was 8 or 9 years old. His father worked as an electronics engineer. Before high school, David Byrne already knew how to play the guitar, accordion, and violin. He was rejected from his middle school’s choir because they claimed he was "off-key and too withdrawn." From a young age, Byrne had a strong interest in music. His parents say that he would constantly play his phonograph from age three and he learned how to play the harmonica at age five.^[2] In his journals he says, "I was a peculiar young man — borderline Asperger's, I would guess."^[3][4] As revealed by Tina Weymouth in the commentary for the concert film Stop Making Sense, Byrne is left handed but plays guitar right handed.

Music career[link]

Talking Heads: 1975–1991[link]

As part of Talking Heads in 1978 Photo: Jean-Luc Ourlin

He graduated from Lansdowne High School in southwest Baltimore County. Byrne started his musical career in a high school duo named Bizadi with Mark Kehoe. Their repertoire consisted mostly of songs such as "April Showers," "96 Tears," "Dancing On The Ceiling," and Frank Sinatra songs. Byrne then attended the Rhode Island School of Design (during the 1970-71 term) and the Maryland Institute College of Art (during the 1971-72 term) before dropping out and forming a band called "The Artistics" with fellow RISD student Chris Frantz.^[5] The band dissolved within a year, and the two moved to New York together with Frantz's girlfriend Tina Weymouth. Unable to find a bass player in New York, Frantz and Byrne persuaded Weymouth to learn to play the bass guitar.

After some practice and playing together they founded the group Talking Heads which had its first gig in 1975.^[6][7] Multi-instrumentalist Jerry Harrison joined the group in 1977. The band released 8 studio albums before going into hiatus in 1988. David Byrne desired to go solo, but it took 3 years to announce that the band were breaking up in 1991. A brief reunion for a single "Sax and Violins" in 1991 occurred before again dissolving. The band were inducted into Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002, when they reunited to play 4 tracks.

Solo album career: 1979–1981;1989–present[link]

Byrne at London's Royal Festival Hall in April 2009.

During his time in the band, Byrne took on outside projects, collaborating with Brian Eno during 1979 and 1981 on the album My Life in the Bush of Ghosts, which attracted considerable critical acclaim due to its early use of analogue sampling and found sounds. Following this record, Byrne took his attention on Talking Heads. My Life in the Bush of Ghosts was re-released for its 25th anniversary in early 2006, with new bonus tracks. In keeping with the spirit of the original album, two of the songs' component tracks were released under Creative Commons licenses and a remix contest site was launched.

Rei Momo (1989) was the first solo album by Byrne, after leaving Talking Heads, that features mainly Afro-Cuban, Afro-Hispanic, and Brazilian song styles including popular dances including merengue, Cuban Son, samba, mambo, cumbia, cha-cha-chá, bomba, and charanga. His third solo album Uh-Oh (1992) followed that featured a brass-section and was driven by catchy tracks such as "Girls on My Mind" and "The Cowboy Mambo (Hey Lookit Me Now)". His fourth solo album, titled davidenryb (1994), was a more proper rock record, with Byrne playing most of the instruments on it, leaving percussion for session musicians. "Angels" and "Back in the Box" were the two main singles released from the album. The first one entered the US Modern Rock Tracks chart, reaching #24. For his fifth studio effort the emotional Feelings (1997), Byrne employed a brass orchestra called Black Cat Orchestra. His sixth Look into the Eyeball (2001) continued the same musical exploration of Feelings, but was compiled of more upbeat tracks, like those found on Uh-Oh.

Grown Backwards (2004), released by Nonesuch Records, used orchestral string arrangements, and includes two operatic arias as well as a rework of X-Press 2 collaboration "Lazy". He also launched a North American and Australian tour with the Tosca Strings. This tour ended with Los Angeles, San Diego and New York shows in August 2005.

Byrne and Eno reunited for his eighth album Everything That Happens Will Happen Today (2008).^[8] He assembled a band to tour worldwide for the album for a six-month period from late 2008 through early 2009 on the Songs of David Byrne and Brian Eno Tour.

