Chapter 31Strive to discover the mystery before life is taken from you.
If while living you fail to find yourself, to know yourself,
How will you be able to understand
The secret of your existence when you die?
—Farīd ud-Dīn Attar, twelfth-century Persian Muslim poet
9540 BCE
Site of modern-day Göbekli Tepe
It has been thirty-five sun cycles that they have known peace at last. The daughters of Nanshe have fulfilled her vision—bountiful food and years of safety lead to the desire to search for higher sense of meaning. The villages in the plains below have blossomed, as have the numerous farms. Hundreds upon hundreds of people now live within a day’s walk of the monuments, which serve not only as the storyboard for all time, warning future generations of the dangers of the giants, but
