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130 Gulf" in the south to the Mediterranean Sea in the northwest and bor- dering the great Land-Between-the-Rivers, which was as yet not habit- able. Those were the lands one could call the Spaceport Lands: Mes- opotamia, where the pre-Diluvial spaceport had been; the Cedar Mountain, where the Landing Place remained functioning; the Land of Shalem, where the post-Diluvial Mission Control Center was to be established; and the adjoining Sinai peninsula, site of the future spaceport. The name of the forefather of all these nations, Shem— meaning "Sky Chamber"—was thus quite appropriate. The broad division of mankind into three branches, as related in the Bible, followed not only the geography and topography of the areas to which man had spread, it also followed the division of the Earth between the descendants of Enlil and the descendants of Enki. Shem and Japhet are depicted in the Bible as good brothers, whereas the attitude toward the line of Ham—and especially Ca- naan—is one of bitter memories. In this there lie tales yet to be told—tales of gods and men. and their wars. . . . The tradition of the division of the ancient settled world into three branches is also in accord with what we know of the rise of civilizations. Scholars have recognized an abrupt change in human culture about 11,000 B.C—the time of the Deluge, according to our findings—and have named that era of domestication Mesolithic (Middle Stone Age). Circa 7400 B.C.—exactly 3,600 years later—another abrupt advance- ment has been recognized. Scholars have named it Neolithic ("New Stone Age"); but its principal feature was the switch from stone to clay and the appearance of pottery. And then, "suddenly and inex- plicably"—but exactly 3,600 years later—there blossomed out (circa 3800 B.C.) in the plain between the Euphrates and Tigris rivers the high civilization of Sumer. It was followed, circa 3100 B.C., by the civilization of the Nile River; and circa 2800 B.c., the third civiliza- tion of antiquity, that of the Indus River, made its appearance. These were the three regions allotted to mankind; of them evolved the na- tions of the Near East, Africa, and Indo-Europe—a division faith- fully recorded in the Old Testament's Table of Nations. All that, Sumerian chronicles held, was the result of deliberate decisions by the Anunnaki: sat exchanging their counsels regarding the Earth. The four regions they created. THE WARS OF GODS AND MEN The Anunnaki who decree the fates