Work in theatre and film: 1981–present[link]

In 1981, Byrne partnered with choreographer Twyla Tharp, scoring music he wrote that appeared on his album, The Catherine Wheel for a ballet with the same name, prominently featuring unusual rhythms and lyrics. Productions of The Catherine Wheel appeared on Broadway that same year. In Spite of Wishing and Wanting is a soundscape David Byrne produced for the Belgian choreographer Wim Vandekeybus's dance company Ultima Vez.

In 1991, Byrne released a classical instrumental album The Forest, where some of the tracks were already featured as a score for 1988 Robert Wilson theatre piece of the same name.

His work has been extensively used in movie soundtracks, most notably in collaboration with Ryuichi Sakamoto and Cong Su on Bernardo Bertolucci's The Last Emperor, which won an Academy Award for Best Original Score. In 2004, Lead Us Not Into Temptation (music from the film "Young Adam") included tracks and musical experiments from his score to Young Adam. Byrne also wrote, directed, and starred in True Stories, a musical collage of discordant Americana released in 1986, as well as producing most of the film's music. Byrne also directed the documentary Île Aiye and the concert film of his 1992 Latin-tinged tour titled Between the Teeth. He was chiefly responsible for the stage design and choreography of Stop Making Sense in 1984. Byrne added "Loco de Amor" (Crazy for Love) with Celia Cruz to Jonathan Demme's 1986 film Something Wild.

Byrne wrote the Dirty Dozen Brass Band-inspired score for Robert Wilson's Opera The Knee Plays from The Civil Wars: A Tree Is Best Measured When It Is Down. Some of the music from Byrne's orchestral album The Forest was originally used in a Wilson-directed theatre piece with the same name. The Forest premiered at the Theater der Freien Volksbühne, Berlin in 1988. It received its New York premiere in December 1988 at BAM, the Brooklyn Academy of Music. The Forestry Maxi-single contained dance and industrial remixes of pieces from The Forest by Jack Dangers, Rudy Tambala, and Anthony Capel.

In late 2005 Byrne and Fatboy Slim began work on Here Lies Love, a disco opera or song cycle about the life of Imelda Marcos, the controversial former First Lady of the Philippines. Some music from this piece was debuted at Adelaide Festival of Arts in Australia in February 2006 and the following year at Carnegie Hall on February 3, 2007.

In 2008 Byrne released Big Love: Hymnal - his soundtrack to season two of Big Love. These two albums constituted the first releases on his personal independent record label Todo Mundo.

In 2010, David Byrne songs were featured on the soundtrack of Oliver Stone's Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.

Byrne and Brian Eno provided the soundtrack for the film Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps.^[9]

Other musical contributions: 1990–present[link]

Byrne has contributed songs to five AIDS benefit compilation albums produced by the Red Hot Organization: Red Hot + Blue: A Tribute to Cole Porter, Red Hot + Rio, Silencio=Muerte: Red Hot + Latin, Onda Sonora: Red Hot + Lisbon, and Offbeat: A Red Hot Soundtrip. Byrne appeared as a guest vocalist/guitarist for 10,000 Maniacs during their MTV Unplugged concert, though the songs in which he is featured were cut from their following album. One of them, "Let the Mystery Be", appeared as the fourth track on 10,000 Maniacs' CD single "Few and Far Between". Byrne worked with the "Queen of Tex-Mex", Tejano superstar Selena, writing, producing and singing a song ("God's Child (Baila Conmigo)"), included on Selena's last album, "Dreaming of You", before her death. Byrne was the host of Sessions at West 54th during its second of three seasons and collaborated with members of Devo and Morcheeba to record the album Feelings in 1997.

Byrne playing; Austin City Limits, in 2008

In 2001 a version of Byrne's single “Like Humans Do”, edited to remove its drug reference, was selected by Microsoft as the sample music for Windows XP to demonstrate Windows Media Player (not included in SP2 installs).^[10][11]

In 2002, he co-wrote and provided vocals for a track, "Lazy" by X-Press 2, which reached number 2 in the United Kingdom and number 1 on the U.S. Dance Charts. Byrne said in an interview in BBC Four Sessions's coverage of his Union Chapel performance that “Lazy” was number 1 in Syria.

