Quote: Our earth is degenerate in these latter days (antedating attrib Assyrian tablet 1922)

[Mark Mandel]

My only quibble is with your saying that this pseudo-quotation
   "*furnishes strong evidence* for a story that is 'too good to check'"
God forbid, you might find this post being quoted as evidence for YOUR
support for it! Better (imho) to say something like "is used in support of"
or "purports to furnish...".

m a m

On Thu, Sep 9, 2010 at 11:08 AM, Garson O'Toole
<adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>wrote:

> The reference work "Respectfully Quoted: A Dictionary of Quotations
> (1989)" contains a passage attributed to an "Assyrian stone tablet of
> about 2800 B.C.":
>
> Our earth is degenerate in these latter days; there are signs that the
> world is speedily coming to an end; bribery and corruption are common;
> children no longer obey their parents; every man wants to write a book
> and the end of the world is evidently approaching.
>
> A 1953 citation is provided together with a 1949 cite for part of the
> quotation. The companion commentary states "Both of the above
> quotations would seem to be spurious."
>
> http://www.bartleby.com/73/456.html
>
> Were there any cultures in 2800 B.C. with a literacy rate high enough
> that a comment such as "every man wants to write a book" makes sense?
>
> The above quote is quite popular because it furnishes strong evidence
> for a story that is "too good to check" about the time invariant
> preoccupations and trepidations of mankind. Here is an example in 2008
> in The Sunday Times UK:
>
> Predictions of the world’s end are nothing new though. We’ve picked
> out 30 of the most memorable apocalypses that never, for one reason or
> another, quite happened.
>
> 1: 2,800BC: The oldest surviving prediction of the world’s imminent
> demise was found inscribed upon an Assyrian clay tablet which stated:
> "Our earth is degenerate in these latter days. There are signs that
> the world is speedily coming to an end. Bribery and corruption are
> common." Wherever more than two people over 30 are gathered together,
> expect to hear remarkably similar sentiments.
>
> http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/faith/article4717864.ece
>
> Google Books archive has many instances of this quote and several are
> in publications that are incorrectly dated. Misleading information
> suggests dates of 1914, 1916, and 1917. But the earliest cite I have
> found so far is in 1922:
>
> Cite: 1922, Report of the State Librarian to The Governor, State of
> Connecticut: Public Document No. 13, "Librarian's Report, 1920-22",
> Page 93, "Report Submitted November 18, 1922 by State Librarian George
> S. Godard", Published by the State of Connecticut, Hartford,
> Connecticut. (Google Books full view)
>
>     HUMAN NATURE THE SAME
>
> A tablet (Assyrian) 2800 B.C. says:
>  "Our earth is degenerate in these latter days; there are signs that
> the world is speedily coming to an end; bribery and corruption are
> common; children no longer obey their parents; every man wants to
> write a book, and the end of the world is evidently approaching."
>  Tablet preserved in Constantinople.
>
> http://books.google.com/books?id=9bQYAQAAIAAJ&q=degenerate#v=snippet&
>
> Another instance of the quotation appears in 1923.
>
> Cite: 1923, Nineteenth Century Evolution and After by Marshall Dawson,
> Page 76, Macmillan Company, New York. (HathiTrust)
>
> The reading of what these ancient records had to say on this point
> provoked only humor, a decade ago. The expressions used are, indeed,
> quaint. An Assyrian tablet, dating from 2800 B. C., preserved in
> Constantinople, says:
>
> [The target quotation is repeated here.]
>
> http://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015001674079
>
> In 1926 the California State Board of Education uses the quote. Note,
> the Google Books archive contains a document with an incorrect 1914
> date. President Lyndon Baines Johnson used the passage in a speech in
> 1967.
>
> I would appreciate any help in tracking this quote. Thanks.
>
> Garson
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
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>

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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org