Good find, Mark. However, your link needs fixing. From the article:
"He said that craters recently found in Argentina date from around
the same period - suggesting that the Earth may have been hit by a
shower of large meteors at about the same time."
This is what I longed believed but never delved into. My undeveloped
theory was that a large meteor hit somewhere in the Arabian Sea or
Persian Gulf, with a shower hitting a large area of the earth.
However, I thought this would have been about 1800 BC, which
coincided with the decline or collapse of the EBA in Europe, the Near
East, the Harappan culture in India, Shang dynasty China, and so on.
I believe that the World Serpent myths originated in this cataclysmic
event, as well as myths associated with some Near Eastern goddesses
such as Cybele/Kubaba/Kubebe/Sun Goddess of Arinna in Anatolia, and
Pallas Athena in Greece.
I've been wanting to post this last theory, but I'll go ahead and say
right now I believe Pallas Athena's name should translate as "Fire
Ball" and is derived from this cosmic event. Her birth from Zeus's
head seems clearly to relate to this object. Athena's character is
very similar to that of the Irish Brigid. Also known as Breo Saghaid,
her name translates as "Flaming Arrow," a name whose meaning seems
synonymous with that of Pallas Athena.
I also wondered if the Kaba'a stone in Mecca is part of this meteor
shower, as was the Anatolian 'Great Goddess' at Pessinus, as I
recall. Is it just coincidence that the Kaba'a has a name similar to
that of Cybele/Kubaba/Kubebe? The concept of the 'Dome of Heaven'
being made of rock was also derived from meteorites.
--- In cybalist@..., markodegard@... wrote:
> We seem to have another 'smoking gun' of an ancient catastrophe.
This
> one is an apparently meteoric impact from ca. 2300 BCE, one that is
> spectacularly located: near the confluence of the Tigris and
> Euphrates.
>
> http://portal.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?
xml=/news/2001/11/04/wme
> t04.xml&sSheet=/news/2001/11/04/ixhomef.html