In 2006, his singing was featured on "The Heart's a Lonely Hunter" on The Cosmic Game by Thievery Corporation.

He is featured on the tracks "Money" and "The People Tree", on N.A.S.A.'s 2009 album The Spirit of Apollo. Also in 2009, David Byrne appeared on HIV/AIDS charity album Dark Was the Night for Red Hot Organization. He collaborated with Dirty Projectors on the song "Knotty Pine". In the same year, Byrne performed at the Bonnaroo Music Festival in Manchester, Tennessee. He also was a signator of a letter protesting the decision of the Toronto International Film Festival to choose Tel Aviv as the subject of its inaugural City-to-City Spotlight strand.^[12]

In 2007, David Byrne provided a cover of The Fiery Furnaces' song "Ex-Guru" for a compilation to celebrate the 15th birthday of Thrill Jockey, a Chicago-based label.

In 2008, Byrne and his production team programmed the Battery Maritime Building, a 99-year-old ferry terminal in Manhattan, to play music.^[13] Essentially Byrne took the old New York City building, hooked the entire structure - pipes, heaters, pillars and all, electronically to an old pipe organ, and made a playable musical instrument of it, for a piece called "Playing the Building".^[1] This project was also installed in 2005 in Stockholm, Sweden,^[14] and at the London Roundhouse in 2009. It bears similarities to a series of installations performed by New Zealand and Detroit based artists Alastair Galbraith and Matt De Genaro, recorded on their 1998 record Wire Music and 2006 follow-up Long Wires in Dark Museums, Vol. 2. Byrne says that the point in this project was to allow people to experience art first hand, by creating the music with the organ, rather than simply looking at it.^[15]

In April 2008, Byrne took part in the Paul Simon retrospective concert series at BAM performing "You Can Call Me Al" and "I Know What I Know" from Simon's Graceland album.^[16]

In 2008 Byrne collaborated with The Brighton Port Authority, composing the music and singing the lyrics for "Toe Jam".

In May 2011 Byrne contributed backing vocals to the Arcade Fire track "Speaking in Tongues" which appeared on the 2011 edition of their album The Suburbs.^[17]

Other work[link]

Byrne founded the world music record label Luaka Bop in 1990. It was originally created to release Latin American compilations, but it has grown to include music from Cuba, Africa, the Far East and beyond, releasing the work of artists such as Cornershop, Os Mutantes, Los De Abajo, Jim White, Zap Mama, Tom Zé, Los Amigos Invisibles and King Chango.^[18][19]

In 2005, Byrne initiated his own internet radio station, Radio David Byrne.^[20] Each month, Byrne posts a playlist of music he likes, linked by themes or genres. Byrne's playlists have included African popular music, country music classics, Vox Humana, classical opera, and film scores from Italian movies.

In 2006, Byrne released Arboretum, a sketchbook facsimile of his Tree Drawings, published by McSweeney's. Byrne is also a visual artist whose work has been shown in contemporary art galleries and museums around the world since the 1990s. Represented by the Pace/MacGill Gallery in New York, he has also created public art installations, many of them anonymously. In 2010 his original art work was in the exhibition The Record: Contemporary Art and Vinyl at the Nasher Museum of Art at Duke University.^[21]

Personal life[link]

While working on the film True Stories, Byrne met costume designer Adelle Lutz whom he married in 1987. They have a daughter, Malu Abeni Valentine Byrne, born in 1989. Byrne and Lutz divorced in 2004. Byrne began a relationship with the artist Cindy Sherman in 2007.^[22]

Although a resident of the United States since childhood, Byrne is a British citizen,^[23] and has never applied for U.S. citizenship. He lives in New York City.

