Where was the Tower of Babel II

The Tower of Babel, the cradle of civilization, was in Turkey

Linguistic Evidence

Proto Indo European (PIE) is considered to be the ancestor of most modern languages. While previous theories have suggested that Proto-Indo European was spoken somewhere between the Black and Caspian sea to Eastern Turkey, or alternatively in the Russian Steppes, a recent computer model has determined a more definite location of where the proto-Indo European language originated, as well as the timing and then spread of modern languages.

(Boukeart et al, Science 2012).

According to the Bible, this split began at the Tower of Babel, the namesake of Babylon. Genesis 11 1-3: Now the whole world had one language and a common speech. As people moved eastward, they found a plain in Shinar and settled there. They said to each other, “Come, let’s make bricks and bake them thoroughly.” They used brick instead of stone, and tar for mortar. Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

Dr Jud Burton believes the traditional present day Eridu is not the location of the original Tower of Babel, pointing out that Upper Mesopotamian Turkey lines up better with the historical Proto-Indo-European language shift, the mother lounge of most European and Asian languages. Proto-Indo-European split into major language groups, and later thousands of languages, thus better fitting the Genesis 11 narrative than the language split occurring in the current Babylon location.” (Blurry Creatures 223).

Archaeological Evidence

Ken Griffith and Darrell K White follow archaeological, biological, and historical evidence that all point to Upper Mesopotamia as the origin of human civilization, as well as the most likely location of Babel. They note that conqueror Sargon claimed to have moved Babylon from Subartu to Akkad, enforcing the possibility that the original Babylon was farther north.

“There are four ancient tels along the Tigris River, two of which appear to have retained some form of the original names until at least Neo-Assyrian times, and one of them until today. The preservation of one name alone would not be a very strong case. The preservation of three names, Shinar, Erech, and Calnah makes a much stronger case that this is the correct location. Figure 8 shows our candidate sites for the first kingdom of Nimrod in Çınar.”