Adam's Rib and other anomalous elements in the Hebrew Creation Myth a new view by.with wood engravings by James Metcalf. Signed By Both Robert Graves and James Metcalf

Limited Signed Edition (Signed by both Robert Graves and James Metcalf on limitation page). Number 142 of 250 copies. 36 wood engravings and 36 line drawings by James Metcalf. (viii) + 74pp. Dust jacket complete. Red cloth with bright gilt titling on spine. No ownership marks. Very clean and tight. It is now generally recognised that the story told in the first four chapters of Genesis is only one of a group of Middle Eastern Creation legends, from which it differs in many particulars. But attention has hitherto been drawn' rather to the likenesses between Genesis and its Sumerian, Phoenician, Babylonian, Egyptian and Hittite counterparts, than to the differences. Robert Graves is the first to show that Genesis, a document of unexpectedly late composition, contains Western as well as Eastern elements; and further that such unmythical anomalies as the creation of trees and pasture before the heavenly bodies, and the formation of Eve, the `Mother of Mankind', from the rib of a man, are best explained as anecdotes based on a misreading of certain Canaanite icons, captured by the Hebrews when they overran Hebron. Mr. Graves suggests that these icons were intended to be read boustrophedon (`as an ox ploughs') and not always from the same direction, as the author of Genesis has assumed; and that they tell an altogether different story of a more primitive Creation myth current in Canaan. The argument is illustrated by a reconstruction of these icons, thirty-six in number, which have been engraved on wood in sub-Mycenean style by James Metcalf. These are shown twice, in different orders, to illustrate both the conventional Genesis story and the hypothetical version. Size: 4to.…