Obviously, I can’t reveal everything we’re working on for Emissary, but I did a concept painting today related to the epic of Gilgamesh. The main character, Campbell Essex (played by Phil Morris), is a forensic archaeologist working on such things as first language and ancient proto-cultures.

In a purely archaeological context first language is the hypothesized root language of Greek, French, Hindi, Persian, and others. This theory of monogenesis, supported by academics like Merritt Ruhlen (see On the Origin of Languages: Studies in Linguistic Taxonomy. Stanford, California: Stanford University Press), is currently being explored through several different branches of historical study. However, in a biblical context, the first language was the language of man before the events of Genesis 10 – 11 (the tower of babel).

“Now the whole earth had one language and few words. And as men migrated from the east, they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. And they said to one another, ‘Come, let us make bricks, and burn them thoroughly.’ And they had brick for stone, and bitumen for mortar. Then they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city, and a tower with its top in the heavens, and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered abroad upon the face of the whole earth.’ And the LORD came down to see the city and the tower, which the sons of men had built. And the LORD said, ‘Behold, they are one people, and they have all one language; and this is only the beginning of what they will do; and nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible for them. Come, let us go down, and there confuse their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech.’ So the LORD scattered them abroad from there over the face of all the earth, and they left off building the city.’ Therefore its name was called Babel, because there the LORD confused the language of all the earth; and from there the LORD scattered them abroad over the face of all the earth.” (Genesis 11:1-9)

In circles where these events are taken at face value there is a notion that it was this language which gave man power over the earth. Some believe that Noah, having known the true names of the animals of the earth as having had them named by god himself, was able to control the animals and draw them to the ark.

Phil reminded me that this concept is similar to the way Garth Ennis used the “voice of god” power in his graphic novel series Preacher. In the series the protagonist can force a man to do his bidding by knowing his name.

We think it’s an interesting idea for Campbell to be deeply involved in the idea of a first language and the culture associated with it.