BEROSSUS. – Priest of Bel (Marduk) at the Babylonian temple of É-sag-ila, born c. 340, died at Cos, where, already an old man, he went (according to Vitruvius, *De architectura*, IX, 7-8; cf. Pliny, *Hist. nat.*, VII, 37; Plutarch, *De plac. phil.*, II, 29) to teach astrology (c. 260 BC). The Greek form βησσοσς (better than βησσοσς) seems to correspond to the Akkadian name Bel-υσυ-σιυ (Bel, protect him). He wrote in Greek a lengthy history of Babylon (*Babyloniaca*) in three books, which he dedicated in 275 to King Antiochus I (v.) Soter (280–261), the munificent restorer of the É-sag-ila.
The first book expounded cosmogony, with allegorical explanations and references to natural science, especially astronomy. The second and third books dealt with the ten kings “before the great flood,” for a period of 120 sars or 432,000 years, the flood itself, and the kings (about 200) who succeeded one another up to Alexander the Great over a span of 10 sars or 36,000 years. B. drew on cuneiform sources, some of whose contents differ from those of the texts known today, adding other mythical elements. The work, written in poor Greek, did not arouse much interest among the scholars and literati of the time; but it was widely used by Hellenistic Jews, who drew from it testimony to demonstrate to pagans the historicity of biblical narratives concerning creation, the patriarchs, and the flood. Fragments of it survive in the works of Flavius Josephus, Eusebius, and George Syncellus, who cite it second- or third-hand from Posidonius, Alexander Polyhistor, Apollodorus, Abydenus, and Juba, King of Mauretania. Following the example of the Judeo-Alexandrian writers, Josephus cites B. to confirm the authority of the Bible on the flood in *Contra Apionem*, I, 19 and in *Antiquitates Judaicae*, I, 3, 6, on Abraham (*Ant. Jud.*, I, 3, 9 and 7, 2), and on the last kings of Babylon (*ibid.*, X, 1, 4; 2, 2; 11, 1; *Contra Apionem*, I, 20). The interesting account by B. of the flood, whose hero is Xisuthros (Σισυθροσ), βησσοσς = Zi-ud-συ-σιυ (better than ζυ-συ-σιυ) (and better ζυ-συ-σιυ = Ubaratutu), is preserved by Eusebius, *Chronicon*, I (ed. A. Schöne, Berlin 1875, cols. 11–24; cf. ed. J. Karst, Leipzig 1911, pp. 10–12), who took it from Alexander Polyhistor. B. was called the father of the Babylonian Sibyl (Pausanias, X, 22, 5; *Cohortatio ad Graecos*, 30; Suda, *Lexicon*, s.v.), perhaps because of some similarities with the oracles of the Sibyl. B. is also mentioned by Tertullian, *Apologeticum*, 19; St. Jerome, *In Danielem*, 5, 1; Cassiodorus.