Cycling[link]

Byrne is known for his activism in support of increased cycling, and for having used a bike as his main means of transport for most of his life, especially cycling around New York. He has a regular cycling column in the New York Times.

He says that he cycled when he was in high school and returned to it as an adult in the late 1970s. He likes the freedom and exhilarating feeling cycling gives him. He has written widely on cycling, including a 2009 book, Bicycle Diaries.^[24] In August 2009, he auctioned his Montague folding bike in order to raise money for the London Cycling Campaign.

In 2008, Byrne designed a series of bicycle parking racks in the form of image outlines corresponding to the areas in which they were located, such as a dollar sign for Wall Street and an electric guitar in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. Byrne worked with a manufacturer that would construct the racks in exchange for the chance to sell them later as artworks, and the racks remained on the streets for about a year.^[25]

Views[link]

Byrne also posts personal comments on the music and, occasionally, on the state of the recorded music industry. In July 2007, Byrne posted the following comment:

There was another piece in the Times today about yet another 20 percent drop in CD sales. (Are they running the same news piece every 4 months?) Jeez guys, the writing's on the wall. How long do the record execs think they'll have those offices and nice parking spaces? (Well, more than half of all record A&R and other execs are gone already, so there should be plenty of parking space). They, the big 4 or 5, should give the catalogues back to the artists or their heirs as a gesture before they close the office doors, as they sure don't know how to sell music anymore. (I have Talking Heads stuff on the shelf that I can't get Warner to release.) The "industry" had a nice 50-year ride, but it's time to move on. Luckily, music remains more or less unaffected — there is a lot of great music out there. A new model will emerge that includes rather than sues its own customers, that realizes that music is not a product in the sense of being a thing — it's closer to fashion, in that for music fans it tells them and their friends who they are, what they feel passionately about and to some extent what makes life fun and interesting. It's about a sense of community — a song ties a whole invisible disparate community together. It's not about selling the (often) shattered plastic case CDs used to come in.^[26]

Works by David Byrne[link]

Solo studio albums[link]

• My Life in the Bush of Ghosts (with Brian Eno) (1981)
• Rei Momo (1989)
• Uh-Oh (1992)
• David Byrne (1994)
• Feelings (1997)
• Look into the Eyeball (2001)
• Grown Backwards (2004)
• Everything That Happens Will Happen Today (with Brian Eno) (2008)

Talking Heads[link]

• Talking Heads: 77 (1977)
• More Songs About Buildings and Food (1978)
• Fear of Music (1979)
• Remain in Light (1980)
• Speaking in Tongues (1983)
• Little Creatures (1985)
• True Stories (1986)
• Naked (1988)

Books[link]

• True Stories (1986)
• Strange Ritual, Chronicle Books (1995)
• Your Action World (1999)
• The New Sins (Los Nuevos Pecados) (2001)
• David Byrne Asks You: What Is It? Smart Art Press (2002)
• Envisioning Emotional Epistemological Information with DVD (2003)
• Arboretum, (2006)
• Bicycle Diaries (2009)

^[27]

Film[link]

• Stop Making Sense - concert movie from Talking Heads tour (1984)
• True Stories (1986)
• Ile Aiye (The house of life) - Documentary (1989)
• Here Lies Love - concept album in collaboration with Norman Cook (released 2010)
• Ride, Rise, Roar - music documentary of his concert tour with Brian Eno (released 2010)^[28]
• This Must Be the Place - 2011

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Sytze Steenstra: Song and Circumstance. The Work of David Byrne from Talking Heads to the Present. New York and London: Continuum Books, 2010.
• John Howell: David Byrne. (American Originals Series) New York: Thunder's Mouth Press, 1992.
• Ian Gittin: Talking Heads - Once in a Lifetime: The Stories Behind Every Song.

External links[link]

Find more about David Byrne on Wikipedia's sister projects:
	Images and media from Commons
	Quotations from Wikiquote

Wikinews has related news: Musician David Byrne sues Florida governor over campaign song

• Official website
• David Byrne at the Internet Movie Database
• David Byrne on Charlie Rose