"... Gilgamesh tablet XII, as attested by the Sumerian fragments, consists of material which dates from about the end of the third millennium or the beginning of the second millennium B.C. and which therefore existed in literary form already at the time of the commonly accepted date of the composition of the epic. Nevertheless, this tablet is without question a later supplement to the adventures of Gilgamesh. For it will be noted that the concluding passage of Tablet XI returns to the beginning of the epic and closes with almost the same words with which the poem ends, indicating that the wreath of myths and legends is complete. An instructive parallel to this is found in Psalm 8, which closes with exactly the same words with which it opens - "O Lord, our Lord, how glorious is Thy name in all the earth." Others are contained in the sections on the new, postdiluvian world order and the sign of the covenant in Genesis 9:1-7 and 12-17, which close in much the same way in which they begin. It will "be recalled that also some of our church hymns, ending with the same stanza with which they begin, exhibit this feature ..."